FENNIMORE, Wis. — Angie Faith used to work so she could pay to go roller-skating. Now she works to maintain the half-century legacy of her family’s business.

Faith, 54, of Fennimore, is the owner-operator of Speedy Mart, a gas station and convenience store in Fennimore founded by her parents in 1972.

“She has done an amazing job,” said Faith’s mother, Sharon James.

Jim James, 83, and Sharon, 78, purchased what was then a full-service gas station on Fennimore’s Lincoln Avenue 52 years ago.

The building had a bay door that opened into a garage with a hoist, where Jim James worked on automobiles. That beginning set the groundwork for the business’ evolution.

“He specialized in Volkswagens,” Faith said.

Faith purchased the business from her parents 17 years ago.

“When my dad decided to sell it, none of my other siblings were interested in it,” Faith said. “My dad had built this business from the ground up. It would be horrible to see it go (away) with all of the work he put into it.”

When they were just starting out — around one year after purchasing the business — Jim and Sharon James leased the station to another person to manage and moved their young family to Grants Pass, Ore.

“Jim had some brothers who lived out there,” Sharon James said.

Jim James worked as a mechanic in Oregon and had a brush with fame.

“When we were living out there, John Wayne and Katherine Hepburn were filming (the western movie) ‘Rooster Cogburn,’” Sharon James said. “Jim would eat at a (restaurant) out there and he would see John Wayne eating there, too.”

Faith said the state of the Fennimore business eventually drew the family back to southwest Wisconsin.

“We moved to Oregon and an ex-chief of police for Fennimore was taking care of (the business) for dad and it wasn’t going so good,” Faith said. “So we got in the car and we moved home (to Fennimore) and saved the business.”

Jim and Sharon James packed up their children, Rick, Mike, Angie and baby Tammy, and returned in 1975 to set Speedy Mart on a course toward success.

“A sales rep came in and got us interested in doing (the business) as a convenience store,” Sharon James said. “We were the only convenience store with gas at that time (in Fennimore). People would come in and say, ‘Groceries and gas? This will never go.’”

The business eventually did grow and change, with the James family expanding the size of the convenience store while continuing to operate the gas station.

“In those days, we had to send in copies of receipts to get reimbursed for credit cards,” Sharon James said. “We had to read the pumps twice a day — we were checking how many gallons were sold. It wasn’t like the automatic ones that tell us minute-by-minute how much gas was in the tanks. It has certainly changed over time.”

Faith worked in the business as a kid. For a while, she and a cousin sold fireworks outside the business.

“We sat out by the highway with a little table and sold sparklers and snaps and little snakes,” Faith said. “I guess that’s where I started out in retail.”

Faith said she was stacking groceries in the store and cleaning its restrooms around age 8.

“That was my roller-skating money,” she said.

The business eventually dropped car repairs from its offerings. A freezer containing meat from Weber’s, in Cuba City, Wis., and frozen pizzas stands where the garage door was once located. The hoist is covered by flooring under Speedy Mart’s snack foods aisle.

“You can feel (the hoist) as you walk across it,” Faith said.

Although she worked at the business as a kid, Faith didn’t anticipate coming back as an adult.

“I went to school for music — music merchandising was my interest,” Faith said. “I went to Richland Center (for college) but it just didn’t pan out. One of the teachers was a relative and that doesn’t work — having a relative try to teach you how to play piano.”

Faith decided to return to Fennimore and help her dad with the business. Of her siblings, older brother Rick is an engineer, next-oldest brother Mike teaches and performs music, and younger sister Tammy is a registered nurse.

One of Faith’s aunts managed the business from 1981 to 1989, while Rick also managed the store from around the fall of 1989 to mid-1990.

Faith was managing the business full-time by 2003, which gave Jim James more time to spend on his hobby farm outside Fennimore.

“She has done everything to stay current,” Sharon James said of Faith.

Faith purchased the business in 2007 — a year marked by another significant life change.

“I got married (to Lee Faith) that same year,” she said. “I bought (the business) in January and we got married in September of that year.”

These days, Speedy Mart faces competition from a grocery store located across the street, two chain discount stores and two chain gas stations.

“It’s good to have competition,” Faith said, adding that Speedy Mart’s status as an independent business selling Mobile gasoline gives her the flexibility her competitors lack.

“They can’t make a snap decision like I can,” she said. “If I want, I could decide to take (the price of gas) down a nickel. It’s one of the advantages I have. I love being my own boss.”

Faith said Speedy Mart’s busiest days are in the summer months.

“We get a lot of people who are going camping or fishing,” she said. “I sell bait here — nightcrawlers and things like that. People pick up their bait and their beer and pop, gas and ice before they go.”