Here's an
aerial photo from the 1940s of Stancil Oil
Company's Selma headquarters beside US 301,
which was then a two-lane highway. Four
generations of Stancils in the family
business have made changes with the times Transcript of Gary
Ridout's interview with Larry Stancil:
My grandfather’s name was R.T. Atkins. He had
a good job as a district manager with an
insurance company in Raleigh. It was a big
deal and a big risk to leave Raleigh and come
to Selma and start a business. But he came to
Selma, bought a vacant lot, and started Atkins
Oil Company in 1941. That was a hard year
because the United States was involved in
World War II and gas was being rationed so he
almost did not make it through 1941.
My father, Moses
Warren “Mokie” Stancil was born in 1921. My
mother, Betsy Atkins Stancil, was born in
1925. She grew up in Raleigh and Smithfield.
My father grew up in Smithfield and served in
World War II but he stayed stateside in the
United States where he was stationed mainly in
Kansas and Texas. After he left the military
he worked with his father-in-law at Atkins Oil
Company.
Mr. Atkins
retired in 1955 and Dad merged with the
American Oil Company. Dad built some class A
service stations and added more gasoline
accounts as the population grew. In the 1960s,
there was home-heating and tobacco-curing
business in addition to the gasoline
business for automobiles. In 1965 he
merged with the Rogman Oil Company of
Smithfield and changed the name to Stancil Oil
& Tire Company.
Larry and
Mokie Stancil in the early years of their
business partnership.
Mokie
Stancil's community involvement
My father was a
wonderful civic leader and church leader in
Johnston County. In those days, being in
different groups helped promote your business
and he knew that.
He was connected
with the Salvation Army for over 50 years. At
one time, he was the longest serving Salvation
Army Board member in the southeastern United
States. He was president of the North Carolina
Mental Health Association and also the
Johnston County Mental Health Association.
He was president
of the North Carolina Oil Jobbers Association
that became very important during the oil
shortage of the 1970s. He was president of the
Smithfield-Selma Chamber of Commerce which is
now the Triangle East Chamber of Commerce. I
was president a few years later and we were
the first father/son presidential combination
in the history of the chamber.
He was on the
Johnston Community College board for many
years and received the Volunteer of the Year
award from JCC. He was also a member of the
Lions Club in Smithfield.
He was an active
member for many years at the First Baptist
Church in Smithfield. He moved the family to
Centenary United Methodist Church in the 1970s
where he served on many fund-raising
committees and on the Administrative Council.
He helped Jean Kelly raise money to start the
Boys and Girls Club in Selma.
The Stancil Oil fleet of delivery trucks
during the heyday of the service business.
Another
generation makes its mark
I was born in
1953, and when I was a teenager in the late
1960s I would help mow grass at the oil
company, wash the oil-delivery trucks, and
help out in any way I could at that time. Many
of the farmers had a large gasoline or diesel
tank on their property. This was to fuel
trucks and tractors used on the farm. After I
got my driver’s license, I drove oil trucks
and helped install tobacco curers.
In 1976 I
graduated from Atlantic Christian College
(today's Barton College) and went to work
for my dad full-time. Together we started
building and supplying convenience stores.
At our height of business we supplied fuel
to around 20 retail accounts and had 1,500
heating and agricultural customers in
Johnston, Wayne, Wilson, and Harnett
counties. We had up to 75 full-time and
part-time employees. Several of our
employees worked with us for 40-50 years.
Over time, we
saw that oil usage for tobacco curing was
winding down. Oil also was being used less and
less in home heating. Historically, farmers
fueled their curing barns with wood, then
moved to kerosene-fueled pot-bellied stoves,
and then to an oil-fueled jet-burner placed in
the middle of the curing barn. As time went
on, more and more tobacco farmers cured their
tobacco with propane gas.
In the 1970s and
1980s, my dad had several two-bay gas stations
in Smithfield, Kenly, and Clayton. Convenience
stores and self-serve gas was evolving in the
retail world at that time. It was a real
revelation watching people pumping their own
gas and spilling some of it! Our first
convenience store was built between Bojangles
and McDonald’s in 1978 in Selma.
As Dad and I
both got older, we decided to scale back to a
smaller operation when Amoco sold to BP Oil.
In 2004 we sold
off a portion of the company and reinvested
in assets without underground storage tanks.
Stancil Oil continued serving agricultural
and heating customers until 2016 when that
part of the business was sold because of
lower demand for our products. In the
last 10 years we have downsized to one
company-run convenience store where it all
started in 1941. We continue to fly the
Marathon Oil flag as our fuel supplier for the
last 15 years.
