Earliest Price of Gasoline You Can Remember

Texas. 1972 when I was in the Army - 22.5¢ per gallon. Stuck in my mind because it did not end in .9.

My dad used to talk about getting 8 gallons for a buck.

Sometime in the 80s. “Regular” was not the Regular we have now. I remember Regular and Unleaded. Maybe one was 89.9 and the other was 99.9.

The lowest was during the Winter of 98/99 and the highest was a few years ago (I think).

the earliest I can remember is mid 70s and somewhere around ¢60. The earliest I had to pay for gas it was late 80s and gas was between ¢70 and ¢80/gal.

As a kid in the early 60s in Baltimore, I remember Dad paying 24.9¢ while at the station across the street, it cost a penny more!!

When I bought my first car, I was living in San Diego - about 1975, I think - and the cheapest I could find was 49.9¢ at a generic gas station. Then in '76, I was driving across Indiana on my way to Purdue, and it cost me around 75¢ or so, plus tax on top of that (shortly thereafter, Indiana included the tax in the pump price) and I remember people whining that soon, gas would cost a dollar a gallon!! ON NOES!!!

Of course, minimum wage was $2.30 at that time. If the same ratio existed today, gas would cost $2.35 or so a gallon - not much of a change there from a certain point of view.

27¢ a gallon in the late sixties, during gas wars. Stations would put out signs, “Gas War!” and they would cut prices to undercut their competitors down the block.

In 1986 in Pakistan, the first time I filled the tank on my new car I still remember the price of PKR 7.61 per liter. Equivalent of $2.21/gallon.

My first fill-up in the U.S. in Jan 1988 was at $1.03/gallon in the DC area.

This. Although I don’t remember this, but my father had a gas/service station (with curbside pumps, anybody remember them) in the 30s and around when I was born (1937) a gas war at 17c drove him into bankruptcy.

When I was in HS, it was always around a quarter. But in NJ, which had legal price fixing of gas, it was always 29.9. Now Jersey is one of the cheapest. And they pump it for you.

19.9 as the regular price. As low as 16.9 when there was a mild gas war. (There were major gas wars in the region where it got really low, just not at any station I saw.)

19.9c would be about $1.60+ now. I’ve paid less than that the last several fill ups.

57¢ back in the mid-70s, Texas. It stuck in my head because of the 57 varieties thing (I think).

29 cents a gallon, 1967. There was a gas station down the block from my house and I saw their sign every day of my life.

My family bought a big motorhome in either the summer of '72 or '73 but before the first oil crisis. I always remember my dad saying how it had a 70 gallon gas tank and when we picked it up from the dealership we drove to a gas station and the salesman filled the tank for us. I remember looking at the pump and it was $22 and change. So it must have been around 30¢ a gallon.

Then the price of gas shot up, my parents become upside down on the equity of the financed motorhome, argued constantly, sold it (at a loss I assume), and eventually got divorced*!* :smiley:

Ditto on both of these. When gas got to be over $1 a gallon, it was a big deal.

On Saturdays when I was in college, my dad would give me $20. I used to be able to fill the tank on my car, and have enough left over to go out for the evening.

I can’t remember the lowest I’ve personally seen it, but I do remember vowing I would never pay more than 50 cents a gallon. This was during the early 1970s oil embargo, and gas prices started climbing, but on the poor side of my West Texas town they seemed to still keep it just under that. I figured there’s always be cheap gas over there somewhere.

27 cents a gallon was the lowest once I started driving. I remember the odd price wars before that putting it as low as 22 or 23 but not being the one paying the bill I really didn’t pay very much attention.

More than the price I remember all the cool crap you got with the gas; especially since I’m sitting here having my coffee in an Esso mug. The hitch was that you got whatever it was after a fill-up (or X number of fill-ups) of 8 gallons or more and I rode a freaking motorcycle with only a 5 gallon tank. Our local Esso, Texaco and Sinclair places would count two of my stops as making the grade for the freebie and the others didn’t. So I stayed pretty loyal to the three of them.

The lowest price I can remember is (IIRC) 15 cents in South Carolina or Georgia around 1972. I was impressed by how much lower it was than in New York where I lived.

In 1991 I was paying £1.80 for an imperial gallon, so £1.50 for a US gallon. Back then it was around $1.90 to the £, so $2.85 per US gallon.

In 1972, I worked for my father in law for a few weeks pumping gas. The lowest price I remember from then was 22 cents a gallon

.38 in NJ when we came home after four years in Italy, our car came into the port in Newark and we had to fly out from IL to get it, I was fascinated by all the signs in english so paid close attention to all of them.

20 something and 9/10 cents, when I was a wee lad. 24.9?

.89 cents. It was usually around .99 cents in my area when I got my car in mid 90’s. Recently it was only $1.49 but of course I didn’t need any gas.