East Lyme — The original Trakas gas station in 1931 was not much bigger than an outhouse, but George Trakas, the 90-year-old second owner of the business, recalls that his father had enough room for a case to sell candy.

Only problem was that the neighborhood kids would hide in the bushes, waiting for his dad, Theodore, or mom, Victoria, to step away for a few minutes so they could run in and steal as much as they could carry away.

"The profit wasn't there," Trakas laughed.

But the business soldiered on, and as cars proliferated the little building was moved, added onto and, in 1950, was torn down to make way for a new concrete-block garage and gas station. George said they did only minor repairs and oil changes.

"We took only what we could handle," he said.

Then, in 1990, the garage made way for a modern convenience store and updated self-serve pumps that stand today as Trakas' Sunoco Food Mart.

Dan said the change was necessary as automobiles became more complex and he and his uncle decided to bow out of the repair business but needed the extra income a convenience store could offer.

"There's no such thing as just a gas station anymore," he said. "You need to do one or the other."

Last week, the Trakas family celebrated the 85th anniversary of their business, and though it wasn't the first gas station in town — a few agriculture-related stops predated it but no longer exist — the Pennsylvania Avenue fuel purveyor is the longest-running Sunoco station in the nation, according to Josh Carlisle, New England area distribution manager for the company.

"The next closest is 70-something (years)," Carlisle said.

Actually, said current owner Dan Trakas, George's nephew, the family initially was a distributor for the now defunct Tidewater Oil Co. Their affiliation with Sunoco started a couple of years later, but has been unbroken ever since.

Still, the company presented a plaque to George noting 85 years of brand loyalty. The elder Trakas also enjoyed cakes noting his 90th birthday and the station's 85th year.

George recalls pumping gas in the early days for a price of $1 for 10 gallons — 10 cents a gallon.

"Here's two bucks — fill it up," he remembers customers telling him.

At the beginning, said Dan, pictures show Pennsylvania Avenue as unpaved — just packed dirt in which horses shared the road with cars. Any improvements to the gas-station property was done by hand because heavy equipment for moving dirt and rocks was not available, he said.

"Nothing was handed to you," George said. "We had to get up every day and work."

Luckily for him, that was right next door, since the family had built a home in 1927 after moving from New London. They also owned cabins behind the business that they rented out in the summer.

The main artery in those days, George said, was Boston Post Road because Interstate 95 wasn't even on the drawing boards — that would be well over two decades down the pike.

Dan pointed out that the Trakas gas station survived the Great Depression that started in 1929. And then World War II brought its own problems because steel was in short supply for making automobiles and gas was rationed.

The station survived because of attention to detail, such as the proper way to wash car windows, a method that George explained as Dan mimed with his hands the motions he first learned from his uncle.

"I got people coming in here (who tell their friends) ... 'I don't care if you're 30 miles away, go to Trakas,'" George said.

"It's one of the few stations that still offers full serve," said Steve Maley, New England marketing manager for SEI Fuels, which distributes gas for Sunoco.

Sunoco is a 130-year-old American company that has remained independent through the years and has never had dealings with the OPEC oil cartel, Maley added. The company started creating fuel stations in 1922, but few of the stations have survived and any that did were not loyal to the Sunoco brand as long as the Trakases have been, said Carlisle, the company executive who appeared for the family's 85th anniversary celebration last week.

George Trakas, who speaks with his nephew nearly every day about the gas station, said loyalty to customers as well as business associates has been a key part of the family's longevity in Niantic.

"It was a family, and we treated you as family as well," Trakas said.

l.howard@theday.com