I was on the
Johnston County Tourism Authority board for
six years, chairman for two years. I was a
member of the Smithfield Jaycees and served a
term as president. I was on the North Carolina
Oil Jobbers board in Raleigh for several
years. At Centenary United Methodist in
Smithfield, I have served on the
Administrative Board and the Board of Trustees
for many years.
Larry Stancil
talks about the family business inside the
museum he has assembled.
The Stancil Oil Museum
My fascination
with memorabilia from the oil business goes
way back. As a child, I watched my grandfather
and father build the Atkins Oil business and
then the Stancil Oil business. This
fascination turned into the Stancil Oil Museum
that is located on Highway 301 in Selma. It
started when I tore down a warehouse that my
granddaddy had built on the Selma property in
the early 1940s.
As I was going
through the material from the warehouse, I
came across glass Amoco items which were used
in the early gas pumps. I said to myself: “I
can’t throw this stuff away!” So I put it to
the side. This was in the early 1990s. I knew
of very few people that were collecting these
types of relics. There was no e-Bay, there
were no computers, so I felt like I had to
keep it.
As I grew to be
fascinated with the items, I realized I liked
the evolution of the American Oil Company and
later Amoco in the world of business. This
fascination has led me to flea markets and
swap meets all over the United States. I got
to know some other collectors who have called
me from time to time with items that they
think I would like.
Most of the
material represents what 1940s-1960s travelers
would see when they stopped at an Amoco gas
station. The material includes road maps,
tourist attraction brochures, and Amoco
promotional items. Selling gasoline has always
been very competitive, so companies were
always trying to determine what would attract
the customers.
Larry and Warren Stancil with one of their
first large billboards.
Diversification
led to billboards
The change in
the oil business moved our company toward
diversification. Early on, we moved into the
heating and air business on a small-scale
level. We installed duct work and insulation
in houses during that time and sold window
air-conditioning units on a small scale.
Stancil Oil
moved into the commercial building business in
the mid-1980s. We purchased several commercial
buildings around the county, many of which we
still own. In 1986, our company entered the
storage business. In Johnston County, we now
have several storage-unit locations. In the
United States, there is a great need for
storage because it is estimated that one-third
of the American population moves every year.
This creates a need for storage.
In 2003, we
began the billboard business. I learned in the
late 1970s that it would be a good thing to
promote our business using some sort of
signage. We had a store and gas station in
Kenly and I felt that this was a good place to
do this type of promotion. I soon learned that
if you have a small sign promoting the
business, you also have the back of the sign
that is useful for promotions. The revenue
from the back side of the sign would help pay
for the cost of the front of the sign.
I then realized
that there are many “old junker” signs that I
could buy from companies at a good price. I
bought signs owned by the Chesapeake Bridge
Authority on Interstate 95. Many of them had
weeds and vines all over them and they needed
a new paint job. I soon had about 10 or 12
signs that I used to promote the oil business.
Soon I began to experiment with signs for
commercial businesses. One of our first ones
was a sign for McDonald’s. This was installed
in the late 1970s.
One interesting
story about the beginnings of the billboard
business centered around an interaction I had
about 6:30 at night in Selma in the year 2000.
I was locking up the gate and this man who I
knew pulled up to speak to me.He said:
“I just went and got a permit to rezone some
land near where you already have a sign that
you are renting from me. I want to sell you
that land for $25,000.” I said: “I don’t know,
that’s a lot of money!” But I ended up buying
the land and put up a mono-pole billboard (one
pole holds the sign up). This sign had Amoco
Oil on one side and Burger King on the other.
The revenue from the Burger King side just
about paid for the entire transaction.
My son, Warren
Stancil, started renting signs when he was 16.
Based on his work and the signs we already
had, we started a new company called
Interstate Outdoor Billboard Advertising.
Warren is now the president of this company.
We currently have about 700 billboard spaces.
One innovation
in this business is electronic signs. In 2006
we installed the third electronic sign in the
state. This is on the corner of highways 301
and 70 (in Selma) in an area called “Catch Me
Eye.” We now have 25 electronic signs, and we
have billboards from Selma to Boone.
The
Stancil Oil Company and the associated
activities may be one of the oldest businesses
in the state. I am very proud that we have been
able to deal with the constant changes in all
these businesses and I am proud of what we have
accomplished since 1941. My hope is that this
success will continue into the future for my
family.
