Fill 'er Up: The Glory Days of Wisconsin Gas Stations

Fill 'er Up: The Glory Days of Wisconsin Gas Stations. "...Fill 'er Up travels throughout Wisconsin to profile a number of historically significant gas stations — unique buildings that changed the way we live and have become symbols of various stages of the automotive age. 'Gas stations developed innovations that become standard everywhere. They were on the forefront of changes in marketing. They were the pioneers of the commercial strip,' said Architectural Historian James Draeger.
The first filling stations were crude shacks but backlash from the neighbors resulted in stations that looked like little houses designed to blend into the neighborhood. In Platteville one such station, built in the early 1930s, is still in operation. English cottage-style brick stations with blue tile roofs were built in Monroe and La Crosse during the mid1930s. Both structures are examples of the Pure Oil Co.’s distinct style designed by architect Carl Petersen.
Wadham’s, a Milwaukee oil company, built stations that displayed an Asian influence. Today two of the few surviving examples of these pagoda-like structures, designed by Milwaukee architect Alexander C. Eschweiler, stand in Cedarburg and West Allis."