Bob Collins
Honk, if you remember full-serve gas stations. It wasn’t that long ago that you could drive up to a pump, hear the ding-ding as your tires passed over the hose that announced your arrival to a guy working on someone’s car in the garage, tell the attendant to “fill it up with high-test,” and then get a set of steak knives for your trouble.
The last vestige of that era disappeared in the Minnesota city of Hendricks on Sunday night when, according to the Marshall Independent, the Hendricks Gas Stop burned to the ground.
Milton Johnson was the man at the pump for at least 50 years. He started as an employee before he left for the military in 1944. He became part-owner in 1946 and bought out his partner Peder Moen in 1956. Johnson sold the station to a local man in 1997.
When Johnson joined the station there was only one building with a front awning over the front door area. “At that time, we had a hoist sitting outside,” Johnson said.
He and employees used the outdoor hoist and an outdoor ramp to change oil and do other work.
(Photo from Marshall Independent newspaper)
