Primarily Petroliana Shop Talk Forums Shop Talk Petroliana Forums General Petroliana Discussion Amazing Generosity!

Recently I have been selling a few items to generate some cash for my upcoming Iowa Gas trip, and to pay for a couple of recently bought and expensive signs.
Most of my items have sold and are being packed away for the long trip to Des Moines. Just last week, I was able to sell a rack of Polarine bottles to a gentleman that I have done business with and resides in the great state of Texas! We made arrangements to have some friends of his pick the bottles up at Iowa Gas, and he was sending me a check for the payment.
I was gone for a couple days last week, but when I arrived home on Saturday evening, his check was waiting for me with a personal note attached! He had included an extra $100 in the check and asked that I forward it to "OLD GAS" , as he enjoyed the site so much and wanted to donate to its upkeep.
The friendship that I have developed with another collector, whom I have never yet met, and the enjoyment I receive from daily interaction on this site, make its continued support a top priority for me and I am thrilled that others in our community feel the same way! For this this collector to contribute an unsolicited donation, simply because of his enjoyment of the site, speaks volumes to me!
My sincere thanks to him and everyone else that has taken the time and gone out of their way to contribute to the maintenance of this great site!
THANK YOU ALL!---KEVIN

Great story Kevin !

And thanks Old Gas for making the shows and auctions not just about adding to our collections, but also about friendships made on here.

Rad!

Very cool! Gotta love this site and the people!

That's great!!!!!

Great story Kevin! This site is a lot like a church,a church is just a building, it's the people inside that make it a church,just as with this site it's the members that make it Oldgas.

Hello everyone,
My name is larry and i live in Australia, I have just read this thread and thought i needed to comment on the "Friendships" struck up here. About a year or so back i was chasing one of the big 17ft Standard signs on the pole, I eventually found one through this forum and contacted "GASSYPHILLIPS" in Iowa, after a lot of emails back and forth, Garry and i got it sorted out, i even had to get him to cut the pole down to size for me for transport to Australia, (once i put it back together no one will ever know it was cut) About 6 months ago i asked my Son if he would like to go to the U.S with me and do a bit of a road trip, Once everything was set in motion i decided to contact Garry to see if we could call into Iowa and pay him a visit, We flew from Australia to LA then straight onto Chicago, jumped in a pre arranged hire car and headed to just outside of Des Moines arriving at our motel at 2:30 am. In the morning we drove out to Garry's place to meet him and his Mate / Buddy RC,we spent the day with them and bought some more great stuff from them, 3 weeks later we were in Carlisle PA, My Son and i looked at each other and said, "lets go back to Garry's" We drove straight through from Carlisle to Des Moines,about 16hours, stopping only for fuel and coffee, Coincidently we arrived back in Des Moines at about 2:30 am again. The next morning we were back at Garry's and spent another day with Garry, RC and Dave and had a few beers with some of them, plus some of their families dropped in and also some neighbours called in to say "Gday" to the Australians, What a Fantastic afternoon we had with all of them, So yes, my Son Simon and i have struck up a great friendship not only with Garry but also his Buddies RC and Dave, all from being on the forum and having an interest in all this great old stuff.

Hope you enjoy the story, Thanks and Regards, larry

I love to hear these stories about relationships and special experiences that had their roots on this forum. They make the difficult issues here much easier to deal with. For too many, this hobby revolves around money. But these friendships and experiences are priceless. I'm glad Oldgas.com could be part of it all.

Great to hear!

Larry that's awesome! Collecting stuff is just an excuse to meet wonderful people and make friends.

Thanks for that post Larry. Definitely what oldgas is all about.
Glad to hear of your good experience in the States.

Hello everyone,
Thanks Jim, Braden, Dave and MetroPetro for your comments, We did have a great time and experience in the U.S. We did a 5000 mile back road tour through about 14 states covering an area bordered by Iowa, Tennessee, Sth Carolina and Pennsylvania, We met up with some wonderful people, all collectors of Petroliana and other great "Junk". We also sat in the back yard and had a beer with a Bloke named Wallace (1st name) out the front of his Gas Station in the back yard of his house in Lynchburg Virginia. About 2 year ago i bought a wide body Wayne 60 gas pump from Wallace, and it was Fantastic to actually meet him and sit and talk and have a beer with him, Like we did with Garry and his Mates in Iowa, The feeling was pretty hard to describe, standing on the other side of the world in the middle of rural America, with my Son, and just having a great time and just casually talking with the people we have met through collecting this stuff, They treated us like we had known them all our lives. FANTASTIC.

Thanks Again and Regards from larry in "Strayer" ( Australia )