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Grayson:
gas station, Duncan, Mouth of Wilson February 24, 2020 The Cobblestone Gas Station Every old photo has a story to
tell. Sometimes it’s not initially
clear what that story is, but there was a particular set of circumstances
that led to the picture being taken.
That might be less true today with digital cameras, but decades ago,
in the era of black and white pictures, photos were often more
deliberate. After all, they had to pay
for the film and pay again to have it developed. There was more likely to be an event or a
gathering that deserved preservation with the taking of a picture. I’ve seen this picture for about 20
years. It belonged to my grandpa Roy
Duncan, but I only knew a part of the story that was told to me by my
grandma. And she wasn’t sure that
story was completely accurate since the picture was likely taken a decade
before she met my grandpa. My grandma said this picture was taken
near Mouth of Wilson in Grayson Co, VA.
Soon after my grandpa’s father Perry Duncan died in 1937 in Wilkes Co,
NC, he traveled north to Virginia to find work. He eventually found it at Mouth of Wilson
where he went to work on a dairy farm for a family who had five daughters. Those five daughters are believed to be
five of the eight women in this picture.
That means this picture would be from about 1938 or 1939. I don’t know the name of the family at
Mouth of Wilson, but living nearby was a man named George Mink who either
sold horses or kept horses. I don’t
know if “nearby” meant he was their next door neighbor, or if he lived a few
miles away. The only other clue I could get from
the picture was that the women appear to be standing in front of an Esso gas
station. One of the signs says
Prestone Anti-Freeze is $2.65 per gallon.
That sounds like a lot of money for back then. This is an advertisement from the December
1939 issue of Poplular Science where Prestone is at the “New Low
Price” of $2.65. I found earlier advertisements from
late 1937 and 1938 where it sold for $2.95 per gallon. So it looks like the price dropped in 1939
and it stayed at $2.65 for several years.
That means my picture was probably taken in 1939 or maybe 1940. By
sometime in late 1940, my grandpa had returned to Wilkes Co where he worked
at Coble Dairy in Wilkesboro for a year or so before joining the Army in
November 1941. A few weeks ago I posted that picture
on a Facebook group for unidentified photos in the area. I was surprised when Doug Blevins wrote
that he recognized it as the Cobblestone Gas Station in Volney, VA. I looked up the location on Google Street
View, and it looked like the same place to me. Not only did Doug recognize it, but the
place is still standing after all these years. This is the Street View image. But I wanted a better look. Last weekend I drove up to the location on
the side of Hwy 16 in Volney to get my own pictures. Below is the original picture beside one
that I took. The rocks line up perfectly, so this is
definitely the same building. At some
point the gas station was turned into a house, and only the sign above the
door indicates the building’s history.
Perhaps my grandpa took this picture as
he was leaving to go back to Wilkes Co.
He would have been 20 years old in 1940. My grandma says that after they were
married in 1948, she and my grandpa went to Virginia to visit this family a
few times, but she didn’t remember their last name. It was either their house, or that of
George Mink, that had two large spiral staircases inside. She said the family lived across the road
from the gas station, and if so, that would be in the vicinity of Old Orchard
Rd near where Little Wilson Creek flows into Wilson Creek. Now I know the location of the photo,
but I’d still like to learn the name of the family that my grandpa worked for
80 years ago. I checked the 1940
Grayson Co census for households that had five daughters, but I didn’t see
any obvious answers. Perhaps someone
will see this who knows who owned the land across from the gas station. Or, maybe someone knows a family with five
daughters who ran a dairy in this area in the late 1930s. Comments? jason@webjmd.com |