Community gathers to celebrate man who 'takes care of people, not just cars'

SALT LAKE CITY — For many people in Salt Lake City's Avenues neighborhood, Bobby Rose is more than just their mechanic. He's become an iconic figure where he has worked and served others for 34 years.

To celebrate his retirement and mourn the closure of his shop, 3rd Ave Car Clinic, the community organized a celebration to show their appreciation for their mechanic and their friend on Thursday.

Fueled by the desire to give back, dozens of neighbors offered their services and pooled donations to organize a party with a food truck giving out free tacos, buckets of iced sodas and waters, a table with farewell cards, and a custom cake. A band with several residents from the neighborhood even volunteered to perform for the event.

"He takes care of people, not just cars," local resident Jeff Hunt said of Rose, "He is amazingly warm, kind, goes the extra mile. He is the personification of excellent service and just a wonderful human being."

"Bobby's been my mechanic for 34 years," said Joyce Kelen, one of the event organizers. "He's taken care of all of our cars, our kids, my husband's car. He's come to our house even, fixing flats and all kinds of problems."

"He comes to everyone's home," added Peggy Battin, another partygoer. "He's a neighborhood resource."

In the lot of the now-sold gas station and repair shop, dozens of adoring regulars of 3rd Ave Car Clinic and its owner mingled and talked. At the center of the crowd, Rose hugged and greeted old friends by name.

Rose began his career as a mechanic by working for local racing champion Bill Madsen in high school. At the party, Rose hugged and reminisced with Madsen's son and champion, Gary Madsen, about their years on the race track and careers as mechanics. Now, they'll get to bond over their retirements.

Standing inside the shop with signs reading 'Now Closed' and 'Happy Retirement' plastered to its front, Rose's family reminisced about their decades of time in the building.

"I mean, you don't even grow up realizing it's not typical to come into work and some people stop by to say hi to their mechanic, or they bring him a gift from vacation or invite us to their wedding," said Bobby's daughter, Melanie Rose, "I grew up thinking that's just how people regarded their mechanic."

Standing in the entryway between the lobby and garage, Melanie Rose continued, "This is a building that gave us everything that we have. ... It's the end of an era for our family."

Sherrie Rose choked up as she recalled why her husband went the extra mile for those in need, "He did for everybody what he would like to have done for his mom. Like, if you're broken down, you wouldn't want your mom stuck on the side of the road."

"If Jesus Christ was up and living and walking around and nobody knew it, it'd probably be my dad," Melanie Rose said.

The retirement party came as a surprise to Bobby Rose when a group of 10 organizers told him a month before the celebration.

"He was like, 'Why are they making a big deal of it?' ... He thought he would just one day not be here and leave everyone wondering why," Sherrie Rose said.

She said they sold their property and a few people noticed online, but when a public hearing was held about how to use the property, everything changed. To much of the neighborhood's sadness at the loss of a local business, the lot will be used to build housing.

Bobby Rose's retirement announcement came in December and everyone was shocked, key organizer Holly Webster explained. In January, she volunteered to be the first organizer, where she was joined by nine others — none of whom knew each other beforehand.

After the news caused a stir, Sherrie Rose said her husband was approached by a woman who told him that, years earlier, he had insisted she have her oil changed. When she brushed him off, he changed it for free. The woman admitted that she couldn't afford oil at the time.

Rose wiped away tears with a tissue as she recalled the story.

"He's never taken a real vacation," Webster said in a speech in front of the clinic. "He's become an iconic figure in our community. He's been there for each and every one of us in different times, doing emergency gas fills at our homes, helping with flat tires, rescuing our dead cars, fixing our broken cars, and even providing some oversight of our teenage drivers and their cars."

She handed the microphone to Bobby Rose and his son, Dallin.

"I would talk more but I'll be so emotional you won't be able to understand me," Bobby Rose started.

"I can't tell you how much this means to me," he said, choking up.

"I just wanted to thank all of you for being my dad's friend for so many years," Dallin Rose added. "It's going to be hard leaving here. We'll miss every one of you guys very much."

Asked about his commitment to customers and the community, Bobby Rose said, "The thing that's so weird about this is that I don't think I've done anything unusual. I feel I did what anyone who owns a business or a service station should do."

"If I ever didn't take care of someone right, it bothered me that night," he said.

A week after selling the business, Rose struggled with a health scare.

"I ended up in the hospital and had to undergo major surgery. I had an aorta that was ready to burst," he explained. "I'm lucky they found it. ... It was a lot bigger than they normally get."

That scare made him look at life differently and confirmed to him the importance of spending time with family.

He plans to spend his retirement "not getting up at 6 in the morning," enjoying activities with his three children and seven grandchildren, and engaging in volunteer work — he's specifically interested in helping Utah children who have gone hungry during the pandemic.

"I don't want to be laying down in my shop looking up and see that as my last sight," Rose concluded. "I want it to be pine trees or something like that."

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