by Paula Bosse
T. F. Crutchfield was a busy man who had his hands in a lot of pies in the very early days of Dallas. I’ll have to get back to him one day. Above, an ad of his, dated 1854, from an 1855 issue of the Dallas Herald. Below, an ad from the 1858 Texas Almanac.
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An interesting article by Mike Cox on stagecoaching in Texas, from the Texas Almanac, is here.
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Copyright © 2014 Paula Bosse. All Rights Reserved.
by Paula Bosse
Distance matters not to this Main Street medium. Prof. A. Henry was, verily, a man of many talents. (In case you do not know what phrenology is, see this. It’s probably not something one can do easily via mail.)
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From A Souvenir Guide of Dallas, 1894.
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Copyright © 2014 Paula Bosse. All Rights Reserved.
Chop suey *and* famous chicken house…
by Paula Bosse
I came across the above image and was enthralled. I’ve never heard of the Joe Yee Cafe, but this (granted) idealized picture is wonderful. The postcards above and below were from the early 1950s, and if you are familiar with the generally run-down neighborhood around Columbia and Fitzhugh these days, you may well shed a tear that something this charming and picturesque has been gone for many, many years.
I love the surprising color scheme of the restaurant’s interior — those fabulous purples and greens! (The colors are a bit unexpected because they so loudly clash with the bold tomato red of the exterior.)
I did a little research to see what I could find out about Joe Yee’s Chinese restaurant. Seems that Mr. Yee’s cafe was in business by the 1930s, downtown, on Main Street near Field. It advertised steadily over the years, and its ads proudly proclaimed that the restaurant served “the best Chinese food you ever tasted” and was “completely air-conditioned.” Several newspaper accounts (particularly the society columns) mentioned it as a popular place for young people to grab a bite before and after dances at nearby downtown hotels. Business must have been pretty good for the place to have lasted so long at such a primo location. The cafe moved to the Columbia Street location in 1950 where it remained in business until at least late 1956 when a major fire struck.
1938
1943
1953
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Top two early-’50s postcards are from the great Boston Public Library Tichnor Brothers Postcard Collection on Flickr, here.
In old photos of downtown Dallas one often sees “Chop Suey” signs along the streets. I’d love to know more about these restaurants in general, and about Chinese and Chinese-Americans in Dallas in the first half of the 20th century, if anyone can point me to a good source.
If background on Chop Suey is needed, might I point you to to the Wikipedia entry here, or the Snopes entry here.
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Copyright © 2014 Paula Bosse. All Rights Reserved.
Don’t miss the “artistic skating” exhibition…
by Paula Bosse
CITY PARK RINK
Morning Session for Beginners.Special Attraction for Friday and Saturday
G. S. Monohan, champion fancy and trick skater of the Pacific Coast.
A wonderful exhibition of artistic skating Friday and Saturday afternoons and nights at 4 and 9 o’clock.
The admission fee of 15¢ will be charged all spectators and skaters for these four performances.
Tickets at Kramer’s Cigar Store.
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Ad from the Dallas Morning News, March 14, 1906.
An article by Michael V. Hazel about the short-lived Old City Rink is here. (Legacies has covered absolutely EVERYTHING!)
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Copyright © 2014 Paula Bosse. All Rights Reserved.
by Paula Bosse
Over the years, Dallas has been the site of dozens and dozens of beautiful educational campuses, almost none of which still stand — such as the long-gone Victorian-era Ursuline Academy, at St. Joseph and Live Oak streets (near the current site of the Dallas Theological Seminary). The buildings, which began construction in 1882, were designed by the Catholic church’s favorite architect in Texas, Nicholas J. Clayton of Galveston. Such a beautiful building in Dallas? It must be demolished!
Six Ursuline Sisters, sent to Dallas from Galveston, established their academy in 1874 in this poorly insulated four-room building (which remained on the Ursuline grounds until its demolition in 1949). When they opened the school, under tremendous hardship, they had only seven students. But the school grew in size and reputation, and they were an academic fixture in East Dallas for 76 years. In 1950 the Sisters moved to their sprawling North Dallas location in Preston Hollow where it continues to be one of the state’s top girls’ prep schools. After 140 years of educating young women, Ursuline Academy is the oldest continuously operating school in the city of Dallas.
Construction took a long time. (ca. 1894)
When Latin cost extra. (1894) (Click for larger image.)
It even had a white picket fence. (ca. 1906)
1908-ish
1909 city directory
1912 (click for large image)
After a year and a half on the market, the land was sold in 1949 for approximately $500,000 to Beard & Stone Electric Company (a company that sold and serviced automotive electric equipment). The property was bounded by Live Oak, Haskell, Bryan, and St. Joseph — acreage that would certainly go for a lot more these days (according to the handy Inflation Calculator, half a million dollars in 1949 would be the equivalent in today’s money of about five million dollars). A small cemetery was on the grounds, in which the academy’s first chaplain and “more than 40 members of the Ursuline order” had been buried. I’m not sure how these things are done, but the cemetery was moved.
