Good reflexes have saved me from injury many times in my career (and before my professional life, I had a near-calamitous encounter with a bus in London). Yesterday I managed to not sideswipe any nearby vehicles as my neck swiveled sharply to catch sight of what looked liked a historic Pure Oil filling station. Once I managed to find a street that would take me back over the railroad tracks, I happily confirmed that my peripheral vision was correct! I can add another Pure Oil Filling Station to my collection, this one at the corner of 8th Street and 8th Avenue in Huntington, West Virginia.
The former Pure Oil Station at 8th Avenue and 8th Street in Huntington, West Virginia.
Pure Oil Company, founded in 1914, was well known for its “English Cottage” gas stations. John A. Jackle and Keith A. Sculle, in their book The Gas Station in America, discuss the origin of this romantic cottage idea and its architect, Carl A. Petersen. Jackle and Sculle (and other sources) trace the Pure Oil English cottage prototypes to two gas stations built in the Indianapolis, Indiana area in 1927.
This former filling station has an L-shaped footprint, which is differs from the typical Pure Oil stations I’ve seen, including the Pure Oil Station in downtown Paris, Kentucky.
Section of the 1931 Sanborn Fire Insurance Map of Huntington, West Virginia, showing the site with a frame, corner-oriented filling station. Sheet 23, volume 1.
There was a frame filling station, oriented to the corner, on this lot in 1931. According to its website, Neighborgall Construction Company, founded in 1926, constructed “dozens of Pure Oil service stations throughout West Virginia and Ohio.”
This was possibly the original interior plan of the Pure Oil Station. Image from Jakle and Sculle.*
Around 2006, the former Pure Oil Station underwent an adaptive reuse by a local law firm (still the occupants of the building). The interior of the building had, at that time, the original terra cotta tiles and tin ceilings.
Detail of the office – the sun was in the wrong place in the sky at the time!
The garage doors were replaced, but otherwise the brick building is instantly recognizable as a Pure Oil station. It’s a preservation success story that brightened my day!
*John A. Jakle and Keith A. Sculle. The Gas Station in America. (Baltimore and London: The John Hopkins University Press, 1994), 139.
There was a Pure Gas Station a few miles from me, but it closed about 10 years ago. The family that owned it was getting old and needed to retire but had no buyers. I used to fill up there. Florida.
There is still a “cottage” near me in Montgomery, Ohio. Saved from demolition in 1958.
That’s great news!