I feel confident in asserting that there are not many readers of this post who would drive by the scene depicted above without taking a second look. Unless one were dashing to another appointment, or otherwise beset by the bothers of daily life, there can be no reason not to at least slow and take a little peek.
Let’s do that. As usual, I promise that there’s more here than meets the eye.
Last Spring, I was definitely not beset by the bothers of day to day life as I was on something that I am told is called “vacation”. My understanding about how this vacation thing is supposed to work is that you get to drive largely aimlessly for days on end and do pretty much nothing besides stop at places like the one in our lede photo. I should note that this definition of “vacation” is one that I’ve had for most of the past 40 years or so. And aside from when I had small children in the back seat (i.e., “the bothers of daily life”), it’s generally worked.
There will never again be small children in my back seat, so theoretically I ought to get to do vacation with increasing frequency. We’ll see about that. But at least for now it seems prudent for me to seize the moment. And so it happens that last Spring I had the entirely guiltless chance to put in 1400 miles over the course of a week touring New Mexico.
There is literally nowhere one can look in New Mexico and not catch a glimpse of some fabulous scenery. Either you’re standing right in the middle of it, or it’s just hanging out there a little way in the distance.
NM plates have carried the “Land of Enchantment” phrase for decades. The 2017-launched “Chile Capital of the World” plate won the America’s Best License Plate award from the Automobile License Plate Collectors Association (who knew??). I concur.
Those New Mexico license plates don’t say “Land of Enchantment” for nothing. There is hardly a place in New Mexico that doesn’t make you want to pull over, stop, and take pictures. The whole place is just so cinematic.
Whether it’s driving 200 miles out of one’s way (whatever that means when kind of the whole point of the trip is to drive around aimlessly) to see the National Radio Astronomy Observatory’s Very Large Array where the movie Contact was filmed…
…or encountering a real life Forrest Gump-style runner (“For no particular reason, I just kept on going.“), New Mexico has lots to offer, and I could go on. But what I couldn’t do while driving through Embudo, NM was to go on past the somewhat acclaimed roadside attraction known as “Classical Gas”.
No, not that Classical Gas – not the three-time Grammy award winning hit by Mason Williams that I vividly recall blanketing the AM radio airwaves during the summer of 1968. That Classical Gas was arranged by Mike Post of The Rockford Files, L.A. Law, Law and Order, Magnum, P.I., The A Team, Hill Street Blues and other amazingly famous television themes (not to mention the absolutely iconic Yacht Rock single “Theme from The Greatest American Hero (Believe it or Not)“).
Every single one of those credit sequences (linked) are worth watching, particularly by fans of 1980 – 1990s vehicles and street scenes. Go ahead. I’ll be here when you get back.
Both Mason Williams and Mike Post are still with us, although it’s unknown (to me) whether either has ever visited Classical Gas in Embudo. Nevertheless, I’m going to guess that on the six degrees of separation thing, there are way fewer than six separating Mason Williams, Mike Post, and the Classical Gas “museum” in Embudo. Let me explain.
Classical Gas, the museum/roadside attraction/???? (it’s really hard to classify), is owned and operated by the extremely affable Johnnie Meier. I’m not going to spend much time here going into Mr. Meier’s history since one of the things about being affable in a public setting is that you tend to get a fair bit written about you, and Johnnie definitely has stuff written about him online.
I spent over an hour walking through his collection – much of which might be for sale if Johnnie is in the mood or you make the right offer – talking to Meier about subjects as diverse as old oil cans and STEM education. It turns out that he and I have crossed paths (another of those six degrees things) via work with the U.S. Department of Energy and Los Alamos National Laboratory’s science and technology education outreach. It’s easy to tell that Meier is a man of many talents and interests. Collecting gas station ephemera and equipment is kind of the tip of the iceberg for someone who is clearly quite the renaissance man.
Take that credit card charge thing. Seeing one of these used to be a daily occurrence, particularly if you drove a thirsty 1970s V8 American car as I did back in the day. Then one day, all that just stopped. No more signing something that the station attendant handed you. No more notation of your license plate number on the charge form. No more gas station attendant (unless you live in New Jersey).
Sometimes life just changes, and you forget that it’s happened until you see something like this.
Likewise those “service reminder” stickers that used to be on everyone’s driver’s side door jamb. These were pretty much universal, at least here in the U.S. I haven’t seen a recently-applied one in decades. Should you be interested in starting to use them again, Johnnie Meier probably has you covered with all of the stickers you may need for pretty much forever.
