RAYNOR'S Shell Service Station in Southampton is truly a family business. One of Bermuda's few independent gas stations, it was founded by Reginald Steed Raynor on November 10, 1958. He was 46 at the time. His son, Reginald Raynor, who now owns and operates the station, took it over in 2000, when by coincidence, he was exactly the same age.

Mr. Raynor, Sr. was a mechanic, who worked first at Kings Point in Southampton, where he was foreman. He decided to open the station on property he and his family owned. "There's Raynors all around here," Mr. Raynor, Jr. said.

At about the time his father made the application to start his garage, another application went in from a Mr. Sousa to start an Esso station not far down the road. Mr. Raynor, Sr. was turned down on the grounds that the two stations would be too close together. This was 1958; formal desegregation was still a year away.

"It was the mindset of the country at the time," Mr. Raynor, Jr. commented.

His father's mind was set on opening a garage, so with E.T. Richards, the first Premier of Bermuda as his attorney, Mr. Raynor, Sr. set about obtaining the right to open his station.

He won his case and the station has been there ever since. He ran it himself for 32 years, and in 1990 leased it out to a non-family member, in whose hands it remained until 1996, when Mr. Raynor, Sr. passed away. Among the by-laws the father had arranged for the company that owns the station was a rule that it could not be sold outside his family.

The station thus became the property of Mr. Raynor, Jr., his four brothers and a cousin. At the time, Mr. Raynor, Jr. was running a brown and white lunch wagon called "Red She's", at the foot of King Street in Hamilton, and owned his own taxi.

"I had always wanted to go into the business with my father," Mr. Raynor said. "He kept a tight rein on things." Mr. Raynor bought out his fellow shareholders one by one, selling his taxi to buy the last shares in the company and make it his own.

The station is a success, and next year will be extended backwards, and a patio added over the pumps to modernise the entire establishment. Mr. Raynor expects to close for a period while the renovations are carried out. Bermuda's taxi drivers will not be pleased to hear this; the seven per cent fuel discount that Mr. Raynor offers cab drivers, having been one himself, will be unavailable while the station is closed.

"Since I used to drive taxis, I can empathise with their problems and am glad to offer them a discount," he said.

Behind the station is a body shop that Mr. Raynor rents out. The station itself sells accessories and some parts, refreshments (including a particularly tasty barley soup), newspapers and, of course, Shell fuel.

Shell has a high opinion of Mr. Raynor's station. Like many large companies, it sends out staff members, disguised as ordinary people, to test the service levels at Bermuda's gas stations. The unannounced company visitors are known as "mystery motorists", and do not identify themselves. They rate the gas stations and report back. Mr. Raynor's station was the Bermuda champion for 2001 and won a prize of $1,000.

The atmosphere at Raynor's Shell Station during a busy working morning is very much community-based. Mr. Raynor knows all his customers by name, provides help when needed, and relies on his "new-found friend Pamela Fubler, who does so many things around here". Ms Fubler works alongside Mr. Raynor and the company's five other employees, who work a shift system. The station is open from 6.30 a.m. to 9 p.m. Monday to Friday, and 6.30 a.m. to 10 p.m. on Saturdays.

On Sundays, the station is closed, because Mr. Raynor is a deeply-committed Christian who attends the Church of God on Angle Street. Religion runs in his family. On the wall at the gas station are side-by-side photographs of his parents, Mr. Raynor, Sr. and Lucetta Jane Adams-Raynor, both playing the church organ at the Vernon Temple AME Church not far from the gas station. Mr. Raynor credits his parents for his work ethic and a lot more, besides.

His mother founded the still-extant Socratic Literary Society more than 50 years ago, when she returned to Bermuda from studying in Jamaica, where she majored in literature, drama and poetry.

"She was a teacher for many years, and a Christian," Mr. Raynor recalled. "She always had her principles to the forefront. She always told us to do the right thing."

Mr. Raynor is a former boxer, first as a welterweight, and then as a middleweight amateur champion. He fought in the United States and famously trained with Muhammad Ali in preparation for the Leon Spinks fight. The whole Bermuda team trained with Ali, which Mr. Raynor recalls as "a great experience. Training with 'the greatest' will always live in my mind," he said.

Among the many photographs and souvenirs of a lifetime at Mr. Raynor's home, 200 yards behind the gas station, are many photographs dating back to his pugilist days.

"In my younger days, I did some things that still hurt when I think about them," Mr. Raynor, now 48, admits, "but the greatest day of my life was when I found my saviour. I have never looked back since that day."

Asked what life has taught him, Mr. Raynor said: "Do everything in love. You can't go wrong doing right. We are blessed to be here in Bermuda, compared to some other parts of the world. We must be thankful."