From a November, 1949 Dallas Morning News article on the vacated buildings’ demolition:
A workman applied a crowbar to a high window casing of the old convent and remarked: “I sure hate to wreck this one. It’s like disposing of an old friend. My father was just a kid when this building was built in 1883.” (DMN, Nov. 13, 1949)
And one of East Dallas’ oldest and most spectacular landmarks was gone forever. Looking at these photographs, it’s hard to believe it ever existed at all.
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Where was it? In Old East Dallas, bounded by Live Oak, Haskell, Bryan, and St. Joseph. See the scale of the property in the 1922 Sanborn map, here (once there, click for full-size map). Want to know what the same view as above looks like today? If you must, click here.
Bing Maps
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Photo of the school’s first building is from the Ursuline Academy of Dallas website here. A short description of the early days of hardship faced by the Sisters upon their arrival in Dallas is here.
The photograph, mid-construction, is by Clifton Church, from his book Dallas, Texas Through a Camera (Dallas, 1894).
1894 ad is from The Souvenir Guide of Dallas (Dallas, 1894).
1912 text is from an article by Lewis N. Hale on Texas schools which appeared in Texas Magazine (Houston, 1912).
Aerial photograph from the George W. Cook Dallas/Texas Image Collection, DeGolyer Library, Southern Methodist University, here. Bottom image also from the Cook Collection, here.
Examples of buildings designed by Nicholas J. Clayton can be seen here (be still my heart!).
DMN quote from the article “Crews Begin Wrecking Old Ursuline Academy” by William H. Smith (DMN, Nov. 13, 1949).
Another great photo of the building is in another Flashback Dallas post — “On the Grounds of the Ursuline Academy and Convent” — here.
Many of the images are larger when clicked.
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Copyright © 2014 Paula Bosse. All Rights Reserved.
“Great galloping Perunas … it’s a mechanical horse!”
by Paula Bosse
You’re a parent of comfortable financial standing who graduated from SMU. What do you get the future Mustangs in your life? You get them a mechanical Peruna!
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Great galloping Perunas … it’s a mechanical horse!
The most amazing just-pretend horse in all the world.
He canters, turns left, turns right, all with just a flick of the reins. Peruna’s coat is silky dyed sheepskin as is his flowing all white mane and tail. He sports a cowhide saddle and bridle. Of sturdy stock, polyester and fiberglass built on a steel frame, Peruna holds up to 700 pounds. Stands 39″ high, 35″ long. An import corralled only at N-M. 150.00
Mail orders to Dallas. Add 7.00 shipping charges.
Neiman-Marcus
Dallas • Houston • Fort Worth
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I’ve had this ad for years and have no idea where I found it. I used it back in 2012 in an old advertising blog I had, so I’ll use myself as a source.
In 1965, the price of this SMU-specific toy was $150, the equivalent in 2014 money is about $1,150.
Photos of the original Peruna, the Shetland pony mascot for SMU, can be seen here.
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Copyright © 2014 Paula Bosse. All Rights Reserved.
Pairs well with bluebonnets…. (click for larger image)
by Paula Bosse
I’m a sucker for these kinds of state maps. Look at Dallas, home of the State Fair, symbolized by a very large Zeppelin-like, blue-ribbon-bedecked bovine hovering over our fair city. I’m not sure I would have come up with that, but it’s always nice to be remembered and/or stereotyped by the fine folks on Madison Avenue.
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Copyright © 2014 Paula Bosse. All Rights Reserved.
by Paula Bosse
When you think of Dallas and soft drinks, you probably think Dr Pepper. But back in 1909, Dallas was the main office for the Western division for the Birmingham, Alabama fizzy drink Celery Cola (containing, one presumes, delicious celery-flavored syrup). Their offices were in the somewhat low-rent stretch of Exposition while rival Coca Cola was snugly housed at the cushy southeast corner of N. Akard and Ross.
Only a couple of weeks after an official state charter was granted to local aspiring soda tycoons W. A. Massie, E. O. Massie, and J. B. Green to start officially producing the elixir in Dallas, this ad — a bit on the defensive side — appeared in the Dallas Morning News (click to see larger image):
DMN, Feb. 28, 1909
Not so much an ad as testimony. Ads are usually more like this:
As it turns out, Celery Cola ceased production in 1910 after repeated findings of the presence of cocaine and large amounts of caffeine by the Pure Food and Drug Administration. Let’s hope Messrs. Massie, Massie, and Green bounced back from their ill-advised investment. The owner of the Celery Cola Company certainly bounced back — he continued to create soft drinks such as — no kidding — “Koke” and “Dope.” Dallas is better off with Dr Pepper. The only whispered allegation that’s dogged them is prune juice — and that stuff is 100% legal.