“Permanent Record”. Obviously a different permanent record than the one that talks about that time I was sent to the principal’s office in 5th grade for clobbering some kid named Bill over the head with one of those plastic and chrome chairs we had in the back of the classroom. He deserved it, and the Principal agreed; but still insisted that this would become part of my permanent record.
The gas station credit card thing, and the service reminder stickers are but examples of how Classical Gas is chock full of stuff that makes one nostalgic for the warp and weft of a day-to-day life that has largely slipped away unnoticed and now no longer exists.
Remember when “trading stamps” were everywhere and these dispensers were at gas stations and grocery store registers…ready to crank out a string of stamps that needed to be pasted into “redemption books” (a term that always seemed more religious than I was ever comfortable with)? Then one day, no more stamps.
Did anyone mark the occasion where redemption was no longer possible?
Getting back to the point about how Classical Gas and the flotsam and jetsam of commercial culture that it contains may not be far separated from someone like Mike Post or at least the television industry that he was a part of, is the fact that Classical Gas is not simply the abode of a obsessive collector of petrolina and all manner of lost and nearly forgotten commercial culture. (Pat, I’d like to buy some punctuation, please.) Yes, it’s all of that, but it is also a part of the vibrant New Mexico-based television and motion picture production industry.
Let’s say that you are someone interested in filming a television show that takes place in the time of Jim Rockford (1974), perhaps my favorite Mike Post-related effort. Where would you actually find gas pumps that looked like those from that Union 76 station that Gretchen Corbett and James Garner are standing in front of?
Well, if you are with a production company working out of New Mexico, you might call Johnnie Meier at Classical Gas, and he’d have you covered. You could outfit an entire gas station from the 1920s through at least the 1970s with materials from Classical Gas.
Hopefully, once you worked out the financial details, you’d send some Teamsters to pick the stuff up in Embudo since by his own admission, Johnnie is getting a little old to be lugging things like gas pumps and giant signs in and out of his own truck. Which is what he was doing on the day I encountered him.
Johnnie spends a lot of time dragging stuff around the Southwest. Much of that is due to the fact that right now New Mexico is one of the top 10 states in the U.S. offering substantial tax credits for film production companies. Subsequently, the state has developed significant infrastructure for film production work. Netflix has invested by building a 100 acre studio site near Albuquerque, and it’s far from the only studio setting up shop in the state. Watch carefully, and you’ll see an increasing number of films and streaming series that use New Mexico as their location or backdrop.
The lead character of Duster, set in 1972, drives a 1970 340 Duster all over NM and parts of AZ. This show by the way is a 1960s – 1970s car spotter’s dream. I intend to write a full post on this show soon.
For example, the recent (and now unfortunately canceled) HBO series Duster was largely filmed in Albuquerque. Here’s Duster’s namesake vehicle ripping through what turns out to be the corner of Central Avenue and 5th Street downtown in “1972”.
Closer to Embudo is the old mining town of Cerrillos. Maybe you recognize the Casa Grande trading post (aka, the “Cerrillos Turquoise Mining Museum and Petting Zoo)”?
For what it’s worth, I am of the belief that the words “and Petting Zoo” should be appended to the names of most historical sites in our United States. The “Lincoln Memorial and Petting Zoo” is a concept that surely can get considerable traction under the current national circumstances.
Moving inside, you notice the windows full of colored glass bottles.
Any Dark Winds fans out there? Granted, the filmmakers CGI’d out the prominent 1980s Saab parked outside the trading post (in real life on the day I was there and likely for most of the past 10 years) for when Jim Chee was supposedly in the building during the show’s early 1970s time frame.
There was no Sergeant Manuelito present on the day I visited Los Cerrillos (and Petting Zoo), although I can verify that most of those pots and cans were indeed hanging from the ceiling.
I might suggest a Dark Winds storyline in future seasons that focuses on glass telephone pole insulators. Because a) I love glass telephone pole insulators and b) both the Cerrillos Trading Post and Mr. Meier over at Classical Gas are flush with these things.
Well, there’s probably a much bigger market supplying vintage gas pump globes to collectors and production prop masters than telephone pole insulators since unfortunately no one ever seems to notice if a film has period-correct insulators.
