In addition to the clown described in this post, Magic Forest in Lake George, NY has 3 other Muffler Men.  The owner refers to this one as “Pecos Bill.” It is not known where this statue came from or how long it has been at Magic Forest.  Pecos Bill was heavily modified at some point.  His chaps, vest, beard, and large droopy hat are unique.  The owner said that the hat seems to sag a little lower each year.  This Muffler Man is one of 4 or 5 that have long sleeves.  I have not been able to determine if these sleeves were original or a later addition.

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Ray Carr from Cleveland’s WCSB 89.3 did another phone interview with me for his radio show on April 29, 2014.  We chatted about my latest roadtrip from Phoenix to San Francisco where the American Giants team got to see and shoot a number of Muffler Men.  One of the high points of the trip was the stop in Pahrump, NV to see the former Texaco Big Friend.  There are only a handful of these statues left.  I also spoke about my favorite stop on this trip which was in Hayward, CA where Bruce Kennedy has a collection of four Muffler Men.  I really appreciate Bruce’s taking time to share the stories behind each statue and letting us get some unique shots of each of them.

 As I did with my first interview with Ray Carr, I have added video footage to the audio so that listeners have visual references to what is being discussed.  Carr’s program features in-depth, live interviews with movers-and-shakers: politicians, journalists, athletes, and folks like me who are interested in Americana. He also features rare oldies music and comedy from the 1950s and 1960s. It was a pleasure to be on his show.

The high point of our West Coast trip was our stop in Hayward, CA at Bell Plastics.  The company’s owner, Bruce Kennedy, has been collecting Muffler Men for a few years now.  His first statue was “Big Mike,” a Muffler Man which has been in Hayward for a very long time. The statue was installed in the 1960’s on Mission Boulevard at the Morris Car Wash. Big Mike held a giant scrub brush at that location. When the Tyre Treads tire store moved in the building, the statue’s scrub brush was replaced with a muffler. The tire store closed in 2010 and the following year, Kennedy bough the statue and moved it to a temporary location. The public found out where it was stored and Kennedy had to hide the statue until the restoration was complete. When Big Mike was restored and delivered to Bell Plastics, he received a big welcome which included press coverage. Shortly after the statue was installed at its new home, Kennedy came in to work one morning and discovered a brand new axe wrapped in paper.  A note was attached to the axe that read “For Big Mike.”  Since the axe is a little too big to fit the statue’s hands, it is displayed in the company’s office.

 After restoring Big Mike, Kennedy was bitten by the Muffler Man bug.  He began prowling the internet for more of them.   He particularly wanted a Cowboy statue. He finally found one for sale in Kansas City, KS. This was one of the last Muffler Men statues made by International Fiberglass.  It was located at a gas station in Boonville, MO from at least 1972 until the late 1990s. It may have been originally installed at a Phillips 66 gas station but I haven’t found any evidence of this. During this time, the cowboy’s hat bore the letters “MU” indicating his support for the University of Missouri.

In 2000, the statue was sold at auction to David Disney for $9,800.  He planned to donate the statue to the Kansas City Children’s Museum.  That never happened and the statue languished in storage for 13 years until it was sold to Kennedy in 2013.  The statue was in bad shape when it arrived in Hayward.  However, it was completely restored and installed in front of Bell Plastics just a few months later.  The statue’s face has uncharacteristic airbrushed details.  Kennedy calls this statue “Big Don.”

Next, Kennedy acquired a Paul Bunyan style Muffler Man from Paramount, CA.  This statue is painted in the original colors with a red shirt and blue pants.  There is some damage to the statue’s shoulder and back which Kennedy plans to repair.  The statue came with a steel platform, as well as an axe and pickaxe. Kennedy has not restored this statue yet but it stands of the lot at Bell Plastics and goes by the name of “Fix-it”. 

