Casa Linda Aerials — 1940s
by Paula Bosse
Enjoy that wide-open space while you can… (click for larger image)
by Paula Bosse
Here are two fantastic aerial photos showing the Casa Linda area east of White Rock Lake. The one above shows the very early days of development of the Casa Linda Plaza shopping district. The first building was the Casa Linda Theater, which opened on August 9, 1945 (the grand opening feature was “The Affairs of Susan” starring Joan Fontaine and George Brent). The theater (now Natural Grocers) can be seen at the middle left. Buckner Boulevard (Loop 12) runs diagonally in this photo, from the lower left to the top right; Garland Road runs horizontally just above the theater. The then-new Fire Station #31 (which opened in the summer of 1947 and is still in service) can be seen on Garland Road, above and to the left of the theater. (See this same view in a current aerial view from Google here.)
Also visible in the above photo is the sorely-missed Pegasus-topped service station at the corner of Garland Rd. and Buckner.
Below, a view from the other direction — this time looking toward the southeast. This aerial photo was taken by Lloyd M. Long in 1941. Carl M. Brown, the developer of Casa Linda, had already begun turning farmland into a new residential neighborhood — the shopping center was still years away. The land which would eventually become Casa Linda Plaza can be seen just left of the center of this photo — Garland Road can be seen running from the lower right to the upper left (from East Dallas toward the city of Garland). (To get your bearings, see a “labeled” version of this photo from SMU’s Edwin J. Foscue Map Library, here.)
Edwin J. Foscue Map Library, SMU
Opening of Casa Linda Estates, Oct. 1937 (click for larger image)
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Sources & Notes
Top photo was posted in the “Dallas History (Before 1960)” Facebook group. The person who posted the photo gave the date as March, 1945, which seems incorrect, as the fire station was not built until 1947.
The second aerial photo, “Casa Linda and Vicinity, Dallas, Texas, Looking S.E. from 9,500′ (unlabeled),” was taken by Lloyd M. Long on March 1, 1941; it is from the Edwin J. Foscue Map Library, SMU Libraries, Southern Methodist University and can be accessed here. (The “labeled” version can be found here.)
Read an extremely enthusiastic profile of Carl M. Brown and his Casa Linda dreams in a 1953 “Story of Free Enterprise” article here.
The Casa Linda Shopping Center Wikipedia entry is here.
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Copyright © 2019 Paula Bosse. All Rights Reserved.
Flashback : Dallas 
Not CASA View—CASA Linda
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Yikes! Thanks! I’ve corrected the error!
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here is another aerial of the area from 1945
http://digitalcollections.smu.edu/cdm/ref/collection/agr/id/16
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For years gas station was owned by Jim Smith up until it’s demise.
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I think it was called Jim Smith’s Super Service.
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Great view of the CCC/ POW camp at Winfrey Point
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I wondered what that was!
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Also visible is the narrow footbridge that went from in front of Sunset Inn across Sunset Bay to the point where the Dreyfus Club used to be. I think it was a footbridge–it looks pretty narrow.
And the DeGolyer Estate, now part of the Dallas Arboretum.
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Correct me if I am wrong as repeating what my father had told me. Mr Degoyer was the #2 man @ Texaco. (Think he and HL Hunt got along?) Heard Degoyer came down with terminal illness and took his lime. He donated the land to SMU which sold it to the City Of Dallas.
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Wow that is definitely not The same thing I thought it would be.i got there around the late 60s.and sow changes as it came to gather.i haven’t been back in about 27yers
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[…] Another great aerial — this one from the 1940s showing the Casa Linda shopping center in East Dallas — showed up in the February post “Casa Linda Aerials — 1940s.“ […]
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[…] “CASA LINDA AERIALS — 1940s” […]
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I worked at Jim Smith’s Exxon station in 1969 to 1971. Pumped gas, drove a wrecker, was the night manager for a while, until I went back to college. Jim was a very nice guy and always told us you guys that our ears were “wiggling” when we learned something. Bud Tarver was the front manager. Honest Joe’s pawn shop owner used to stop by and try to trade or sell us things.
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