Classical Gas also makes room for a wide variety of other artifacts that have little or no connection to gas stations. A large fiberglass Woodsy Owl figure stands guard over the museum’s backyard. Woodsy – for those readers not born in or adjacent to the 1970s – is the red-headed stepchild to the U.S. Forest Service’s much better known mascot, Smokey (the) Bear. This artifact appears to be the “old Woodsy”, which was retired by the Forest Service in 2009. Replaced with a redesigned Woodsy, the Forest Service published instructions about how the old Woodsy costumes (but presumably not large fiberglass models) needed to be destroyed by fire in the presence of a U.S.D.A. Forest Service law enforcement officer.
Of course there’s a Smokey figure at the Casa Grande Trading Post, and Petting Zoo.
Yeah, the severity of that order seems to have surprised Smokey too. Then again, the Forest Service is a big deal in New Mexico, and so presumably its mascots should take the demands of their employers very seriously. It turns out that nearly 35% of the land in New Mexico is federally-owned. Of that, 34.88% – or 9,418,000 acres – is managed by the Forest Service. What that means is that I as a U.S. tax payer hold a pretty big stake in the Land of Enchantment; and even though 3.4 million of those acres are used for classified activities such as shooting missiles and (at least in the past) detonating nuclear weapons, I’m pleased that Woodsy and Smokey are out there watching over most of the remaining 25 million acres of my enchanted land that is readily open to my periodic inspection.
During most of my March, 2025 trip Southern New Mexico was beset with severe dust storms.
Actually, I was able to kind of inspect even some of the mostly-prohibited parts devoted to shooting missiles and blowing things up. Later in the week, after spending time in Albuquerque/Santa Fe/Taos near Embudo, we made it down to the southern portion of the state and drove through White Sands. Here (above), we’re passing through the wonderfully-named “Organ, NM“. Organ is at the southern end of the White Sands Missile Range. Trinity Site, where the first atomic bomb (built in Los Alamos, NM, which I also visited) was detonated in 1945 is at the northern end of the range well over 100 miles away. Trinity Site is open to the public just twice a year, on the first Saturday in April and the third Saturday in October. I fully intend to visit some day. This seems mandatory for anyone who is a student of 20th century science and technology.
Back to Classical Gas, maybe the next time I pass through, Johnnie will have done something with the 1953 Chevrolet Sedan Delivery that is long-term parked in front of the museum.
There does seem to be some kind of sporadic effort at Classical Gas to work on the handful of vehicles on-site. This 1953 Mercury looks to be a bit further along in the “let’s see if we can get it running” process. Then again, given the favorable climate in New Mexico, there’s a good chance that the Mercury under cover may have sat somewhat indefinitely with its hood up. My impression is that Johnnie is a busy guy and there’s really only so much one man can do with the riches that comprise his collection. The Chevrolet and the Mercury seem like they may someday make it back on the road or perhaps into the background of some filmed production that is set in the mid-1950s.
Other artifacts, such as this Ford pickup’s hood will likely only wind up exhibited as the art they have turned into. This patina-rich hood looks destined for a wall in a bar or restaurant somewhere. Then again, maybe it should reside at your house. If so, you know where to find it. From the looks of things, it is highly likely to be waiting for you right where I found it on the ground at Classical Gas.
To my mind, it’s not really possible to honor all things petroleum without acknowledging where all of that comes from. Accordingly, Classical Gas has a good representation of dinosaurs. Naturally there’s one of the Sinclair Dinos that used to (and once again!) decorate the front of Sinclair Stations.
Johnnie has other dinosaur models. Because, why not? These look about ready to break free of their glass telephone pole insulator boundary (petting zoo).
I hope that in their dash to freedom they don’t knock over this excellent collection of vintage radiator and oil treatments.
Not everything at Classical Gas is directly related to gas. A large portion of the sign from a former Blake’s Lotaburger dominates one end of the property. Blake’s – “The Original Green Chile Cheeseburger” – is a New Mexico tradition (and is likely only one or two degrees of separation from gas of one type or another). Lotaburger scored numerous references on that more modern New Mexico tradition, Breaking Bad.
There’s also the sign from the former Jalopy’s Drive-In, which the Internet says used to be located in Perkins Oklahoma. I’ve never been to Perkins, although I guess I’ve been near there (it’s kind of between Oklahoma City and Tulsa). It’s hard to say when Jalopy’s closed but it doesn’t seem like it was that long ago. The various Internet sites that discuss restaurants inform me that this “location” is permanently closed and suggest that I find a “similar place”.
As if.
Like I’m going to trust the frickin’ robots to suggest something “similar” to an actual drive-in restaurant in what’s sort of the middle of nowhere in Oklahoma?
“Huh. How ’bout Chipotle? That’s close.”
