Back in the day, that billboard used to be on the west side of I-5 closer to Centralia, and it was much, much bigger and very well-constructed. You could tell it was someone’s specific labor of love to build a personal vehicle for broadcasting their messages of hate. And the messages, while very much of the same right wing bent as today, were often enough at least somewhat witty. That was back in the era when archconsevative wackos were still regarded, at least around here, as more or less marginal cranks and “characters”, rather than the base of one of our major political parties.
The original owner died and the sign fell into disrepair and was eventually dismantled. At some point thereafter the present permutation popped up. The only part of the original left is the Uncle Sam face, which has always seemed very out of place on the tiny reader board of today with it’s pallid and banal MAGAesque slogan recycling.
A bit further south, still in Lewis County, are also the remnants of Gospodor Monument Park. Back in it’s short-lived heyday, it had spotlights at night and a huge “permanent” flame blazoned from one of the tall towers.
Since the demise of the original billboard and the monument, that stretch of I-5 is just another segment of freeway, notwithstanding the countryside is pleasant and you can still get a great burger at Mrs. Beesley’s.
If I recall correctly, it was not a billboard but a pair of them, so that NB and SB traffic would both be able to easily see the message (not entirely sure that both were the same). And the state had a law against billboards but the original owner somehow made it under that law.
True, it was two billboards in a sort of V configuration, with one side facing each direction. And as I recall, there’d always be different messages on each side. As I drove by and read it from one direction I’d try to read the other side through my rear view mirror.
Hmm, not sure about a gas station. But if it was there I must’ve seen it, as I’ve driven that stretch countless times over the years. Might you be thinking of an outfit just north of the Cowlitz River crossing on the east side of the freeway? It had a sign right by the highway with a pedestal on which sat two trucks that had been put together backend against backend, so it looked like a truck with two front ends. I always thought it was a wrecking yard.