Pure Service Station at Oberlin & Meister

Here's a photo that ran as part of a 1955 newspaper ad for Clem Rice, "Builder of Beautiful Homes." The full page newspaper ad for the company had a nice assortment of photos of both residential and industrial construction projects that the company had recently completed.

Here's one of them. The caption for the photo read, "Located on the corner of Oberlin Avenue and Meister Road, this is one of the eight Service Stations Clem Rice has completed in the past three years."

The 1955-56 Lorain City Directory identified the station as Jack's Pure Oil at 3217 Oberlin Avenue. It was the first gas station at that intersection, predating both Super's Sohio Station and Bill's Sunoco Service Station by a year in the City Directory.

It also predated the Lorain Plaza Shopping Center, which I assume was constructed where all those trees are in the photo. The Sandy's hamburger drive-in at the same corner came a decade later in 1965.

Jack's Pure Oil became a Union 76 station in the early 1970's. (This wiki entry explains why.)

Here's what the same corner looks like today. The Valero gas station has the same 3217 Oberlin Avenue address.

By the way, the PURE brand is still around. Click here to visit the official website. Remember the great "Firebird" logo?