The Oak Creek man preserving American highway signs and Milwaukee beer culture

OAK CREEK, Wis. — From the inside, you’d never be able to tell Eric Polinski is a collector.

“I mean this is pretty much just basic living,” he said.

He lives with his three cats, a dog, and dozens of cut-off plaid shirts.

“If I could have my way, I’d cut them all off. But I need some winter shirts also here,” he said.

But you may have seen his house before. If you drive down Howell Avenue in Oak Creek, you’ve likely seen the large railroad sign and Phillips 66 sign in a driveway. That’s Polinski’s house.

“It brings a smile to a lot of people’s faces and when it brings a smile to their face it brings a smile to my face, and it also it just keeps me more motivated to keep going and doing the things I enjoy doing,” he said.

Polinski is an Americana collector. His driveway is full of old Coca-Cola placards, highway signs, and a Texaco pump. He likes the highway culture which is why he also has stop lights, miles-per-hour signs, and other road signs.

Some people collect Winnie the Pooh items and others have world-record Smurf collections. For Polinski, he is like a curator and this is his museum. He’s preserving parts of the past.

“Everything just brings back beautiful memories,” Polinski said.

James Groh

Simply put, he likes the look. It makes him feel good. Inside a shed in the yard, there is even more. It’s a man cave that looks like the museum of Wisconsin beer signs. There’s Pabst, Blatz, Highlife, and Leinenkugel neon lights, mirrors, and collectibles.

“I collected it because of the fact that I love neon signs as I grew up. I loved the looks of them, the lighting of them, the coloring of them,” he said.

A lot of his collecting has come from his work as a basement waterproofer. He is able to take a lot of the items clients don’t want to keep anymore. Since he is in a basement, he finds neglected collectibles. Also, some people have personal bars in their basements, so that’s how he amassed such a large collection of beer gear.

“If it looked good to me, I picked it up.”

He also uses Facebook Marketplace, rummage sales, and his network of friends to find deals.
Despite a sign that says road closed in front of his house, people from all over the Midwest can’t resist pulling into his driveway to take a look around. It happens, “a couple of times a week,” he said.

Maybe that’s because next to his road closed sign is a McDonald’s drive-thru sign.

“I don’t mind wasting the Illinois people’s time because they’re Bears fans, you know.”

James Groh

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Eric has been putting this collection together since he was in his early 20s back in the early 1980s. He has put blood sweat and tears into this. Recently, he got a deep cut. He bandaged the cut himself and kept on working in the yard.

“Ain’t the first cut. It ain’t going to be the last.”

Now 62, Eric is beginning to think about the next steps in his life. He would love to move up north and spend his days by a lake. Before that, he must take care of his home and collection.

Ideally, he’d like to sell the home to someone as is with all the collectibles. Polinski wants someone to continue the work he has done for the past four decades. If he can’t find anyone, he said many of the items will go to an auction.

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