the history of the gas station, is on display at the Fisogni Service Station Museum

skip the first 45 seconds . This is just the first of several videos for those of us that can't travel to Milan Italy.

The museum is looking to sell the entire collection to an organization that can house it in a better exhibition center, but it isn't going to break up the collection

After nearly 40 years of hauling pumps across countries and borders, Mr. Fisogni faces a dilemma that often besets collectors of any other trinket: who will take over his precious possessions?

Mr. Fisogni's 26-year-old son, who works in a financial firm in Paris, says he has no interest. Mr. Fisogni says auctioneers have, over the years, offered to buy individual pieces, but he wants to keep his collection whole. The result is that Mr. Fisogni's compilation of gas pumps is gathering dust.

found on http://www.museo-fisogni.org/

A few kilometers' away from Milan, the Fisogni Museum displays an impressive collection exclusively dedicated to the history of filling stations: the petrol pumps, signboards, the compressors and tools which contributed to powering the world in the last two centuries.

 Today the Museum is composed by more than 8000 pieces divided among gasoline pumps (150), oil tanks (2.000), equipment like oil replacement, grease-cup, fire extinguisher, air compressor, etc. (2.500) and an incredible number of accessories, gadgets and toys, having the logos of the automotive companies from the beginning of the century.

The Museum provides also a very rich archive of technical design or advertising materials continually consulted by students and designers.

For the best article, bar none, about this collection, read http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10000872396390443991704577579492914779770.html?KEYWORDS=fisogni who does superb writing about car related things, and that surprises me. I always had the idea that the Wall Street Journal was a stodgy banking and investment newspaper. Well, I was wrong!