Soulsby Shell Service Station, Mount Olive, Illinois, on Route 66.

The advent of the national road system in 1926 ushered in a golden age for mom-and-pop entrepreneurs. For Henry Soulsby of Mount Olive, it happened just in time. Mr. Soulsby followed his Irish immigrant father into mining, but in the mid-1920s, an injury forced him above ground. Understanding that a national highway would soon pass through Mount Olive, he invested most of his life savings in two lots at the corner of 1st Street, now called Old Route 66. With the balance, he built an automotive service station.

The Soulsby Station is an excellent example of a house with a canopy form. By the time Mr. Soulsby built his station in 1926, the leading oil companies had been hiring architects to design stations that would blend well with neighborhoods to minimize local opposition to the crudeness often associated with gas stations. Mr. Soulsby designed the building himself, considering these trends and blending well with the surrounding area.

Although the Great Depression soon began, the station thrived. America was broke, but it was still traveling. As Will Rogers would say, "We might be the first nation to drive to the poorhouse in an automobile."

When Henry Soulsby retired, his children Russell and Ola Soulsby took over the station, a partnership that would endure until Ola died in 1996. Each was as adept as the other at pumping gas, checking the oil, and looking under the hood or chassis to detect and fix problems. Russell always had an eye for technology. During World War II, he was a communications technician in the Pacific theater. He turned his experience into a radio and television repair business shortly after coming home. He used the antenna on the station's roof to test his work.

Route 66 was a great agent of progress and development, but its success helped spell its doom. In the late 1950s, Interstate 55 began supplanting it in Illinois, and the Soulsby Station ended up a mile from the new thoroughfare in Mount Olive. In 1991, the Soulsby Station stopped pumping gas but continued to check oil, sell soda pop ("pop" in northern Illinois), and greet the ever-growing legion of Route 66 tourists. Sending everyone off with a wink and a wave, Russell and Ola closed the doors for good in 1993 and sold the station in 1997 to a neighbor, Mike Dragovich. When Russell Soulsby died in 1999, his funeral procession took him under the canopy one last time; this time, it was his friends' turn to wink and wave.

The current owner, Mr. Dragovich, and the Soulsby Preservation Society began preservation efforts in 2003, removing vinyl siding, restoring the original doors and windows, and repainting the exterior. In 2004, the National Park Service provided grant support for restoration efforts. Today, the station looks essentially the same as it did during its post-World War II heyday. It was listed in the National Register of Historic Places in 2004.

People worldwide drive by to imagine what Old Route 66 would have been like in its heyday.

Compiled by Dr. Neil Gale, Ph.D.

Photos Copyright © 2014, Neil Gale.

Baltimore & Ohio Railroad Co. (B&O) Depot in the City of Flora, Illinois.

The Flora B&O Depot has been critical to the town’s history. In 1872, the first depot was built, and this building was funded by selling bonds to businesses and citizens. This depot was destroyed by a fire in 1916. 

When a new depot was completed in 1917, it contained three floors. The main floor was used for passengers, and it had a large waiting room with a baggage room and restrooms. The Western Union office, yard office, mailroom and ticket office were also located on this floor.

The second floor held the offices of essential depot members. Men who occupied these offices included the chief clerk, division engineer, superintendents, dispatchers, carpenters, signal supervisors, train masters and road foremen, railroad law enforcement officers, and the district’s physician.

The third floor contained large offices. Later, these offices became one social room. There, railroad employees and their families held potluck dinners and socials. Not only was the depot a hub of transportation and commerce, but it was also a center for much of the social life in the community.

The depot building was an enormous part of the economic life of the community during the early years of the 20th Century. In the 1920s, the railroad employed half the wage earners in Flora, and in 1924, three hundred employees worked at the local station.

In the 1950s, cars became the chief means of transportation as roads improved. Travelers no longer looked to trains as the primary source of transportation. The depot quickly became less important to the community. The days of 12-passenger trains stopping at Flora daily turned into a fond memory. 

In 1998, the Flora B&O Depot was named one of three sites in Clay County on the National Register of Historic Places. With this recognition and the interest of many community citizens, the Flora Community Development Corporation (FCDC) purchased the depot from CSX Railroad Company.

FCDC successfully obtained three federal grants to restore the building, matched by local donations from citizens. Today, the University of Illinois Extension Service rents the third floor, and the second floor is a rented community room for meetings and various activities. The first floor houses the Flora Chamber of Commerce office, a museum containing city and county historical artifacts and two unfinished rooms available for occupancy.

Flora Depot

Edited by Dr. Neil Gale, Ph.D.