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Carl Light, Ozark Auto Sales
When they asked me in high school, “What do you want to be?” I said “I want to be a used car dealer.” That’s really what I said. I said I want to have a used car lot in Lebanon, Missouri.
I was born in Lebanon at Breech Hospital. Growing up, my whole family were car people, mechanics, body men, you know, that’s what we did. We didn’t farm. We didn’t join the army. We worked on cars.
I have been dealing in used cars for 25 years. I have owned this lot on West Commercial for 12 or 13 years now. The White Rose gas station was on this spot in the 1930s. In 1961 this building opened up as a FINA station. Franklin and Sons FINA, “the fine folks at FINA” as they used to say. This lot has been a service station or a car lot for the last 100 years. My Uncle Bill actually owned it for a little bit and had Walter’s Service Center. I guess this place is in my blood. For as long as I can remember I’ve wanted this particular spot. I rented it for a few years, and when it came up for sale, I wasn’t sure I was ready to go all in, but my wife, Christy, said, “Honey, you need to go for it!” So we went for it and we are still here today.
I wouldn’t want to be anywhere else. I love being downtown. You can walk to the tire shop, you can walk to a restaurant, you see people walking around and meet people. I just love being downtown. I am living my dream in downtown Lebanon.
Carl Light, Ozark Auto Sales
And check out Carl on YouTube! He does videos of some of the cars that come on to the lot!
