As interests in material rhetoric continue to evolve among communication scholars, questions persist about how durability impacts the rhetorical dimensions of objects. To more fully understand how such objects participate in suasive activity during their lifetimes, I examine multiple aspects of material rhetoric in an encounter with the ruins of an abandoned Saturn dealership. By seeking ways to perceive how such a desolate place speaks and advancing a concept of ruin rhetoric that is sensitive to matters of time and durability, I argue that Saturn's ruins assemble a rhetorical perspective of a distinctively "American" car company and its consumers.