After 8 decades, Balboa Island fuel dock is Newport Harbor’s scuttlebutt central
With a steady flow of pedestrians on one side and boat access on the other, Island Marine Fuel is like the Newport Harbor version of a barbershop, where you can get the lowdown on most things local.
“If you want know what’s going on around the harbor, you go to the fuel dock,” said Island Marine Fuel operator David Beek. “Customers come in to get the fish report, boating weather conditions or any other scuttlebutt.”
Beek sometimes feels like the dock, at 406 S. Bay Front on Balboa Island, is also a tourist information center.
“Tourists come in to ask where the fish are, where the whales are, where the ocean is, the Newport Pier and the Wedge, and some don’t realize they are on an island,” he said. “Sooner or later, the whole world walks into our store. Tourists come from Japan, Russia, and when they don’t speak English, we communicate using sign language or I’m always drawing maps to show them where to go.”
Newport Harbor is one of the largest small-boat harbors in the world, with about 11,000 registered vessels. Island Marine Fuel is the only mini-mart on the harbor that can supply beer, wine, ice, fresh limes and, of course, marine products.
The site has been owned by Beek’s family since 1936, when his grandfather Joseph established Island Marine Fuel as a Shell station. Joseph Beek also established the Balboa Island Ferry in 1919.
“In the first few decades, my grandfather would hire someone to manage the day-to-day operations,” Beek said. “Joe Beek was not ... on the dock pumping fuel.”
Bob Bisbee then leased the facility from the family and ran his own operation for a couple of decades before the Beeks got back in the fuel dock business in the early 1990s.
David Beek, who had managed a Home Depot in Santa Ana before starting his own business as a manufacturer representative for home and garden products, took over the fuel dock in 2000 at the request of his father, Seymour.
“In my wildest dreams I never thought I’d be running a fuel dock,” Beek said. “After reviewing the operations, I saw the potential from what it had once been and I wanted to bring it up to the glory days from the ‘70s and ‘80s when it was a 76 station operated by Bisbee.”
Beek, however, was unable to continue with the 76 brand because Unocal was no longer supporting the marine fuel business. About the same time, a representative of Valvetect — which was like the Chevron of the water on the East Coast — contacted Beek about expanding to the West Coast. He agreed.
Not knowing what to do with the big orange 76 ball, Beek got a massive crane to remove it and load it onto a ferry boat and then stored it in a ferry parking lot. He decided to place an ad on eBay, and a day later, a collector of gas station memorabilia bought it for a couple of hundred dollars.
“It lives on somewhere,” Beek said with a laugh.
After cleaning and re-merchandising the store, introducing the Valvetect diesel fuel product and training a crew, the store was ready. “Seymour runs the ferry and I run the fuel dock,” Beek said.
Assistant manager Danny Knowles, originally from Virginia, has been working at Island Marine Fuel for three years. “I love my job,” he said. “It’s always entertaining, every day is different. Customers are always in a good mood because it’s hard to be mad when you’re on a boat. And it has the most beautiful scenery, like being able to enjoy the sunset after closing down after a busy day.”
Newport Beach resident Michael Jarvis said he’s a longtime customer of Island Marine Fuel because of its great service. His wife, Tamerra, agreed, adding with a smile, “I’m ... here just for the coffee — it’s free and it’s a really good cup of coffee.”
The crew also works to prevent boating collisions. “We refer to it as air traffic control — managing inbound and outbound boats and avoiding catastrophes,” Beek said.
The team even has had to rescue boaters who have fallen overboard.
“Once, a boater who didn’t know how to stop his boat ended up bouncing back and forth between the ferry [dock, about 25 feet away] and our dock a few times,” Beek said.
Sometimes the crew is required to head off a catastrophe of another kind. Some boaters have had to be reminded to put their bathing suits back on.
Susan Hoffman is a contributor to Times Community News.
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