Geezers know a lot

In my short and modest career as a newspaper columnist, I’ve learned a few things. Importantly, I have learned that geezers know a whole bunch of important things. They may not know much about the Theory of Relativity or the artwork in the Sistine Chapel, but they know a whole lot about things that really count. Like how many gas stations Worland had back in the ‘50s. The profound knowledge of geezers is something I’ve suspected more and more as I proceed through my 70s, and recent experience has confirmed it.

After my column about Worland’s early grocery stores, a reader stopped me in a restaurant and noted that it wasn’t just grocery stores that had changed a lot in Worland, but also service stations, and he suggested that I do a column about the early service stations. I thought this sounded like a great idea.

Today, I count four (maybe only three) convenience stores with gas pumps, which are self-service arrangements, and one station that provides the traditional services rendered by businesses selling gasoline. I take no position as to which arrangement is preferable, but I know there was a distinct difference. When I drove my 1955 Pontiac into a station anywhere in the country, attendants would come to my window, and ask what I needed. They would always check the oil, the air in my tires if I asked, and, again, if I asked, the contents of my radiator, and such things as wiper blades. Of course, sometimes your car had more serious problems and to address those, and repair the problems, the station attendants would lift the car on a hoist, check what needed to be checked, and do what needed to be done. The great majority of the early service stations I mention in this column were these old-fashioned kind.

In general, I have a good long-term memory, but after listing all the gas stations I remembered from the ‘50s, I had the unsettling feeling that I’d left a bunch out. So, it was time to consult some experts. I talked to my friend Lloyd Nielson, and he agreed to help me out with this quest, starting with inquiries down at Maggie’s Café. A couple of days later he called and essentially said I had to go to Maggie’s myself and talk to the gathered throng there, but that when it came to old gas stations, they constituted a blue-ribbon panel.

Well, I decided that if this is what journalism requires, I would have to bite the bullet. So, the next morning I awoke at 5 a. m., sleepily bumped around the house and, still groggy, lurched out about 20 minutes later.

When I arrived at Maggie’s (my house is only two blocks away and it was relatively warm that morning: “minus 2,” said the Pinnacle Bank), I found a number of wide awake but older men – “geezers,” to use the technical term. I soon determined that Lloyd was right, they knew lots and lots about old gas stations. In fact, I learned about twice as many stations as in the list of stations I’d compiled. For something like 45 minutes I talked to Karl Hergert, Dan Cook, Ernie Geis, Vince Cervantes and Lonnie Ruder. Later I talked with Harold Aagard, Bob Fritzler, and Gerry Geis. This exercise is more complicated than you might think, because some operators worked at different stations, the same stations had different operators, and the brand of the stations changed (like Exxon, Texaco and Sinclair).

While they talked I took notes and learned of some 16 stations on the main street through Worland and eight stations on Tenth Street. By the first route, when coming in from Thermopolis, a driver would cross the bridge (the old bridge, not the new one installed in the early 1980s), proceeding down Culbertson. Then, the same driver would loop around to the north, following Fifth Street on to Big Horn Avenue, turn right and proceed east. The last station in this stretch was two blocks east of 15th Street and Big Horn Avenue. The other route proceeded north from 10th Street and Big Horn all the way through Worland to a point around Lloyd’s Drive-In.

I see, however, that I’m getting perilously close to my word limit on this column, so I have to sign off for now. In the next column I’ll list and discuss all the Worland gas stations of yore.

John Davis was raised in Worland, graduating from W. H. S. in 1961. John began practicing law here in 1973 and is mostly retired. He is the author of several books.