The Gas Station in America (Creating the North American Landscape) [Hardcover]

Professor John A. Jakle (Author), Professor Keith A. Sculle (Author)

Book Description

Series: Creating the North American Landscape | Publication Date: August 1, 1994

In the first volume of their celebrated "Gas, Food, Lodging" trilogy, John Jakle and Keith Sculle offer a comprehensive history of the American gas station, exploring every aspect of this roadside icon, including its evolving architectural identity; its place in both the American landscape and popular culture; the corporate decisions that determined its look and location; its metamorphosis into the mini-mart; and its role as the most visible manifestation of one of the world's largest industries. From the quaint curbside filling stations of the 1910s to the novelty designs of the 1920s (when stations were built to resemble English cottages, Greek temples, Dutch windmills, and Spanish missions) to the Bauhaus-inspired stations of the 1930s to today's nationwide chains of brightly lit look-alikes, The Gas Station in America is the definitive book on the subject. Richly illustrated with more than 150 images--postcards of gas stations, vintage ads, maps, and other memorabilia--this book bears witness to an economic and cultural phenomenon that continues to be a defining part of the American experience.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

The most significant features of our landscape are often invisible to us. For example: how often have you wondered about the evolution of the gas station? How many gas stations are there in the U.S.? Are gas stations increasing or decreasing in number? What do Bauhaus and feminism have to do with gas station architecture?

Whether or not these questions have kept you awake at night (or been asked of you during job interviews), this delightful hybrid between architectural history, economics, pop-culture studies, and geography will give you unexpected insights into one of the more important components of the American landscape. Illustrated with more than 150 maps, photos, and drawings, and highly recommended.

Review

"Provides important information and insights for those who will explain more fully the American landscape of consumption." -- Thomas Hine, New York Times Book Review

"An exemplary exercise in scholarship... The authors' thorough account offers an interesting and wide-ranging history of the development of the forms of the gas station, the reason for their development, and the significance of these structures in the developed landscape." -- Bruce E. Seely, Design Book Review

"A valuable edition to landscape studies, and a fine book." -- Paul Shepheard, Times Higher Education Supplement

"Fascinating data and documentation... Gas stations have been around as long as automobiles, of course, but they've undergone almost as many transformations as the cars themselves... There are plenty of charts, tables, and maps, but also 150 nostalgic photographs of those old filling stations in all their individual glory." -- Parade Magazine

"Fans of Route 66 will be fascinated... Though this intriguing book is amply illustrated with photos and figures, it's a cultural and business study more than a picture book. What marketing strategies were behind the Bauhaus-inspired stations of the 1930s, the English-Cottage style stations of the 1940s? What's an octane rating, how did stations differ from one region to another? It's all here." -- Chicago Books in Review

"The whole history of the industry, the art of marketing and pumping down to today when, as we pump our own fuel, we must do so under a roof and frequently from the pump of a small 'supermarket,' is outlined in this sensible and informative book. Many a forgotten sight and smell is evoked. Lavishly illustrated." -- Ray Browne, Journal of Popular Culture

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 288 pages
• Publisher: The Johns Hopkins University Press (August 1, 1994)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0801847230
• ISBN-13: 978-0801847233
• Product Dimensions: 10 x 7.1 x 1.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.8 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 3.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #881,454 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

14 of 17 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Gas Stations of the past to the present, March 30, 2000

By A Customer

This review is from: The Gas Station in America (Creating the North American Landscape) (Hardcover)

I think that this book really is a great resource to people who are interested in American history and how an industry can evolve over the decades. The information regarding the retail petroleum industry itself was a little bit thin. I would have liked to see how the industry boomed when cars became a necessity to Americans and how the gas station industry handled that. The pictures in the book make the book very likable even to the everyday person picking up the book off of a coffee table. It takes older American's back to their younger days of $.05 gas and younger American's to a time when gas wasn't over $2.00 a gallon. I enjoyed this book and would recommend it to a person who is interested in the industry of retail petroleum and the evolution of the gas station we all use!

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Very solid overview of gas station evolution, November 14, 2007

By 

Lehigh History Student (Bethlehem, PA) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: The Gas Station in America (Creating the North American Landscape) (Paperback)

This book covers a wide range of issues related to the development of gas stations in America. Its primary focus is to show how the idea of the gas stationed developed and how it changed the cultural and physical landscape of America. There are wonderful pictures in here that show a wide range of gas stations and layouts around the city. It is also an excellent corporate history of oil companies and their role in serving as gas stations. It takes a look at the break up of Standard Oil and its subsidiaries to the mom and pop operations that ran across the country. The idea of product placement is loosely tied in throughout the book and I think the authors are forced to stretch to far to place it here. The book takes on a very academic quality with that discussion and for the general reader it will be a waste of time. As a historian I did not find it useful and I enjoyed the discussion of how these stations developed. Overall this is one of the best sources out there on how the gas station evolved and an excellent look at urban history.

4.0 out of 5 stars Very Useful Source, December 14, 2011

By 

bluegrassgirl "Jenn" (Lexington, KY) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Gas Station in America (Creating the North American Landscape) (Paperback)

This book is one I think I will use often as a preservation professional. It has a lot of great context and photos of historic gas stations. It could only be made better by more photos - perhaps in color.