Old gas stations

[LizzieMaine]

And if you focus in reeeeeeal close, you'll find the dinosaur on the oil cans.

"Mellowed 60 Million Years!"

"Mellowed 100 Million Years!"

You see, motor oil is really a lot like fine wines and liquors. The finer vintages require time to ripen and mellow, to produce that rich full-bodied flavor that only time can bring. Or something.

 

[2jakes]

Dino the dinosaur became the mascot for Sinclair Oils in 1932 when he was registered as a corporate trademark. He was extremely popular, and as Dino’s popularity grew, so did the number of places he was seen. He appeared on the Sinclair gas station globes and signs, and even the name of the gasoline was called Dino or Dino Supreme. Soon after, Dino started to appear on oilcans and maps, along with print advertisements.

The largest promotional event for Sinclair was in 1964. The company sailed nine inflatable dinosaurs down the Hudson River to the New York World’s Fair. Sinclair had 10 million visitors walk through the pavilion to see the exhibit. A wax model of Dino that popped out of a machine was given as a souvenir.

 

[2jakes]

I haven’t found “Dino” atop Sinclair gas stations from the '30s.
Perhaps LizzieMaine can provide us with information or when
they began using the mascot on top of the stations.

Btw:
LizzieMaine...I know if you were my inspection officer in the military...
I would’ve flunked inspection for sure.

You have a keen eye for details!
Amazing.

 

[LizzieMaine]

Dinosaurs were mostly in advertising and on product labels until the late 1950s, when the company realized how popular they were with kids. The trapezoidal station sign with the dinosaur first appeared in 1959.

The usual Sinclair dinosaur was what used to be called a brontosaurus, but print ads for the company in the 1930s and early 1940s featured a whole range of dinosaurs, often incorporating dinosaur facts before sidling into the pitch for the product. Tyrannosaurs, triceratopses, and stegosaurs were the most commonly seen dinos in these ads. I have always been miffed that the best dinosaur of all, the ankylosaurus, was rarely if ever featured.

Among other places where the dinos showed up was at the ballpark: the back cover of the Brooklyn Dodgers' scorecard from the mid-thirties to 1957 usually featured a Sinclair ad, and dinosaur motifs were common. The best was probably the 1940 season, which featured a tight closeup of a realistic, grinning tyrannosaurus -- which may have been the first good look many kids got at the King of Dinosaurs.

There's something about a creature so jovially endorsing a product distilled from the liquefied remains of his own corpse that I find just a bit unsettling. Some things do not bear close examination.

And for that matter, what do you suppose a talking tyrannosaurus doing a motor oil commercial would sound like? This ad works even better if you imagine him doing his lines in the voice of Lionel Stander.

 

[2jakes]

ANKYLOSAURUS
Kinda reminds me of the horny-toad lizards that were so prevalent when I
was a kid living with my grandma. There was an arroyo nearby.

 

[2jakes]

This gas station that Ghostsoldier posted:
I enlarged a bit to see the details... “Flying A wings”.

The combination of camera/lens/film from that time period, lighting
and “art-deco” style decoration, give this photo a surreal look similar
to a “Busby Berkeley” musical number.

I found this:
"Associated Gas Station, 1940s circa 1949
Henry Pease's Associated service station decorated for Christmas on corner of Junipero Serra Boulevard and Ocean Avenue, San Francisco.1940s.”

I went to google search/map to see what’s there now,
I’ll just stay with this image.

 

[Fading Fast]

View attachment 97157 ....

That ⇧ is fantastic.

This gas station that Ghostsoldier posted:
I enlarged a bit to see the details... “Flying A wings”.

The combination of camera/lens/film from that time period, lighting
and “art-deco” style decoration, give this photo a surreal look similar
to a “Busby Berkeley” musical number.
View attachment 97161
I found this:
"Associated Gas Station, 1940s circa 1949
Henry Pease's Associated service station decorated for Christmas on corner of Junipero Serra Boulevard and Ocean Avenue, San Francisco.1940s.”

I went to google search/map to see what’s there now,
I’ll just stay with this image.

You and I think alike - see my post a page back where I commented that, that station looks like its the set of a '30s MGM musical.

