TALCOTT W.Va. (Hinton News) – This week’s piece is a bit different in regards to it being about antiques in my collection. But where it was found is relevant to Summers County history. What you see here is a large early 1930s Eveready Prestone can and a 1930s Eveready Rustone can.
My Grandfather, Bernard Thompson, a lifelong resident of Talcott, WV, was an antique automobilia collector, having started in the 1970s. He found the Prestone cans in the 1920s at Bob Ford Garage in Talcott. He also uncovered a 1930 Model Chevy at the same time in the garage.
An interesting aspect of this building is that it stopped one of the destructive fires that Talcott fell victim to back “in the day.” One of these fires occurred not too long after this garage was built. It started on the west end of Talcott and made its way towards the depot.
It burned up past Pie Hollow and destroyed a considerable number of structures, including both houses and businesses. The only thing that stopped this destructive fire was that once it made its way and got to the left side of the Bob Ford Garage, it was forced to burn out.
You see, this newly constructed business was one of the few in town that had metal siding. The other was Thompson’s Garage that sits farther up the road, across from John Henry Park. I digress and will get back to the artifacts in this discussion.
Granddad retired from Chemical Leaman Tank Lines after working for them for 32 years. The newspaper article you see here is from “The Carbider,” which was for Carbide employees and friends in the Kanawha Valley. While still working in 1985, granddad was interviewed about these early Carbide products.
Granddad said in the article that he had stopped in a little country store in Walton, WV, and saw the rare Rustone cans sitting on a shelf. So he purchased all 6 of them for a whopping .50 cents each. Ha. Granddad is definitely where I received my love for “junk” from. Mom and Grandma brought me my passion for local history.