Photo used with permission. Scott Phillips

Kennedy’s goal is to have one of each Muffler Man model.  Since he already had a Cowboy and two Paul Bunyans, he was thrilled to find a Half Wit model in Flint, MI for sale on eBay.  This statue was originally installed in the mid-1960s at the Poor Boy’s Pantry in Kansas City, MO.  In the early 1980s, it was repainted and given a Hawaiian shirt.  In 1997, the statue was purchased by Bob Perani and installed in Flint at the Dort Mall which he owned.  Kennedy bought the statue from the Perani family and plans to restore the statue.  He will restore it with the Hawaiian shirt paint job.  Kennedy has named the statue “Hollywood” since it briefly appeared in the 2008 movie “Semi Pro.”

My friend Neto and I spent six hours at Bell Plastics getting the histories of each statue from Kennedy.  He also allowed me to use his scissor lift to get close-up shots for my “American Giants” videos.  I plan to launch the second season of the series with footage of Kennedy’s collection.  We had a great time there and I can’t thank Bruce Kennedy enough for playing host and letting us document these statues. 

Special thanks to Debra Jane Seltzer for her editing help with this article. RoadsideArchitecture.com  

A few months ago, I found out that my job was sending me to a broadcasters’ convention in Las Vegas. I decided that this was a great opportunity to take a Muffler Man road trip. Neto and I made plans to fly first to Phoenix.  From there, we would pick up a one way car rental to San Jose and visit 14 Muffler Men along the way and ending with Bruce Kennedy’s collection of Muffler Men in Hayward.

Our first Muffler Man destination was in Prescott, AZ. This statue was first mentioned on RoadsideAmerica.com in 1998.  However, it has actually been in Prescott since the early 1970s. It was originally one of the dozens of cowboys built for Phillips 66 gas stations by International Fiberglass. The statue was moved around in the late 1960s for various Phillips 66 gas station Grand Openings in northern Arizona. When Phillips 66 ended the promotion, the statue was purchased in 1970 and installed in front of Big Johnson Realty.  The statue has been there since then.  When the city changed the level of the street, the statue was kept in place at the original height.  If it had been raised, it would have been in violation of the city’s sign ordinances.  In the summer of 2013, a new business moved into the building next to the statue.  Gamers Trading Post added a few Magic: The Gathering playing cards to the statue’s right hand.

Our next Muffler Man stop was in Flagstaff to see the legendary Louie the Lumberjack. He was one of the first, if not the very first, Muffler Men ever made. Bob Prewitt of Prewitt Fiberglass in Lawndale, CA made the original Muffler Man statue for a customer in Sacramento.  When that deal fell through, he sold the statue to the Lumberjack Cafe on Route 66 in Flagstaff.  The statue was installed around 1964.  Shortly after this, Prewitt sold the lumberjack mold and some animal statue molds to International Fiberglass. In the late 1960s, the owners of the Lumberjack Café ordered a second Muffler Man from International Fiberglass.  The two statues remained at the restaurant until it closed in 1971, they were then donated to Northern Arizona University.  The older of the two statues stands outside Walkup Skydome.  The other statue is installed inside the building in the football field’s end zone.

Upon our arrival we looked the statues over carefully and noticed that they were made very differently. The original is all one piece while the second statue comes apart at the arms, head and waist.  The second statue also has the International Fiberglass stamp on its leg. Both statues have the original axes.  I hopped on top of a roll of football turf inside the dome for a photo to give a size comparison of how big these statues really are. Although it looks small standing in the end zone, Muffler Men are incredibly big.