I’d be much better off just building my own. Drive-in, that is. And if I were to seriously entertain that notion, I’d definitely get on the horn to Classical Gas, which in addition to gas pumps, dinosaurs, old cars, credit card holders, trading stamps and kiddie rides (yup, wrote about those already) there’s most of what I’d need to open my own Big Boy-ish Drive In.
I’m not sure which of the nearly 30 different brands of Big Boy I might choose to replicate. Sure, there are the ever-so-common Bob’s, Abdow’s, Shoney’s or even Frisch’s. But then maybe I should re-create the rather exclusive and little known outside of old-timers in Roanoke, VA, Yoda’s Big Boy.
Invented by Big Boy the double decker hamburger was. Yes, hummmmmm.
A further leg-up on the create your own drive-in is available from Classical Gas as Johnnie holds an entire Valentine Diner. I didn’t get any photos of the whole diner building as I was focusing on photographing mostly small (“small” being a very relative term at Classical Gas) items. But I did get the story about how Johnnie acquired the Valentine and trucked it to Embudo himself. As I said, he’s all about lugging stuff around. It apparently took him a number of years to convince the guy he bought it from to sell it to him, and Johnnie’s not especially eager (he says) to sell it on himself. Nevertheless, I sort of get the idea that this is Meier’s story about many of the items he holds, and for the right price the right person could have their own small diner building for starting up their own drive-in, or maybe a kitchen-focused tiny house (and petting zoo).
A classic piece of Wichita, Kansas-manufactured Americana in nearly ready to move-in shape? The idea is intriguing to say the least and may be worth pursuing the next time I’m in Embudo.
There absolutely will be a next time.
Your description reminds me a bit of the Miracle of America museum in Polson, Montana. It’s got that same ‘field/shed/building full of interesting old Americana’ thing going on except without much of a focus or specialty in anything in particular
Great writeup. Thanks
From what I can tell from writeups on the Miracle of America museum here on CC, there’s definitely a similarity. I’ve never been to the Miracle of America museum, but it’s absolutely on my roadtrip list!
Hi Jeff,
Great article!
We don’t know what we have until it is gone yet here in this Americana museum.
Gary
Thanks Gary. You’re absolutely right…which is why I’m glad it’s still possible to stumble onto places like Classical Gas. They’re everywhere and all we have to do is to take the time to stop and look.
Thanks for the entertaining writeup this morning–and all the photos. I smile that a 2025 video series set in 1972 would be like–back in 1972–watching a series set at WWI’s end. Wow!
I recently flew into Albuquerque for a short visit to the nearby area, but I’m now eager to return—–with a rental car, for sure!
It’s fascinating to me how different generations choose different time periods to mine for entertainment. Right now, the 1970s seem to be ripe. Not so entirely far away as to be considered “history”, but far enough away such that aspects are alien to the majority of viewers. Somewhere in there is a sweet spot.
Really thinking through the time elapsed (as is your point about 2025 vs. 1972 vs 1919) is fascinating to me also in terms of thinking about how characters portrayed in “1972” would be now. So, in real life, Dark WInds’ Sergeant Manuelito would be around 80 years old. Wow.
Wow, with all that you describe him having, Mr. Meier must own at least 2% of the land in New Mexico. You need some space to house that much good stuff.
This sounds like it was a very good place to visit. Writing up a recent roadtrip myself, there are an abundance of good things waiting to be seen – and shared.
Thanks for writing this up. And I suspect you will be back to visit Mr. Meier!
He packs a lot of stuff onto that property. Once one starts collecting buildings (as he’s done with the diner), all bets are off so far as keeping tabs on space management. On the other hand, space isn’t exactly at a premium in much of New Mexico.
It just so happens that I photographed a mockup of a dinosaur at a Sinclair station in Blaine, WA, a few days ago, mostly with the intention of sending the photo to a friend in England.
I absolutely love seeing the Dino mascot reappear.
Thank you for this, I doubt I’ll ever travel that far again else I’d surely put it on my list, I love places like this that hark back to my childhood .
2025 is shaping up to be my swan song .
-Nate
Well, the Southwest has a lot to offer, and New Mexico in particular seems very welcoming for the most part. That probably has a lot to do with why the more rural parts and even the smaller cities seem to be a magnet for retired folks.
Fun, yet disturbing fact: New Mexico’s license plates say “New Mexico USA” because some significant number of law enforcement officers were confusing cars with NM plates with plates from the nation of Mexico.
