University Park, Academic Metropolis — ca. 1915
by Paula Bosse
University Park, prime real estate (click for larger image; see below for HUGE image)
by Paula Bosse
In the 1970s, Park Cities residents received oversized postcards in the mail featuring historic photos of the area. This “Heritage Series” was presented by the Park Cities Bank and later by Fidelity Bank. I’ll be sharing these wonderful images in the weeks to come. First up is this hard-to-fathom view of the intersection of University and Hillcrest, seen around 1915 when SMU opened, taken from Dallas Hall on the university campus. The description:
“In 1915, University Park was a sparsely populated community north of Dallas. At the time, most Dallas residents thought of Highland Park as ‘country living.’ This photo was taken from SMU’s Dallas Hall looking west along University Boulevard with the cross street being Hillcrest. The two-story home seen on the northwest corner of University and Hillcrest has long been replaced with a series of commercial buildings.”
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UPDATE: For a much, much larger image of this photo, click here.
“Heritage Series” postcards used courtesy of the Lone Star Library Annex Facebook page. Postcard credits image to Dallas Public Library.
There is a book all about the houses that were built in that first block of University: The Block Book by Bonnie Wheeler (a review of which can be read here). (You probably won’t be able to find a copy of it, but if you do, snap it up. I see only one copy for sale online, and it is rather outrageously priced at just under $500!)
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Copyright © 2014 Paula Bosse. All Rights Reserved.
Flashback : Dallas 
My great-grandparents built their house in the 2nd block of University Blvd., west of Hillcrest. It’s still there. The Park Cities Preservation Society (?) put an historical marker on it at my mother’s request in March 2008, just one month before she passed. She was at the dedication ceremony.
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So glad to hear that, Robert. There are some beautiful old houses in that area.
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I remember working with this image when I was at the Library. It is part of the Rogers Collection. a magnificent 8×10 glass plate negative. In identifying the location we were able to blow it up and read the street sign which told us the location.
was able to snag a copy of the Block Book at 1/2 Price books last summer but it didn’t cost $500
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It’s a shame when most of us only see historic photos in a grainy, non-pristine, overly duplicated state.
Five hundred bucks for that book is ridiculous! And I say this as a former bookseller who enjoyed making a profit when I could. Congratulations on the find!
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that halftone doesn’t do the photo justice
did pick up a copy of AC Greene’s book a town called Cedar Springs on ebay. suspect I overpaid, but it is the first time i’ve ever seen a copy
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I grew up seeing the Cedar Springs book all the time, but only because my father was good friends with both Bill Wittliff of the Encino Press and A.C. Greene. I don’t have a copy NOW, of course, and I’ve never read it. Figures.
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I still have a couple of copies of the Cedar Springs book plus his “A Place Called Dallas.” I had donated copies of each plus the original and second editions of Justin F Kimball’s “Our City Dallas” and several other books by Greene, Payne, Hazel, McDonald, Castleberry, Starling, Rogers’ all three editions of “Lusty Texans,” Myers’ “Texas Electric Railway,” Mesquite Historical Society’s, “A Stake in the Prairie.” Peter and Andy’s “Dallas Then and Now,” Ken Fitzgerald’s with the same title, the “WPA Guide and Dallas History” and a few more to the Dallas County Pioneer Association library that then president Jim Foster kept in is office in Oak Cliff. Anyone know if it still exists?
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I don’t know if it still exists, MC (I hope so!), but those are great books that you donated.
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[…] “University Park, Academic Metropolis — ca. 1915.” An almost-deserted Park Cities landscape, showing what the intersection of Hillcrest and University […]
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[…] “University Park, Academic Metropolis — ca. 1915,” here […]
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That house on the left is still there and can be seen in Google Street view or satellite view (3415 University). Interesting. I couldn’t verify other houses.
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