For the last 30 years, Dowagiac’s Tym Steinman and his staff with the service garage at the Steinman’s Shell station at the corner of Front and Division streets have ensured that local motorists got what their vehicles needed to keep rolling along.

Now, Cassopolis’ Tom Hartman is looking to carry on the Steinman family’s legacy of providing quality service at an affordable price, at the same familiar location.

Hartman, a veteran auto mechanic, took over ownership of the Steinman Service Center late last month, and has rebranded the business as Hartman Auto Service. In spite of the new name, Hartman is offering the same services to customers, including oil changes, and repair and maintenance work for exhausts, brakes, struts and shocks, as well as minor mechanical work, Hartman said. The shop will also offer tire service in the near future.

Tym Steinman reached out to Hartman earlier this year to ask if he would be interested in taking over the service center, as his family was looking to sell the gas station. The family had owned the property since 1954, when Harold “Bud” Steinman, Tym’s father, opened a small service station at the intersection.

The auto shop opened in 1987, two years before the family converted the station into the 24-hour convenience store it exists as today.

In late July, the Steinman sold the gas station and garage to new owners. After speaking with Tym about possibly taking over the service garage, Hartman spoke to the station’s new management and worked out a lease for the back side of the business.

For Cassopolis man, seeing his name above the garage bays of the shop marks the pinnacle of his 33-year career in auto repair, he said.

“It’s something I always wanted to do,” Hartman said. “I figured, at 58, this would be my last chance to make my dream come true.”

Hartman, a native of Ann Arbor, moved to Cassopolis with his family when he was 14, and has lived in the community ever since. He developed a passion for repairing cars while watching his uncle, a car mechanic, work as a child.

“I always looked up to him,” Hartman said. “He was always under the hood of some vehicle or another. I found his work so intriguing. Pretty soon, I found myself working on cars, too.”

After spending years repairing vehicles as a hobby, Hartman decided to turn his passion into a career. In 1984, after spending a few months working auto service with an area Kmart, Hartman began working for Tuffy Auto Service in Elkhart, where he worked off and on for around 15 years. In between stints, he worked at several other auto shops in the area, including First Choice Auto in Dowagiac.

While he briefly owned a Muffler Man shop in Elkhart in the mid 1990s, this is the first time Hartman has owned a shop without the restrictions that come with being a franchised operation, he said. Owning a business so close to home is also a bonus for him, especially in a community like Dowagiac that embraces automobiles, he said.

Over the last several weeks, Hartman has concentrated on building a base of customers, many of whom have been visiting the garage for years, he said.

“We want to offer quality service with quality pricing,” he said. “We’re not looking to get rich off a single vehicle.”

Hartman Auto Service is open from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Friday, and from 8 a.m. to noon on Saturdays. For appointments or for more information people may call the shop at (269) 782-8043.