Local man befriends turtle near service station
FAIRBANK – “Watch out, kids, if you put your finger in there, you’d lose it,” Stephen Barbush warned two children. No, the children are not watching a dog, a lion or other ferocious animal that comes to mind when hearing a warning of that sort. They are peering into a grate, looking for the Fairbank turtle, a snapping turtle that has been spending his recent summers near the village landmark of Barbush’s Service Station.
“He’d think your fingers were hot dogs,” Barbush added. “Every morning I come out here and give him a hot dog. When he hears it drop into the water, he usually comes out to eat it.”
Barbush has spent the last 14 summers feeding his new buddy. He knows it’s the same turtle because one of his friends dropped red paint on its back years ago. Barbush’s photographs of the turtle show a creature with about a 10-inch diameter shell.
“He’s vicious. He gets muddy, and if we try to scrape the mud off to make sure he’s the same turtle, he gets real mad,’ said Barbush.
Every May the turtle makes its way into the intersection, occupying one of two grates in front of the station. It seems the turtle has a system as he stays in the grate filled with water during the day and the grate with a mud floor in the evening. The rest of his time is spent in the pipe between the two grates.
Barbush admits that he does not know where the turtle resides during the winter months. The safest guess is the nearest creek, but it lies across New Salem Road, a far distance for a small turtle.
Barbush also has no idea why the turtle decided to camp out in this particular grate. One can only imagine that the turtle comes for the hot dogs, but in addition, it might stay for the conversation and camaraderie that take place in front of the service station.
Barbush and his buddies August Tokish, George Feverio, Ron Porreca, Steve Rosneck and Albert Apicella play pinochle daily at a table, complete with kitchen chairs and an umbrella, that is set up outside the station.
“The guys play pinochle here every day from one to six. They put in a shift, you could say. …If there are enough players, I go home and do some work there. This is just a hobby for me,” Barbush said, referring to his duties at the service station.
A tree now grows where the gas pump used to stand. In 1998, the pump had to be removed to comply with a new state mandate.
“That ruined it for everyone. They’d pull into the station and I’d take care of them, pump their gas, check their oil.”
Despite the lack of a gas pump, the service station continues to be the hub of Fairbank. Passersby stop and chat with Barbush, the intersection is the yearly home of a giant Christmas tree, and Barbush continues to help others in the community during the holidays.