Service station turns heads at Iola Car Show
By Greg Seubert
One of the most popular attractions at this year’s Iola Car Show didn’t have a souped-up engine or a fresh wax job.
What it did have took show visitors back in time.
Larry Fechter and his wife, Rhonda, spent much of this year’s car show, held July 8-10 in Iola, talking about the service station that they had built on the show grounds.
The station is based on a business that Rhonda’s grandfather, Paul Matykowski, operated for many years in Crivitz, a small community about halfway between Green Bay and Iron Mountain, Michigan, on U.S. Highway 141.
“I used to have a nice shop on the other side of town,” said Larry, the show’s former director and now its senior adviser.
“I sold it and moved on a lake,” he said. “I thought I wouldn’t miss my shop, but I did. I was going to build a new shop. To make a long story short, (Iola Car Show executive director Joe Opperman) and the board thought it would really be conducive if we built something here and I was in agreement with that with one provision: I would have to buy the property. I wasn’t about to spend a lot of money on someone else’s property. They agreed to it and sold me the property.
“I made a commitment to the board that I would build something that would be an addition to and contribute to the success of the show,” he added. “From what I can see here, it’s been nothing but that.”
Larry came up with the idea for the replica of a Mobil gas station, which includes two gas pumps, signs, benches and a pay phone booth.
“I wish I had a nickel for every picture I’ve seen taken,” he said. “I’ve always known that the passion of the hobby is what drives the hobby. The passion, I have it for cars.”
The Fechters financed the building, which will be a permanent exhibit at the show.
“If you built a shop in your backyard, you’d put up four walls and a steel shed,” Larry said. “That’s what I was going to do and I was happy with that, but when this came about, I knew as soon as I signed on that the deal was going to cost us money because of all the additional aesthetics. I wasn’t just going to put up a Morton shed here. That’s not the commitment I gave the board.”
His plan is the change the station from show to show.
“I’m always going to give it a new flavor,” he said. “You might come back here next year and there might be a tow truck. You’re going to see something different. I’m not going to change brands, though. I’m loyal to Mobil.”
Rhonda doesn’t know what her husband has in mind.
“He won’t even tell me,” she said. “It’ll be a surprise for me also. He’s the creative mind behind all of this. He didn’t build the building, but everything else is his work of art. He did a fantastic job.”
Local hangout
Rhonda grew up in Crivitz.
“It’s quite a touching tribute,” she said. “My grandfather originally ran the service station and they served sandwiches there as well. My father took over, the pumps were removed and it became a supper club. We called it Matty’s Supper Club. I don’t remember my grandfather’s place as much as I do the supper club.”
Rhonda and her family also lived in the building.
“We lived upstairs and we were together all the time,” she said. “I have pictures of my grandfather where there are a group of people there. It was a very social, comfortable atmosphere. They knew everybody. I’m sure there were people that traveled that road back and forth and that was the place they stopped, just like our supper club.”
Larry said the station goes hand-in-hand with the thousands of vehicles that are displayed at the show, which returned to Iola for the first time since 2019.
“These cars are a simple time machine to us owners,” he said. “When you can jump in a 1967 GTO, go out on a country road where there’s really nothing that’s new and find an oldies station, you’re back in 1967. There’s not too much out there that gets that close to a time machine except for that. That’s the love of it.
“The only thing you know for certain is the past,” he said. “You know how certain things from the past made us feel. If I put chairs up out there, that’s going to conjure up somebody’s memory of a good thing: maybe that’s where they sat with Grandma. That’s the fascination behind it.”
The service stations from the past are a far cry from today’s convenience stores, according to Rhonda.
“They’re dying off,” she said. “They get taken away or torn down and they put a Subway up. That’s what’s nice about this. It helps people remember those times and what it meant.”
A big hit
The station would have been finished in time for last year’s show, which ended up getting canceled because of COVID-19 concerns.
The extra year gave the Fechters more time to work on the building.
“It was totally finished maybe a week or two ago,” Rhonda said. “It touches you in so many ways, it really does. I just feel so good about it. Not only is it unique in its own way, but it’ a warm-your-heart feeling.”
Larry and Rhonda spent hours during the show telling the story of how the station went from a vision to reality.
“I’ve heard people say how wonderful it is that it’s here, how well it’s done,” Rhonda said. “I think Larry’s purpose also is that it’s something for the working man and woman to know that they can do this. You don’t have to have a large budget.
“Some of these things here are reproductions,” she added. “You don’t have to spend a large budget to do this. That is what he wanted to do: to let people know that it’s something that’s feasible and workable. He also wanted to have it here for people to enjoy, reminisce and remember.”
“I knew whatever I did in here would conjure up memories and feelings,” Larry said. “I just had a gentleman that had his family take a picture of him right over here because he used to own a Mobil station.
“In my book, that’s mission accomplished,” he said. “That’s what I love.”