MEXICO – For more than 50 years, area people have filled up their vehicles at a gas station along River Road in Mexico.

But on Friday, that fill-up will be the last.

Irving Oil’s dealer representative, Greg Miller, said Thursday that the company is closing the gas station for strategic and economic reasons.

“The site needs a lot of work, and it has a lot of limits for what can be done,” he said.

The pumps and building will be taken down next week, and four people will lose their jobs.

One brand of gasoline or another has been offered at that site for more than 50 years.

Donna and Butch Towle of Towle’s Hardware in Dixfield have been managing the station for about four years.

“Most of us feel very badly about it, but we couldn’t float another business,” she said.

The Towles also operate a convenience store and gas station at Weld Street and Route 2 in downtown Dixfield.

Donna said the couple plans to break ground on a new, larger convenience store at a lot next to their Dixfield store in the spring that will provide expanded gas pumps and parking, and in two years, the couple hope to remodel the nearly 100-year-old hardware business.