Thursday is "This Old House" Day

Today's "old house" is actually a colonial revival style gas station that was built in 1931, for $1000 and located on Sea Street in the Adams Shore neighborhood.  Originally, the roof had a light in the shape of a ship with sails perched upon it.

Out Of Gas

This Cape Cod revival style brick building is all that remains of Parkway Gas & Filling Station on Furnace Brook Parkway. Built for $1000 in 1929, the grocery store and filling station was a convenience in earlier days and filled a need for the many new automobile owners at that time.

I met one of the "demo" folks who told me that the remaining building is going to be repurposed as a dance studio. The pile of granite blocks from the demolished garage will make a handsome stone wall around the property.

Fill 'er Up

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This Gulf station is showing a price of $2.61 per gallon and no one lined up at the pump. The price for fuel seems to be creeping up again.

Worker Series

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Meet Bryan Egan, who along with his brother Greg, owns and operates Egan's Sunoco on Adams Street. Bryan and Greg took over the family business when their father retired in 1982. They are a full service gas station, state inspection station and will fix and maintain your car. They have employed many young people over the years including their own children.

Bryan noted that there used to be 9 gas stations located along Adams Street between Lakin Square and Furnace Brook Parkway; now there are 3. One of the reasons Egan's Service Station survives is because of the friendly, honest, top quality service they render to customers like me who keeps a car for many years beyond its warranty. One of my family cars is 13 years old . . . what year car do you drive?

Gas Prices

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Here's hoping that the gasoline prices stay below $2.00 a gallon in 2009. Do you have self-serve or does an attendant pump your gas like they do at this station?

Lighthouse Station

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Perhaps this should be called "Beacon Gas" because it is a gas station that has been a fixture on the Southern Artery for many decades. If you enlarge the image you will see the air hose attached to the wall of the lighthouse. The pumps and the cash booth are now located a short distance away.

Do you have any interesting gas station structures where you live?

Fill 'er up, please

Click and enlarge this beautiful vintage gas pump at A. C. Smith & Co. and you'll see that the last sale was for $4.40! I wonder how long ago that was? It's fun to see the old mobilgas logo here. Do you have a favorite old gas sign? If you haven't had your fill (pardon the pun), come back tomorrow for a visual treat I found inside this gas station.

Car art

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Here is one of the artistic details on the front facade of the "functional" style commercial gas station located at 117 Beale Street, Wollaston. What you are looking at is an inset rondel with a raised design of a 1926 car . . . I bet there was lots of leg room, not to mention head room, in those 1926 "buggies".

A. C. Smith & Co

[click image to enlarge] Adjacent to the Wollaston Fire Station is this handsome brick gas station built in 1926 for $16,000. The architects, Batty & Gallagher, designed what would become a ubiquitous cultural landmark . . . the gas station . . . who knew then? I like the pineapple finials at the corners and tomorrow we'll take a closer look at some of the other exterior features. This is one of the few remaining period gas stations in Quincy. Do you have any interesting ones in your neighborhood?