West Bend, Wi – This week’s photo dates to March 1935. Can you pinpoint the name of the filling station and its location? Bonus question: What school was leveled to make way for the gas station?
The Deep Rock Service Station in West Bend, WI, was located at the triangle corner of 7th Avenue and Main Street. That intersection has since been reconstructed.
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Over the years there were several owners of the Deep Rock Service Station including Matt Goeden, Jacob Schneider, Karl Guse and then his son Ernst Guse.
Prior to the gas station there was the Babille Academy.
According to the Dorothy E. Williams’ book “The Spirit of West Bend” the private school was founded by August Babille who came to West Bend from France in the 1850s. “The best families in town, including the well-known Weil’s, sent their children to the Babille Academy,” wrote Williams.
The Spirit of West Bend also noted, “Babille built an unusual house with shuttered windows, an innovation in the village, on a triangle of land in the middle of town.”
Babille’s home also served as the school; it was razed years later and the site occupied by the Deep Rock filling station.
Jerry Mehring said there were actually three filling stations at that intersection including City Service on the northeast corner and Bohn Oil on the southeast corner. Mehring also believed someone from the Herriges family also had ties to the Deep Rock station.
