As motorways expanded in the U.S. and abroad in the first half of the 20th century, the roadside landscape sprouted more and more buildings. To attract drivers’ attention, some were designed with eye-catching, eccentric designs ranging from airplanes to cowboy boots. Here are a few:
Giant Teapots and Other Quirky Gas Station Designs
This teapot-shaped filling station was built in Zillah, Washington in 1922, intended as a humorous reminder of the Harding Administration’s Teapot Dome Scandal. Appropriately enough for a gas station, the corruption scandal had erupted over secret leasing of the nation’s naval oil reserves. The station remains a historic landmark in the town. (Credit: Kevin Schafer /Getty Images)
A Sphinx Petrol Pump in London, England around the 1930s. (Credit: Imagno/Getty Images)
The Royal Albatross, an actual airplane used as a service station, was built along Ventura Boulevard in California. Gasoline pumps were set up under the wing spans. (Credit: Bettmann/Getty Images)
No, it’s not a truncated Mr. Peanut. This Shell gas station is the last one of its kind in Winston-Salem, North Carolina. A handful were built throughout the 1930s as a part of quirky advertising plan to draw in more customers during the Depression. In 1976, it became the first individual station in America to be listed on the National Register of Historic Places. (Credit: Franck Fotos/Alamy Stock Photo)
A garage owner in Châteauroux, France believed that gas pumps were an eyesore in his picturesque town. In the late 1930s, he disguised one of his pumps as an elephant made from old gasoline cans. (Credit: Tucker/Fox Photos/Getty Images)
This windmill was attached to a filling station in Waterloo, New York. (Credit: George Rinhart/Corbis via Getty Images)
Hat & Boots was built in 1954 in Seattle, Washington. The Hat sat over the office while the pair of boots served as the restroom. The station closed in 1988, but the town raised funds to save the local landmark and a restoration project was completed in 2010. (Credit: The Library of Congress)
This gas station sits attached to “Igloo City,” a hotel in Cantwell, Alaska that was built in the 1970s, but abandoned after violating building-code regulations. The gas station operated for a while, but after no promising future for the hotel, it eventually closed down as well. (Credit: Walter Bibikow/Getty Images)
This wagon, known to be the largest covered wagon in the world, can be found in Milford, Nebraska off I-80. After serving as a gas station in the 1990s, the wagon lost its wheels and now is a golf shop. (Credit: Philip Gould/Corbis via Getty Images)
Pops sits off Route 66 in Arcadia, Oklahoma. Not only is it a place to stop for gas, but it is a ‘soda ranch’ and diner that offers up a signature collection of over 700 types of soda. Built in 2007, it has become a popular tourist attraction. (Credit: Christian Heeb/Getty Images)
