By: Ronald Brantley
Who can forget the service stations of yesteryear? They were what they said they were, service stations. Almost all of the owners were born and raised right here in our hometown. The mill paid off on Thursday night and Friday so mill hands went around and paid their bills, this included the service stations. They ran a tab until you got paid. Service stations not only sold gas and oil but other things that you might need. Most batteries had post on top of the battery. If the battery cable got damaged you would need a battery cable end that went on the post. Nowadays, batteries have side posts, I for one don’t like them. A person could buy those terminal ends at any service station but you don’t see them in service stations anymore. Another thing that you won’t see is radiator stop leak. It used to come in a little tube of powder like material that was poured into the radiator to stop leaks instead of buying a radiator. Another thing that isn’t seen that much anymore is a pay phone. These phones were installed for the convenience of the customer. Most of the stores had a light outside and over the phone. Twenty-four hours a day you could drive by and chances were there would be someone using the pay phone. They slowly disappeared as people started buying the bag phones at first then the phones with pull-out antennas then small cell phones that you didn’t have to pay roaming fees on. Remember those roaming fees? Now, I don’t know where there is a single pay phone. Most service stations didn’t sell tires but a lot of them fixed flats. I don’t know why but it seemed like cars had more flats than they do now. Another thing we don’t see in service stations are those steering wheel knobs. You could go into any service station and there would be at least fifty knobs to pick from with pictures of bathing beauties to bird dogs on them. Cars have power steering now so the sale of knobs stopped. We don’t even ask for a quart of oil anymore. I’ll look around the next time I get gas and see if they still sell oil. I know they don’t put it in for you or add water, clean your windshield. You can check your own tires by inserting two quarters in the air machine and check the tires if you hurry. If the time on the machine runs out it takes two more quarters to get it started again. And water, I don’t know how they handle water, I never have asked. I can even remember when they sold imitation white sidewalls. People would buy black-wall tires then put those imitation white sidewalls on. Especially if you rode recap tires but recaps are another story all together. I won’t get into the twenty-nine cents per gallon gas. I will always remember when people would pull up to the gas pumps, ask for five dollars’ worth of gas and say make that half regular and half high test gas. There are so many things I still remember that we don’t see anymore. The steering wheel covers, seat covers from Western Auto, extra tires on the outside instead of a donut hidden underneath the car. All these things are gone but the memories are still sweet. A man told me he had a full service gas station here at home but I haven’t been by to check it out yet. I want me one of those steering wheel knobs.
Brantley is a lifetime Tallassee resident and regular columnist for The Tribune. He can be reached at Rbrantley1@elmore.rr.com