Dallas Skyline | Flashback : Dallas

May 22, 2014

Stemmons and Inwood, Before and After

Stemmons and Inwood, looking southeasterly toward town, 1954. Below, pretty much the same shot, 1994.

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Top photo by the great Squire Haskins; bottom photo by the firm bearing his name that carried on after his death in 1984. Both from the Squire Haskins Photography Collection, Special Collections, University of Texas at Arlington Libraries.

For more on the life and career of Dallas photographer Squire Haskins, see the article “Squire Haskins: High Flying Images” by Brenda S. McClurkin, here.

Need a visual aid? See a Google Map view of the same area today, here.

Click photos for larger images.

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May 6, 2014

Braniff DC-3 Over Downtown — 1940

braniff_triple-underpass_imagearchives

by Paula Bosse

Unless there was some sort of photo manipulation involved, that photographer pretty much had just one chance to get that shot. And he got it.

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Sources & Notes

Photo from Image Archives USA, available for purchase here.

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April 17, 2014

Dallas Cowboy — 1945

by Paula Bose

Big changes comin’, pardner.

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Photo by William Langley, from the Library of Congress.

Click for larger image.

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April 7, 2014

Downtown Dallas, ca. 1923 — Zooming in on the Details

There’s a lot going on here (click for larger image) / Photo: SMU

by Paula Bosse

When I see photos like this I always want to zoom in as far as I can, to see the tiny details and everyday moments that might have been captured unwittingly by the photographer. Luckily, this photo has been scanned at such a high resolution (thank you, DeGolyer Library!) that it’s easy to zoom in and wander around it. (Click all of these pictures for much larger images.)

This particular photograph, from the DeGolyer Library at SMU, is attributed to Charles A. McAfee. The DeGolyer caption reads: “Downtown Dallas looking northwest at Santa Fe building complex (center left); Weyenberg Shoe Company at 1300-1302 Jackson; Waldorf Hotel, 1302 Commerce, and the Southland Hotel.” The Britling Cafeteria was at 1316 Commerce — its rear entrance on Jackson is visible in the photo. Here are a few more of the businesses in that 1300 block of Jackson Street, bounded by S. Field and S. Akard (from the 1923 city directory):

1923-directory_jackson-st

And it ALSO shows lots of signs and ads painted on the sides of buildings (some of which might still exist), two men standing on a roof surveying the skyline, a couple of guys talking on the sidewalk, a cafe next door to something that might be a crude garage, cars in a lot where it costs 25 cents to park, and a cool water tower on top of a shoe company. All of which add up to make this a much more interesting and lively photograph than originally presumed.

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Photograph of downtown Dallas attributed to Charles A. McAfee; from the DeGolyer Library, Central University Libraries, Southern Methodist University; access it here. I’ve corrected the color.

Trying to pin a date down (SMU has it as “circa 1920”), I’m guessing the photograph might have been taken around 1923, as the Britling Cafeteria opened for business on November 28, 1922. (I was so interested in that cafeteria that I wrote about it: read the Flashback Dallas post “The Britling Cafeteria Serves Those Who Serve Themselves,” here.)

For other photos I’ve zoomed in on to see the details, see here.

Click photos for much larger images.

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March 18, 2014

Dallas Skyline by E. M. “Buck” Schiwetz — 1961

by Paula Bosse

This drawing reminds me of those wonderful telephone book covers (the ones with all the hidden jokes and intricate details) that I used to pore over as a child. (By the way, when clicked, this image is absolutely HUMONGOUS. )

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From the booklet Five Years Forward: The Dallas Public Library, 1955-1960 (more of which can be accessed here).

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February 17, 2014

Gus Roos Men’s Clothing — 1951

Elm and Akard and familiar skyline…

by Paula Bosse

One of the top men’s clothiers, right there at Roos Corner. (Pegasus!)

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February 14, 2014

Where to Put That JFK Memorial? — 1964

Looking west, 1964 (AP photo)

by Paula Bosse

I’m not really into the whole assassination thing, which may explain why I’ve never seen this 1964 Associated Press photo (with or without the labels). Despite the connections to “that dark day,” I think this is a really interesting view of the city, from an unusual vantage point.

Here’s another similar photo, from April 1964 — this one from United Press International. UPI’s caption:

DALLAS: Site of Memorial Park. The area outlined in white is the block where the John F. Kennedy Plaza will be created as a memorial to the late president. The outline traces buildings now on the site which will be removed on completion of the new county courthouse.

April 1964 (UPI Telephoto)

The original location for the memorial was in the block immediately to the east of the Records Building, not the Old Red Courthouse, where it eventually was placed. I’m not sure why the location changed, but by the time architect Philip Johnson, designer of the memorial, was on board, the site had moved one block south.

The Purse & Co. sign seen at the right side of the top photo is still visible today — it’s probably the largest and most familiar ghost sign downtown. Here’s a picture that was linked to Google maps. (I think I prefer it as a ghost sign.)

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Sources & Notes

Top photo by Ferd Kaufman for the Associated Press, 1964.

Bottom UPI Telephoto found on eBay.

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February 11, 2014

Delta Air Lines’ First Passenger Flight — 1929

by Paula Bosse

Delta Air Lines has had a longer — and more important — association with Dallas than you might think. On June 17, 1929, Delta made its first-ever passenger flight, from Dallas to Jackson, Mississippi via Shreveport and Monroe, Louisiana. According to the Love Field website, “Early flights operated from a passenger terminal near Bachman Lake, which later served as Southwest Airlines’ first headquarters building.” On that first flight, the five passengers sat in wicker chairs and could roll down windows (!) for needed ventilation. The flight took five hours. One of the first ads, from the Delta Flight Museum page, looked like this:

Delta passenger service ad ca. September 1929.

Forty-some-odd years later, the ads — and Dallas — got a bit more sophisticated.

delta_dallas_fur

delta_dallas_fredric-sweney_playing-cards Artist: Fredric Sweney

And we can’t leave out Cowtown!

delta_fort-worth

UPDATE, June 20, 2017: This almost-three-year-old post got a TON of hits yesterday, and I couldn’t figure out why. Eventually, though, I tracked it down: it had to do with yesterday’s Final Jeopardy question (or is it “answer”?):

delta_jeopardy_061917

Nice to see that Jeopardy is incorporating Dallas history into the show!

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Top travel poster — showing Fort Worth in the distance, I guess? — by Jack Laycox.

For a really well-researched article by Timothy Harper describing that first flight, click here (the Dallas bit is contained in the last seven paragraphs).

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February 6, 2014

Bird’s Eye View of Dallas — circa 1900

by Paula Bosse

Wonderful old postcard, looking east, probably from the courthouse. Main Street is on the left, Commerce on the right. I’m not sure of the date, but I’m guessing somewhere around the turn of the century. Click the picture for a very large image, and just wander around the place.