Check out the related Flashback Dallas post “‘No Mice, No Flies, No Caffeine, No Cocaine’ — 1911.”
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Top ad from a Celery Cola site here.
Third ad, with the word “its” misspelled (*sigh*) from the comments section of a Shorpy post here.
Best overview on the history of Celery Cola and its creator, James Mayfield, is here.
My favorite part of this story was reading the long list of Dallas-area “illegal” soft drinks (and other oft-tampered-with foodstuffs) in J. S. Abbott’s First Annual Report of the Dairy and Food Commissioner of Texas (Austin, 1908). The soft drink list begins on p. 46 after an interesting prologue here. Celery Cola was not alone! (And, if I’m reading this correctly, Messrs. Massie, Massie, and Green were fully aware of what was going on, having provided the food cops with cocaine-laced samples several months before they bought into the company.)
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Copyright © 2014 Paula Bosse. All Rights Reserved.
1908
By Paula Bosse
I’m pretty sure there’s no real Irish connection here — other than the name — but how could I pass this up on St. Patrick’s Day!
Dallas Morning News, July 18, 1906
DMN, Sept. 1, 1907
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Top ad addressing the Elks’ conventioneers who were visiting Dallas in 1908 is from an Elks’ historical site, here.
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Copyright © 2014 Paula Bosse. All Rights Reserved.
Stanley Marcus and Coco Chanel
by Paula Bosse
In September of 1957 — way back when that much-missed hyphen was still in “Neiman-Marcus” — Stanley Marcus invited Coco Chanel to Dallas to accept the Neiman Marcus Award for Distinguished Service in the Field of Fashion. Mlle. Chanel had never been to Texas, but her visit here was a meaningful one. Following a 15-year retirement, her re-emergence as a designer in the early 1950s was met with mostly derision by the French press. The American response, on the other hand, was very different. It was because of the enthusiastic reception that her work received from American retailers (such as the even-then legendary Neiman Marcus department store) that she had been able to bounce back and, once again, be considered a force in the fashion world. When she was invited to Dallas to receive the “Oscar” of the fashion industry, Mlle. Chanel was happy to accept.
In the photo above, Coco is seen trying on hats at the downtown Neiman’s store as Mr. Stanley stands by beaming. On her Dallas visit she was also treated to a ranch barbecue (!) where she was photographed watching both a square dance (!!) and a … oh god … Chanel-themed bovine fashion show (!!!). Mlle. Chanel seemed to love the cows-in-ropes-of-pearls runway show, but she was not a fan of the barbecue and beans — she (one hopes discreetly) dumped the contents of her plate onto the ground under the table … right onto the shoes of dining companion Elizabeth Arden (whose shoes may have been ruined, but who had a truly great story to tell for the rest of her life).
From all reports, everyone seemed to enjoy (and no doubt profit) from the successful visit. Karl Lagerfeld, the current creative director of Chanel, recently brought Chanel back to Dallas (both figuratively and literally) with the house’s important Métiers d’Art fashion show which was held at Fair Park in December, 2013. The following day, Lagerfeld was presented with the Neiman Marcus Award for Distinguished Service in the Field of Fashion — just as Coco Chanel had been, 56 years earlier. And the haute-couture circle-pin of life keeps on rolling.
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Top photo by Shel Hershorn for the AP. From the Briscoe Center for American History, University of Texas at Austin.
N-M ad from 1957 (portion of a larger ad).
Chanel’s thank-you telegram to Marcus, from the collection of Stanley Marcus’ Papers at the DeGolyer Library, Central University Libraries, Southern Methodist University.
Entertaining AP article about Chanel and Dallas, then and now (with photos of Stanley Marcus duded-up in an outfit you’d never see an actual cowboy in), can be found here. (Are those butterflies?!)
More photos of Mlle. Chanel in Dallas (along with text of a DMN article on the visit) can be found here.
Even more photos (bovine fashion show…) and a really great post from SMU’s “Off the Shelf” blog is here.
Video of the 2013 Chanel runway extravaganza (Métiers d’Art), held in Fair Park’s hay-stewn Centennial Hall, can be watched here. A shorter video with a few cursory shots of the Dallas skyline and Fair Park can be seen here.
For more on the first French Fortnight, see my post “Neiman-Marcus Brings France to Big D — 1957,” here.
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Copyright © 2014 Paula Bosse. All Rights Reserved.
Flashback : Dallas 