Eddie Highlander pumped gas, changed oil, fixed tires, ran a business, told jokes, helped people and touched countless lives for the better. He was like a favorite neighbor to many, even though they dwelled nowhere near his home. But at the corner of Branch and Third Streets in Platte City, on Missouri 92 highway and at a key turnoff to get to the square and the courthouse, we all frequently passed Bud’s 66 service station, stopped in, and were honorary neighbors.
Thus, sadness for many but gladness for knowing him when word of his passing quietly spread. That so many felt deeply about it is a testament to a humble man who was simply a fun and good person as he ran a traditional old-time gas station. Or perhaps I should say service station, as was the term a few decades ago. Back then, when you pulled up to the pumps someone washed the windshield as they pumped gas for you. You got friendly service at Bud’s 66.
Charles Edward “Eddie” Highlander, 86, of rural Platte County died Sept. 1, 2021. His funeral service was Sept. 3, and his burial was at Pleasant Ridge Cemetery at Weston.
I didn’t learn of his passing till the day of the funeral. The ladies who work at Ron Pine’s barbershop passed the word to another customer and me. A life fully and well lived need not be grieved too much. But when someone you counted on as a fixture in the community for many years passes, you pause and remember. I am still encountering people who appreciated Eddie who had not heard. So, here’s a few words about him.
Many people knew him since he started working at Bud’s in the 1950s and through the decades after he bought and ran the business. My first encounter was in 1981 as a newcomer in Platte County. Something folksy about the little gas station close to the road on a steep hillside was attractive. Eddie, Bud and the help were easy going. The gas cost a few cents more there than at other places. But that old-time service made it seem worth it. Plus, I quickly learned that if you were in a pickle with a car that wouldn’t run or a flat tire when you needed to be somewhere, Bud’s was a reliable place. Eddie set that workplace culture. He would not be run over by someone unpleasant. But if you were a polite and thoughtful person, he’d do what he could to help. Good for business, but it was about more than business.
Some people pulled up to the pumps under that single car overhang to get fuel and because maybe something funny, familiar, or a moment that felt like community would happen. You never knew who might be sitting inside with a cup of coffee, perhaps Ralph the hay man, a judge from the courthouse, a farmer waiting on a tractor tire repair, a few retirees from TWA, or a stranger wondering what kind of station they had stopped at.
Charles, Bud’s son, would often pump gas. Eddie’s patience with Charles is something heartening to remember. But often it was Eddie himself walking up to the driver’s door, smiling, saying howdy, answering the requested fuel with a long drawl “all right.” If you were a regular, perhaps a discussion of the weather, the news, updates on how well his beloved grandson was doing in college, and so forth. When he was taking his time with you, Eddie had a dry, wry, way of speaking whether it was to make a humorous quip or perhaps to alert you that you waited so long to change the oil in your Ford pickup that he had to use kerosene to get it to drain.
For example, as Eddie bent over a friend’s windshield with the squeegee.
Eddie: “Rex, there sure is a lot of bugs on this windshield.”
Rex: “Well Eddie, there’s a lot of bugs between here and St. Joseph.”
Eddie: “Not nearly as many as there used to be.”
Some years ago, people packed the old high school gym at what’s now the Platte City Community Center for a surprise roast of Eddie. I can’t remember if it was his retirement or a birthday. But the place was full. The stories came forth and no one had people laughing more than Eddie.
When I started asking about him in the 1980s, people would tell me that he was known for going to houses to help elderly ladies get their car started on cold winter days, or he’d take somebody some gas. The wonderful picture taken by photographer Bill Hankins of Eddie talking on the telephone, standing just inside the front door with the hand painted Bud’s 66, is very true to form. Someone close to me once backed a rear wheel off an embankment beside a driveway. Unsure what to do, she called Eddie at the station. He came and got her unstuck, probably for little or no charge.
Eddie grew lots of tomatoes in summer and shared. The only time I ever had fresh cracklins, deep fried in hog fat, was after the Highlander relatives had their annual early winter hog butchering on his brother’s farm. Some were available on the station counter, near the monthly charge tab pads alongside the cash register. They were pretty good.
Others knew Eddie Highlander longer and better than me. Their eloquent remembrances on the Hixson-Klein funeral home guest book for his obituary are accurate and heartwarming. Well worth reading. Like all things about the man, pretty good.