Stereoview Souvenirs of the Texas Centennial — 1936
by Paula Bosse
A view of Fair Park not often seen
by Paula Bosse
If you collect stereoview photos and/or Texas Centennial memorabilia, hie yourself over to eBay for some (pricey) goodies (see the link at the bottom of the page). Here are a few stereoview “monoviews.”
Above, part of the Fair Park racetrack, with the reviewing stand for the “Cavalcade of Texas” pageant at the right. If you look closely on the horizon — at the right, above the Cavalcade stands, you’ll see two towers. Are those the two water towers over in Lakewood at Abrams and Goliad (which I wrote about here)?
Here are a few more. The first one with kids and dogs at the Hall of State:
Pegasuses (“pegasi”?) at the Esplanade:
Strolling by the lagoon (and past one of my favorite crazy Centennial design features — those amazing flying-saucer lights!):
I love the camera on the marquee (and those dresses!) at the Hollywood exhibit:
One of my favorite Fair Park artworks — the lady in the niche, at the Administration Building (Women’s Musuem):
I did not know there was an outdoor ice rink at the Centennial — ice skating performances at the “Black Forest” cafe:
Can’t go wrong with another monumental woman in a niche:
A sculpture of a slumbering fairy at the Dallas Museum of Fine Arts:
And, jumping ahead a year, a souvenir from the Pan-American Exposition in 1937: the Music Hall dressed up as the “Casino.”
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Sources & Notes
All images are from eBay, and almost all are currently for sale. See these and more here.
There are a bunch of Flashback Dallas posts on the Texas Centennial — they can be found here.
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Copyright © 2022 Paula Bosse. All Rights Reserved.
Flashback : Dallas 
Paula, thanks for posting these… as usual, they made my Sunday night, oh it’s actually 12:15 am and you’d never expect such exquisite photographs of the Dallas State Fair. Thank you Paula!
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Really enjoyed the tour. I learned some new things
today. Thank you for all the time.and.effort you
put.into this project
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Thanks for the ebay link! There are some really cool ones there that you didn’t post here.
— Are those the two water towers over in Lakewood at Abrams and Goliad (which I wrote about here)?
I am pretty sure you are correct. I drew a line from them on a 1952 aerial to the approximate location of the camera and the angle looks correct. See the green line on these two screen shots:
Also, I looked for what looks like another water tower at the horizon on the right edge of the photo and found one not far from the ones you wrote about a little east of Abrams and just north of La Vista on the Lakewood Country Club grounds:
https://www.historicaerials.com/location/32.813366632653846/-96.74879595637321/1952/19
I am not sure the configuration was the same as it was in 1952 but there was a water tower at that location in 1930 as shown on this 1930 Fairchild aerial:
https://digitalcollections.smu.edu/digital/collection/dmp/id/182/rec/1
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I really loved the pictures!
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I think you are right about the two towers on the horizon. The grandstands were still in that location until at least the early ’50s as I recall seeing Joey Chitwood’s exhibition drivers give some 1950 Fords hard use in one of their performances during the State Fair. I wonder if the long single story building between the stands and the camera isn’t perhaps a WW.I leftover? It has a sort of military surplus look to it. Very interesting photos.
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[…] Exposition is so “Little Rascals” it hurts. I love this photo! It’s in the post “Stereoview Souvenirs of the Texas Centennial — 1936” (a post which has tons of great […]
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