 

[Ghostsoldier]

Rob

 

[LizzieMaine]

Impressive Hell station there. I always figured the arch-demons drove Corvettes.

 

[Frunobulax]

Re Sinclair and Dino. I distinctly remember a commercial as a kid where, when ARCO merged with Sinclair, they retired Dino. It was an animated spot, and they gave Dino his walking papers and he walked toward the rear of the frame, disappearing. So, when I got older and travelled a bit more, I was surprised to go out west and find Sinclair stations, as I thought they were gone from everywhere.

Couldn't find the spot on Youtube, though.

 

[LizzieMaine]

Yep, what happened was that Atlantic-Richfield bought out Sinclair in the late sixties with the idea of absorbing it for its midwestern operations, since Arco only operated on the coasts. They were required to sell off all of Sinclair's East Coast operations as part of the deal, which they did -- resulting in all Eastern Sinclair stations converting to the BP brand in the early 70s. They then tried to eliminate the Sinclair brand entirely, turning all the Sinclair operations in the midwest and mountain states to Arco, but never quite managed to complete the job before the energy crisis hit. They decided then that they didn't need Sinclair, and sold it off to a new investor group. That company, which has no connection to Harry F. Sinclair's original Consolidated Oil Company or the Sinclair Oil Company of the 1930s thru the 1960s, is the Sinclair that exists today, still pretty much confined to the midwest/mountain states area.

Sinclair was once one of the major players in the East, right up with Texaco, Esso, Socony, Tydol, and Gulf in terms of the number of stations, and it was weird to see it disappear almost overnight. Suddenly there were BP signs everywhere, and then just as suddenly they disappeared again into another merger deal.

 

[Frunobulax]

Yep, what happened was that Atlantic-Richfield bought out Sinclair in the late sixties with the idea of absorbing it for its midwestern operations, since Arco only operated on the coasts. They were required to sell off all of Sinclair's East Coast operations as part of the deal, which they did -- resulting in all Eastern Sinclair stations converting to the BP brand in the early 70s. They then tried to eliminate the Sinclair brand entirely, turning all the Sinclair operations in the midwest and mountain states to Arco, but never quite managed to complete the job before the energy crisis hit. They decided then that they didn't need Sinclair, and sold it off to a new investor group. That company, which has no connection to Harry F. Sinclair's original Consolidated Oil Company or the Sinclair Oil Company of the 1930s thru the 1960s, is the Sinclair that exists today, still pretty much confined to the midwest/mountain states area.

Sinclair was once one of the major players in the East, right up with Texaco, Esso, Socony, Tydol, and Gulf in terms of the number of stations, and it was weird to see it disappear almost overnight. Suddenly there were BP signs everywhere, and then just as suddenly they disappeared again into another merger deal.

Thanks for the explanation. When I was younger, BP was the mysterious brand that showed up in my Matchbox toy collection. I was pretty much an adult before the made inroads here, Buying out Sohio.

Our local Community College is Sinclair Community College. I actually convinced a few folks they were changing their name to ARCO Community College at one point.

On another note, does anybody in the midwest remember Att-a-Boy service stations? We had a few around here, but I'll be darned if I can find an historical picture of one.

 

[2jakes]

~ Dorothea Lange ~

My all time favorite photographer.

Dust Bowl

 

[Fading Fast]

View attachment 97216
...

Any post ⇧ with classic Vettes like that will always get a like (if I could auto-set it, I would).

Dust Bowl
View attachment 97276 ...

Not sure I can explain it, but this is a fantastic pic.

 

[3fingers]

^^^ Agreed.

 

[2jakes]

View attachment 97292

Not sure I can explain it, but this is a fantastic pic.

Timing!
Once the dust hits the lens...
forget it.
When I have to video a severe rain storm
for the news, I go to the under pass
of the freeway and shoot into the streets.
Other times, I have my reporter drive the news truck while I shoot from the passenger side.
I trust her, she knows what to do
should the vehicle start to hydroplane!

 

[2jakes]

Dorothea Lange

 

[2jakes]

 

[2jakes]

Packard Clipper, 1950

 

[2jakes]

First thought that came to me when I saw this photo was of my mom.
She’d wrap a scarf around her hair and got down to business. I miss her so much.