We loaded up again and continued our trek north stopping in Pahrump, NV to see one of the last remaining Texaco Big Friends. I photographed this statue back in 2011 not realizing that his days were numbered. Sometime after Texaco
stopped using these statues, this one found its way from Las Vegas area to Pahrump.  Most of these Big Friends were scrapped but this statue was transformed into a green giant. The statue was installed on top of a sign at Valley Homes, a mobile home dealership. Things went well for many years until his owner got in trouble with the law and sadly ended up in prison. When I was there in 2011, I saw that the statue was still in place and in good shape other than a square hole in its back.  In 2012, the sign and statue were removed and carted off to the dump in an effort to clean up the town I suppose.  The statue’s sudden disappearance sparked interest in its history and what had become of it.  Journalists from the local newspapers discovered and published information about these statues which they found at RoadsideAmerica.com and my blog. The Pahrump Landfill started getting phone calls, including a few from me, about the statue and started to realize this was no ordinary statue.  Although the giant was badly damaged during its removal, the manager decided to hang onto it and for that he should have Muffler Man named after him or something.  Eventually he passed the statue on to the Pahrump Valley Museum for future restoration.  When Neto and I arrived we were told that the statue was still in storage but we got to take some photos of it.  The museum would like to restore the statue at some point which will require some effort and money due to it’s poor condition.  One of the statue’s arms and one of the hands has been ripped off.  The statue’s torso is torn in half.  The legs have also been detached and a shoe is missing.  Maybe one day, this statue will reappear as either a Texaco Big Friend or as the Valley Homes Giant once more.

Our next stop Muffler Man stop was more than 400 miles away in Merced, CA.  There, we saw a Service Man model that has seen better days. The Agriculture Museum next to the statue appears to have been closed for a while.  We then moved on to San Jose to see Babe the Muffler Man.  This statue was installed at Babe’s Muffler and Brake in the 1960s.  It was one of three identical statues purchased for this local chain of San Jose auto repair shops.  One of the statues was burned down in the early 1990s by a local gang. The other statue was removed because of a local sign ordinance. The torso, head and arms were attached to the roof of a car which was driven around town to advertise for the three shops until it fell into disrepair.

After San Jose, we headed to Hayward to see Bruce Kennedy’s collection of Muffler Men.  I’ll cover that stop in the next blog post.

I want to thank all the people along the way who took the time to talk to us and share their stories and history on the giants. Also special thanks to the Pahrump Museum for allowing us to go see the giant off site. Thanks to Debra Jane Seltzer for her help in editing. 

If you like giant fiberglass statues, then Magic Forest in Lake George, NY is the place for you. This fairy tale theme park has four Muffler Men and many other statues.  Magic Forest opened in 1963.  It features a 40 foot tall Uncle Sam statue which is the twin to the one in Ottawa Lake, MI.  There is also a Santa statue, an 11 foot tall Tire Salesman, a Caveman, and three modified A&W Root Beer Family statues.  All of these statues were produced by International Fiberglass which made the Muffler Men.

In addition, there are many statues that were produced by other fiberglass companies including an Archer, a couple of Astronauts, an Indian, a Caveman and a Cavewoman, several storybook characters, as well as various animals.  Many of Magic Forest’s statues, including at least one of the Muffler Men and the Uncle Sam, came from the Danbury Fair which was located in Danbury, CT and closed in 1982.

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I’ve mentioned Texaco Big Friend statues in a previous post at this blog.  Of all the Muffler Men statues that International Fiberglass produced, I find these to be the most intriguing. About 300 of these statues were produced in 1966.  However, nearly all of them are gone now.

I recently came across a TV commercial from 1966 on YouTube.com.  It shows how Texaco planned to use the statues in its advertising campaign. Texaco service station attendants were portrayed as your car’s “Big Friend.” While this commercial was being aired, the giant statues were being deployed around the country. However, for reasons that are still unknown, Texaco changed its mind about the statues.  While the TV commercial was still being aired a year later, the statues had all been removed from the company’s gas stations.  It is believed that those statues and the ones that were still in storage were destroyed.

To my knowledge, there are only four Big Friend statues that escaped Texaco’s purge.  They are located in Oregon, Idaho, Arkansa and Nevada.  Three of those statues have either been heavily modified or damaged, while the one in AR has been fully restored.  Recently, I was contacted by Ryan Lindstrom who lives in Chicago.  He owns a well-preserved Big Friend head which was bought at a antique shop in Georgia in the 1980s.  He is considering displaying the head at Route 66 exhibits in the future.

For more about Texaco Big Friends, see this blog post.  Texaco also produced Big Friend signs.  If you missed it, you might enjoy the recent Ray Carr Show interview which covers a lot of Muffler Men topics as well as the Texaco Big Friends and more pictures then are shown here.