Georgetown’s Hat ‘n’ Boots sculptures have been resting at Oxbow Park for several years. The hat, once glorious, now rests in a perpetual state of decay. Attempts to save it have been made, and then thwarted. Yet, the Hat ‘n’ Boots continue to be fiercely admired by all who encounter them.
Georgetown’s Hat ‘n’ Boots sculptures, constructed in 1954, are comprised of steel beams, chicken wire, concrete, and plaster. Buford Seals, a former WW II vet and army-surplus salesman, built the structures himself upon envisioning a western-themed mega-mall. Frontier Village Shopping Center would cost $2 million and would carry just fewer than 200 stores. Says Seals of his bizarrely immense testaments to cowboy living, “I always like Western get ups.”
Tragically, Seals’ funds ran dry before The Village was completed. (Incidentally, Seals moved to San Diego, where he started a prosperous candy store, tooled around town in a white stretch limo, and consistently wore identical Western outfits as his sweetheart Bernice-- a former circus acrobat.) But the Premium Tex gas station to which the Hat ‘n’ Boots served as a landmark flourished. The monolithic Hat ‘n’ Boots were to mark the Village’s gas station. Consistently painted a rich red, the 44-foot tall cowboy hat and its 60-foot brim span housed the pump shelter, and a pair of 22-foot high cowboy boots contained the separate men’s and lady’s restrooms. Resting alongside the boisterous Highway 99, within just one week of its opening, the Premium Tex tied with the most popular Washington-state gas station. And for the next three years, the Hat ‘n’ Boots became the number-one fuel stop in the state. While other stations sold 15,000 gallons of gas per month, Hat ‘n’ Boots was pumping a tremendous 300,000 gallons per month.
Elvis was even rumored to have stopped at the Hat ‘n’ Boots gas station in 1962, presumably while filming “It Happened at the World’s Fair”. What thoughts saturated The King’s mind as he walked amongst the shadows cast by these now-forgotten relics, we can only speculate.
The Hat ‘n’ Boots Premium Texaco Gas Station’s golden days were numbered. The completion of Interstate 5 Freeway yielded a swifter route, travelers swayed, traffic waned, and our beloved roadside attraction slowly went out of business.
In some ways, the Hat ‘n’ Boots up and died while the interstate highway system redefined American travel. Since the gas station’s closure, the Hat ‘n’ Boots have been shuffled from one weary locale to the next. Half of the sculpture lies in a neglected state of disrepair: the cowboy hat has been grimly reduced to its support structure—it is now, literally, a steel-beam skeleton of the triumphant icon it once was. Various plans to rescue this monument have swelled, and then flopped. For instance, in 2006, desperate volunteers draped the hat’s steel-beam remains with flowers as part of a failed attempt to raise restoration-funding awareness.
But all hope is not entirely wasted: the boot set has luckily regained its cheerful coloring and jaunty contours following the success of a 2006 restoration.
The Hat ‘n’ Boots rests upon Georgetown’s Oxbow Park, which is located on the 6400 block between Carleton Avenue South and Corson Ave South.
For further information, visit http://www.hatnboots.org/