Good point. How many other states plates have USA on them? I we had any real border patrol, this would not be necessary.
There are plenty of valid and legal reasons for visitors from both Mexico and Canada to drive across the United States border to vacation, shop, and yes, work, in the United States; increasingly residents of those (and many other) countries have shown they no longer want to, putting a serious crimp on income for many industries and areas in the United States, i.e. our own detriment.
If a Law Enforcement Officer (actually ANY person in the US that has more than a 5th grade education) is so ignorant that they don’t know one of the 50 states is part of the USA without it having that fact be spelled out on a license plate then that says far more about the US educational system (shocker, that) and indicates just plain ignorance if not outright racism. It has zero to do with border patrol.
I live in southern Ontario and we get a fair number of visitors from USA and I am surprised by how many licence plate holders cover up the state name. Is this legal? Because Ontario is quite large we don’t get a lot of plates from other provinces, mostly Quebec, so they are not hard to identify, but American plates are confusing.
Covering up the state name is illegal in most states, but this is rarely enforced. Still, I wouldn’t do it, and certainly wouldn’t drive out of state (or out of the country!) with a partially-obscured plate. However lots of people get away with it.
In case you’re curious, here’s the provision in Virginia’s State Code (where I live) regarding obscuring any part of a license plate, including the state name:
The idea was not to educate law enforcement officers, but rather the general public in other states. I’m still a bit perplexed that any American wouldn’t recognize New Mexico as one of our 50 states, but that’s the reason given by the state’s Governor at the time (the “USA” was added in 1989).
To answer R&D’s question, I’m not aware of another US state that’s used “USA” on its general-issue plates, but many Mexican states did have “Mexico” or “MEX” on their plates in the 1980s/90s, including Chihuahua, which borders New Mexico. I’m not sure how many Mexican states still use the country name, but Baja California definitely does.
There is plenty to see in this great country. Oregon too, has its share. One just needs to get off the gerbil wheel of life and look around. Now I want to go there and see his place. Thanks for this!
I totally agree with your point about just needing to look around this great country and thereby never running out of things to see, do, and experience.
I don’t agree about the Border Patrol. But no matter. There’s something here for everyone.
Thanks for the virtual tour!
For those on the East Coast “Space Farms”interesting place in NJ with a similar concept, complete with petting zoo. My family stumbled upon it by accident during a summer road trip back in the ’70s.
Going by name alone, we were expecting some sort of kitschy space-themed attractions.
Nope, the only thing really extraterrestrial about the place is the name. It was originally the private collection of vehicles and firearms and assorted American owned by a farmer named “Space”. Well worth a visit!
https://spacefarms.com/
Oh wow!! According to Google Maps, Space Farms (and Petting Zoo … or at least Zoo, singular) is right near a school bus garage, a taxidermy shop, AND a junk yard.
My vacation needs would be entirely complete on one short stretch of highway in Sussex, NJ.
Jeff, I loved your tour of this place. I’ve only been to one part of New Mexico (Capulin Volcano National Monument), and would love to go back for a much longer visit. Classical Gas is now on my list of places to see.
So much to talk about here, but I’ll just focus on one – those credit card charge things. I worked in a retail store in my 20s, so I used those slidy-type credit card charge things quite a bit, although the gas station process was extra-special due to the requirement to know your license plate number. Whenever you were running late and filling up with gas, you were almost certain to be behind someone at the counter who forgot their plate number. And then would need to stroll out to and come back into the office to recite it. And just why was this anyway? You could buy any other product with just a credit card… why the extra layer of data for gas?
I look forward to a time in the future when a museum might have an example of the wretched sign-you-name-on-a-blank-screen-with-a-stylus that we have today. Those scribbled signatures that bear no resemblance to reality carry about as much security benefit as putting a plate number on a gas receipt.
Thanks for the tour!
I think you’re right on for equating the “scrawl your name” on current digital charging system with the plate notation thing back in the day of the gas station credit card thing. Neither is/was effective in tracking down fraudsters, but both provide some measure of legal protection as required by liability experts who may not have changed since the prior century.
Every time I encounter one of those signature things, I wonder how it makes sense of the signatures of both of my kids (who are under the age of 30) who do not have signatures in the sense that any of us over the age of 50 have and instead basically just make an “X” on the screen.
My daughter encountered one of those signature pads for the first time when she got her driver’s permit. She completely flubbed her first attempt – her second was a bit better. She was probably helped because she has relatively decent handwriting for her age.
