On my way out to Chepachet for a totally different photo concept, I spotted this old fashioned gas pump in front of Route 44 Auto Sales. The pump dates to the late 1950s. Notice the brand is "Atlantic," not "Atlantic-Richfield" or "Arco". Atlantic Petroleum merged with Richmond Petroleum in 1966, so the pump is clearly pre-merger. The price listed on the pump is a bit later, though. According to this pump, gas is 23.9 cents per gallon, but that price is more consistent with the late 1960s. (The lowest I ever saw it was 12.9 cents in Rocky Mount, North Carolina in 1968.)
Of historical note is that Atlantic Petroleum was formed in 1866 and was later bought by John D. Rockefeller in the formation of the Standard Oil monopoly. When Standard Oil was dissolved due to anti-trust issues in 1911, Atlantic Petroleum survived by absorbing Acme Oil and the original Standard Oil. Nothing lasts forever, though, and Atlantic was acquired by Sunoco in 1988.
I wanted to do something a bit different with the shot in post processing. I started in Topaz Adjust, but applied a dynamic pop HDR-like filter as the starting point. I then increased the light regions to 28 and adjusted the adaptive exposure and contrast. I also adjusted strength, detail boost, and adaptive saturation. In PSE, the only adjustment was a minor levels adjustment for improved luminosity.
