 
Tponetom
Member
Username: Tponetom
Post Number: 101
Registered: 06-2007
| | Posted on Friday, August 10, 2007 - 10:47 pm: |    |
For Historians only.
Who can remember the "Oil Shacks" that graced many of our main streets in Detroit. On E. Warren, between McClellan and Cooper, there were 2 of them, on opposite sides of Warren. They were tar paper shacks, 6' x8' made out of scrap lumber and a tarp on the roof to keep out the rain. (I believe they were squatters who simply occupied an empty lot until they were chased away by the law or some irate landlord.) They sold motor oil exclusively, for a nickel or a dime a quart. A car would pull up to the curb, and the driver would wave at the operator to come and check his oil, and top it off. Most of the oil was in 50 gallon drums. Probably reclaimed oil, but that did not matter. Oil is still oil.
In those days I think cars burned more oil than gas or so it seemed. (Ask a Studebaker owner.)
The punch line to this story is this. Both “ stations’ had a large baseball scoreboard that you could read a block away. The operator would paint in the Tigers score, inning by inning, using whitewash, and he would list the batteries for both teams and at the end of the game he would list the winning and losing pitchers and the HR hitters. We Kids would run like hell home from school to see if Mickey and Hank and Charley and Billy and Goose and Gee Gee and Tommy and Eldon were getting the job done. You can fill in the last names. One hint: Eldon threw his side arm, submarine pitch. Of course, ‘Schoolboy’ was our hero too. |