Another teen we know (who doesn’t have very legible handwriting even under the best of circumstances) just couldn’t get the hang of that signature pad. He ended up just printing his first name for his driver’s permit “signature.” Amusing that the DMV accepted that… we’re quickly regressing in a lot of ways!
Couldn’t agree more about those signing things. I just do a random squiggle and call it a day.
The pictured item is not a credit card machine (imprinter), it is just a small clip board to pass through the window of the car you just filled up. The Imprinter would have been on the stand between the pumps or inside.
I worked at a Texaco station while in college when the Imprinter was still the norm. So I used an imprinter with those same slips. At the end of the day they were sorted by those that used an actual Texaco credit card and those that used the other cards we took. Texaco’s processing fee for the 3rd party cards was higher than that of the owner’s local bank.
This was a fascinating read, would love to wander through a place like Classical Gas.
I’ve only been to New Mexico twice; the first time was in 1971 on the return leg of a cross-country road trip. We took I-40 across the width of the state, although IIRC, the interstate wasn’t completed from about Tucumcari eastward, so we used 2-lane Route 66 instead.
The second time was a one-week vacation in March 2007 when my wife and I flew out to Vegas and traveled about 1700 miles round trip out to Utah, Arizona, and New Mexico, then returned using different routes where possible. The highlight of New Mexico for us was Chaco Culture National Historical Park in the northwestern part of the state.
I’d love to tour the southern part of NM, including White Sands National Park.
Here’s a ’50 Chevy sedan delivery from the Farmington, NM area in 2007:
Thanks! The Chaco Culture National Historical Park was definitely on the list for this trip, but for some reason we wound up doing most of our travel east of there and then we wanted to get down to the southern part of the state to see Carlsbad…which I highly recommend.
Chaco is definitely worth a visit. Because we had to cover so much ground each day on our trip, we didn’t arrive at Chaco until late in the afternoon after the visitor center had closed. We still were able to spend an hour or so before twilight began to deepen. I would recommend spending about a half day to fully appreciate everything there. Attached is a photo some of the amazing structures.
Thanks for the additional info. I definitely want to visit Chaco.
For those following the comments here, I’d also recommend Bandelier National Monument. I didn’t go this time but have been in the past and it’s an absolutely fabulous way to observe ancient pueblos up close. It’s a pretty good hike to see a lot of what’s in the monument, but it’s a one of a kind experience.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bandelier_National_Monument
Bandelier is also a relatively easy drive from the most-visited Santa Fe to Taos part of the state (and not very far at all from Classical Gas in Embudo!).
We had planned to visit SW Colorado and Northwestern New Mexico this year, but had to cancel the trip. However, I had planned to visit Chaco Culture Natl Historical Park, as well as some other sites of ruins. Canyon of the Ancients National Monument particularly appealed to me, as did Hovenweep Natl Monument. Hopefully I’ll be able to get there some day. Many of these sites seem rather sparsely visited, so they seem like a better experience than some of the popular sites.
Still have a bunch of Texaco credit card slips, door jamb stickers,gas pump sign, and a map wall holder from my great-uncle Clyde who started his gas station/repair shop in South Woodstock VT in 1922, during Model T times. I have the plaque from Texaco honoring for 25 years of service in 1947! It was a 2-bay with a small office on the ground floor, and a small apartment above where he and his wife lived until 1978. It’s still there, with a 1940s Goodyear sign still hanging on one of the outside walls. Love these old informal museums of Americana.
That’s great. I’ve probably driven right by that garage at one time or another.
I’ve said elsewhere in comments that one of the terrific things to me about living in New England – and probably similar things can be said of many mostly rural areas – is just how little change there is to the physical landscape over time. Buildings in small Vermont towns may get used for different things over time, but the buildings themselves and the roads they exist on largely stay the same.
Just read this post today. Got hooked with the lede pic, but didn’t foresee how MUCH there is in here. I’ll need to read it again. Great photos, too. Terrific stuff. Thanks, Jeff.
Thanks!
I’m not sure if you mean that there’s a lot in the article or in Classical Gas, but I suppose the same holds true for both. Mr. Meier has packed a tremendous amount of stuff into his museum (or whatever it is). Here’s another image of additional stuff…in this case, the same Texaco airport tanker truck that I had as a youth (sadly, not retained and probably reduced to scrap when my parents’ house in Raleigh was bulldozed for a McMansion within one – yes, one – day of my selling it in the mid 1990s).
Fortunately, Johnnie has me covered if I should choose to recoup that part of my lost past that still haunts my dreams.