I am posting this on the a Garage Journal as well so if you see it in both places please excuse the repetition. I went to an estate sale yesterday. A family was selling off the estate of their parents. The father had been a Ford dealership mechanic since the 1950's. Here is a photo of the stuff I brought home. Obviously this fellow saved a lot of old things and I was very happy that he did. Incidentally when I showed up in my '55 F100 to pick the stuff up the seller almost got a little choked up saying that he thought his dad was looking down smiling that the things he had saved all of those years were going to someone that would appreciate them. One of the items I bought was this 'work station'. As you can see it's a fairly large piece. Despite looking like it is sitting on the ground it actually has four wheels tucked underneath and still rolls fairly well. I was hoping to find out a little bit more about this piece. It looks like there are three small holes on each side spaced fairly evenly from top-to-bottom of the cabinet. They are pretty close to the back edge of the cabinet. It seems like something should have bolted onto both sides. In doing my research I wondered if it originally might have been part of a 1940's type dealership work stations. I know several companies; Graco, Lincoln, Shure, Kent Moore etc. made stations like this. I wondered in the holes on both sides might have been for bolting on the side cabinets. Any thoughts on the origin of this piece?
I'm still hoping someone here can shed some light on the origin of this cabinet. Last night I took a photo with the top off looking down into the cabinet. I don't think the 3/8" plywood top on this thing is original. I wondered if originally something dropped in from the top and was held into the pair of brackets on the rear wall of the inside? There was some group speculation last night that ranged from a base to an old Sun motor oscilloscope or an alignment machine, to a chemical cabinet or possibly even a cooler of some sort. I'm still leaning towards vintage automotive since the guy I bought it from was a Ford mechanic since the 50's. Anyone able to help us out on this? Thanks, Jay
Check on this site.....Ford Rotunda cabinets... https://rotunda.service-solutions.com/en-US/Pages/ItemListing.aspx?catID=126695
Thanks for the tip RG. There sure area lot of cabinets to go through on those pages. Unfortunately it looks like all of the listings are for new items. One lead it did give me was that it looks like Rotunda branded stuff is all made by Shure. If this was true going way back and this cabinet did indeed come from a Ford dealer that might be the company to look at. When I did a little searching under Shure from the 1940s there are some similar cabinets as work station bases. They also have the doors meet in the middle like mine and the handles are mounted horizontally unlike most if the others that mount vertically. Still haven't found the exact match yet.
I'll give you a ride to the top. what is interesting to me is the wasted space below. I'd be tempted to modify the 2nd and 4th partitions to get the maximum space. It must have been made for a specific purpose. strip it, paint it and treat it to a butcher block top. Cool piece!!
The paint is very thick. The blue has been brushed on over the original white. I think I will end up stripping the paint to refinish it. Hopefully there will be some kind of marking underneath all of the old paint.
I'm giving it one last try here. I did find a website specifically dedicated to old gas station item collecting. Even the experts there aren't exactly sure. A couple have speculated that it may originally have been the base cabinet for a "lube bar" from the '30's- '40's. If that were the case it would have had something like this mounted on it. While cleaning it I discovered that the blue paint came off fairly easily. So I stripped it all off. Surprisingly the speckled white coating underneath stayed on. Here is a picture of it all cleaned up. I'm still listening if anyone has any thoughts to add. Thanks.
WAG,,,,due to the general nature it,,2 compartments, each set up to hold separate items, R & L handed probably, my thinking is wheel alignment stuff. That's assuming it is automotive related,,,,
That's an interesting thought. I had tried searching old base cabinets for engine analyzer stations and alignment equipment (Bear, Hunter, etc) but no luck. I presume it was automotive given the rest of the stuff the guy had and the fact that he was a retired Ford mechanic. It also makes sense to me that it was probably painted blue to be in the Ford dealership. But still, I'm not really sure what it originally started as. Thanks for the input. I appreciate the thought.
All I can say is the right man now owns the piece(s). Good for you. Regards, Cosmo in the '49 1/2 ton
have you had it on its side yet?? as I have found part numbers on stickers or written on the underside of them written in crayon or marker one cabinet I have was labeled with a rubber stamp ( AC spark plugs but the cabinet was in good shape you could read the front easily and the internal racks kind of gave it away )
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