Vick"s Corner owner ‘pumped" about life at the Lakes

Almost eight decades later, it"s still going strong.

"We used to be on the south side of Highway 9," says Layton Vick, son of the late Layton C. Vick. "They started the station, had a restaurant, a little bitty cafe across the road. The cafe was a little hamburger shop that may have had one of first drive-up windows in the Iowa Great Lakes."

The family lived above the station. It was Layton"s home all through high school.

Four decades ago the family moved the station north across Highway 9. It coincided with the family"s purchase of a farm there.

The move north across the road put them in Diamond Lake Township, a township likely named by Vick"s great grandfather, Peter Vick, after he immigrated and homesteaded there.

"I think it was named for the way it glistened in the sun," says Vick.

Glistening in the sun these days is the bright red/orange roof at Vick"s Corner, a signature look that helps the full-service station stand out on the busy northwest corner of Highways 9 and 86.

"This is the original building and we maintain it as much as possible," says Vick, who graduated from Spirit Lake High School in 1959 and left town for 18 months to attend the American Institute of Business in Des Moines. He returned 18 months later and helped run the station following his father"s death.

"Another thing we"ve tried to maintain is our full-service," he says. "It shocks the dickens out of people when I come out to pump their gas."

The highest gas price he"s seen here is $3.89 per gallon, a level reached in 2008. The lowest? It was well below $1, but it was so long ago Vick can"t recall the year.

In the 1970s, Vick started hosting antique shows and flea markets at the 10.29-acre site. Several thousand deal seekers traipse through the grounds during the "season"s" three holiday weekends: Memorial Day, July 4 and Labor Day. What began with a handful of dealers has bloomed to include 99.

"We"ve maxed out the space in our grove for them," said Vick.

The station"s interior is also maxed out, something passersby can see as the doors are almost always up. Beyond parts and necessities there"s food (like microwave sandwiches), soda, beer, water and more. Part of the cooler space is outside, a move Vick said his Vick"s Corner image necessitated.

"We did not want to build a new building because it might destroy our image," he said. "We"re proud we look this way and that we"ve been here this long."

It appears Vick"s Corner won"t soon go away. Vick, 67, has no intention of retiring. He and wife Dee still enjoy making the 60-foot walk from their home to the station at 6 o"clock each morning. They"re open until 11 p.m. in the summer, a season where the intersection serves as a marker for hundreds of thousands of motorists, a percentage of which will occasionally need something at Vick"s Corner.

A burden to be here? Hardly.

"The wife and I pretty much run the place ourselves," said Vick. "We"re doing the whole nine yards, selling pop, beer, live bait and tackle. We"ll put in a quart of oil, but only if they buy the oil from us."

EMT

Layton Vick, owner/operator of Vick"s Corner in Spirit Lake, Iowa, took an EMT course years ago as his business was located on a busy highway. "The main reason I did it was because of the accidents we used to have out here," said Vick. "It has paid off. I"ve assisted at some accidents."

Vick also went with an EMT group to present training sessions at schools and hospitals.

Vick"s Corner is located at the intersection of Highways 9