Friday, July 30, 2021

Grand Opening – Ryan’s Cities Service – July 27, 1951

To close out July here on the blog, here’s yet another Grand Opening ad for a Lorain service station. (By George, I’ve posted a lot of them over the years!)

This one is for Ryan’s 24-Hour Cities Service Station, located at Broadway at Nineteenth. Robert Ryan was the owner and man behind the station.

There were some nice Grand Opening freebies for everybody, including plastic magnetic whisk brooms for the men, helium-filled balloons for the kiddies, and orchid corsages for the ladies. (Hey, that’s what Popeye’s pet Jeep only ate: orchids).

I’ve done a few posts on the Cities Service brand, which had several stations around Lorain. Cities Service eventually became Citgo.

As for Ryan's Cities Service station at 1905 Broadway, today the building is part of the home of Quality Security Door Company.

Courtesy Google Maps
Courtesy Lorain County Auditor

2 comments:

-Alan D Hopewell said...

When I was coming up at 1867 Elyria Avenue,that was Trifiletti's City Service (Citgo) station; I think they were still there when I left town in 1991.

Anonymous said...

I always wondered what type of gas station that building used to be.Just by looking at the building you can tell that it was a service station.When I heard the name of the owner I just had to see a photo of him and luckily one was in the write up on the grand opening.There was a Robert Ryan who was an actor from the "40s up until the "70s.He was in alot of film noir and westerns.But I see this Robert Ryan isn't that Robert Ryan.