I want to share a little bit of history on the Blakely Service stations that operated primarily in Arizona beginning in 1949 until he sold out to Gulf Oil in 1963.
I you lived or grew up in Arizona during the 1950's & 1960's many of you will remember the Blakely Gas Stations located throughout Arizona. They had the large Rocket signs and huge American flag flying overhead. If you don't remember the station themselves, you are sure to remember the Cactus glasses that they gave away with a purchase of 10 gallons of gas. These glasses as well as the dishes are now a top Arizona collectible. Not just to Arizonan's but to people moving here from another state, they seem to fall in love with them and want a set.
The family history starts in 1912 with the family moving to Gilbert in 1918. However, I'm going move forward to 1949 when 3 brothers: Monroe (Monty) Blakely, Vincent Blakely and Charles Blakely built Blakely Oil Co.
Monty opened his 1st station in Phoenix located at 19th Ave. and Buckeye Rd. The station was state of the art and the largest in Arizona at the time with 15 pumps. It was well lit, open 24 hours, with self or full service available. It was at this station that Monty introduced the quick 5-minute oil change, and a refreshment stand equipped with popcorn, candy, peanuts and sodas. With the exception of oil changes or service work, Monty did in 1949 what QT has done here today.
In August of 1949, brother Vincent opened the 1st Tucson station on Speedway. It also had 15 pumps and was open 24 hours a day.
Charles opened a station in Wickenburg a year later.
Blakely sold out all but 4 of the stations to Gulf Oil in 1963-64. Vincent kept his 3 original stations in Tucson and Charles kept his station in Wickenburg and operated it until 1981 along with the Bonanza Truck stop located along I-17 just south of McDowell, the truck stopped closed when the I-17/I-10 interchange was built.
Gulf continued to use the Blakely name and began the change over from Blakely to Gulf on 9-1-1966. During the transition from Blakely to Gulf, the number of stations was downsized from roughly 100 stations to 64 stations. They also switched the station operators from salaried employees to having all but 15 of the stations operated by dealers. Even with the reduction in station numbers their income was about the same. By now they were 8th in the state with about half or less individual stations as the other brands. The individual station average was almost twice the gallonage as the others.
Gulf felt it was important to keep the Blakely name for the Arizona motorists while the out of state customers preferred the name brands. It was also important to keep the giveaways as they were the most successful promotions in the history of service station business. They also continued banking in Arizona under Blakely as they felt it was important to the Arizona economy.
I do have a lot more information but, I have needed to completely rebuild the website so it will be a work in progress.
