Postcards | Flashback : Dallas

November 2, 2017

Dallas Skyline, Looking West — 1970

Southland Life welcomes you to Big D…

by Paula Bosse

This is a view of the Dallas skyline that isn’t seen that often — a view across downtown toward the west. This 1970 Southland Center postcard has the heliport-topped Southland Life Building (one of the few downtown buildings designed to face to the east) and the Sheraton Hotel front and center. It’s really interesting to zoom in on this photo and look around — for instance, the sight of the Hilton/White Plaza/Indigo hotel at the left, at Harwood and Main across from the Municipal Building, is a little disorienting (I think it’s the empty lot/parking lot at Elm and Harwood).

Have a little fun and zoom way in on this photo of 1970 downtown Dallas on the Portal to Texas History website, here.

skyline-looking-west_southland-center_1970_portal_info

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Sources & Notes

Postcard was provided to the Portal to Texas History by Dallas Heritage Village; more info on this can be found on the Portal, here.

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October 24, 2017

Nighttime on Commerce Street — 1957

The Adolphus block, at Commerce & Akard…

by Paula Bosse

I love this photo showing Commerce Street, looking west from Akard — especially the green light on the walls of the Adolphus. And that heart-stoppingly beautiful deco “Walgreen” font and neon. Downtown Dallas in the ’40s and ’50s is a place I wish I had known, back when drug stores had soda fountains and hotels had “supper clubs.”

This photo was probably taken in March, 1957, when Ben Arden and His Orchestra “featuring Sylvia and her violin” were appearing at the Century Room in the Adolphus Hotel. Downtown Dallas looked pretty good in 1957.

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Sources & Notes

Postcard photo — “Night view of Commerce Street in downtown Dallas, Texas” — by Leonard Raef; it is currently up for bids on eBay, here. (Thanks to Teresa Musgrove Gibson for posting this today in the Retro Dallas Facebook group!)

I don’t know if I’ve linked to this huge photo of the Adolphus on the Dallas City Hall website, but take a look at it here (then click again to make it really big). I have to say, I think I prefer that Commerce-and-Akard corner with the bright lights of the Walgreens to the more sedate, stripped-down look of the same corner today — it’s still a beautiful building, of course, but, man, that neon was just fantastic.

UPDATE: Some people who remember downtown at this time have thought this might show Main Street. As far as I know, Main has never been a one-way street (as seen in the photo above), but there was a Walgreen store at the northwest corner of Main and Akard, one block away. Seems counter-productive to have two drugs stores so close together, but there you are.

The color photo shows the northwest corner of Commerce and Akard, taken from the front of the Baker Hotel. The same corner can be seen at the right of this black-and-white photo from 1962:

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September 5, 2017

Main and Ervay — The Favorite Downtown View of Postcard Publishers

Landmarks a-plenty… (click to see larger image)

by Paula Bosse

Without question, the most popular view of downtown Dallas offered to postcard buyers in the early years of the 20th century — the one repeated over and over and over — is Main Street looking west from Ervay. The constant is the Wilson Building, which opened in 1904 and has elegantly held the fort at the northwest corner ever since. Later came the skyscraping Praetorian Building at Main and Stone. And a few years later, Neiman-Marcus arrived at the southwest corner of Main and Ervay to firmly establish the intersection as one of the city’s most impressive.

I love these colorized postcards, but it’s always interesting to see them drained of color — they look more realistic, but they still have that air of otherworldliness.

Here are a couple more. This one is lacking Neiman’s (built in 1914), taken around 1908 or 1909 (the Elk’s Arch can be seen in the distance).

And this one, before the Praetorian Building was built in 1907.

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Sources & Notes

Postcards from eBay.

Click pictures to see larger images.

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June 29, 2017

The WFAA Studios, Designed by George Dahl, Rendered by Ed Bearden — 1961

“Communications Center”

by Paula Bosse

Above, the WFAA studios, seen in a wonderful painting by Dallas artist Ed Bearden. The image is from a postcard touting the brand new ultra-modern building designed by one of Dallas’ top architects, the prolific George L. Dahl. The building still stands at Young and Record streets, next to the home of its then-sister-company, The Dallas Morning News (appropriately, the News building was also designed by Dahl … as was the soon-to-be HQ of The News, the old Dallas Public Library at Commerce and Harwood).

The super-cool mid-century “WFAA AM-FM-TV broadcasting plant” was completed in 1961. It opened to much fanfare in April of that year, with star-studded festivities featuring personal appearances by a host of ABC stars such as Connie Stevens, Johnny Crawford, and Nick Adams. If catching a glimpse of “Cricket” or the Rifleman’s son didn’t wow you, the public was also invited to tour the building and gawk at its state-of-the-art radio and television studios. This large 68,000-square-foot building allowed WFAA radio and WFAA-TV to be housed under the same roof. Before this, the AM and FM radio stations were broadcasting from studios atop the Santa Fe Building, and Channel 8 was broadcasting from their television studios on Harry Hines, at Wolf (studios which they sold to KERA at the end of 1959).

Aside from the innovative “folded-plate” concrete roof, one of the first things I noticed about this building was the staircase behind a “wall” of plate glass — I was instantly reminded of the staircase from the old Rogers Electric building (now Steinway Hall) on the Central Expressway service road at McCommas — all it needed was a gigantic ficus tree. (Unsurprisingly, that building — built in 1959 — was also designed by the very, very busy George Dahl.)

Cool building, cool architectural design, cool artistic rendering.

Below is an early pre-construction rendering of the WFAA building, from 1959.

And a photo from the early 1970s.

And here’s a view taken from the side of the building in 1963, looking toward Young Street.

The early-’70s photo above was taken from this ad from the 1974-75 Texas Almanac. Ah, “Communications Center.” (I have to say, I’ve never heard of “WFAA-FM Stereo 98” nor their slogan “The Velvet Sound of Beautiful Music.” In fact, by the time this edition of the Almanac was published, WFAA-FM no longer existed — it had changed both its name — to KZEW — and its format — to rock.)

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Sources & Notes

Color postcard found on the entertaining blog Texas Pop Culture; see the post — which includes scans of the reverse side of the card — here.

Bearden’s signature is a bit hard to make out — the slightly distorted magnified signature can be seen here.

The more I see of Ed Bearden’s work, the more I like it. See his Dallas skyline from 1958 here; see his Dallas skyline from 1959 here.

Photo of the Channel 8 news vehicles is from the Belo Records collection, DeGolyer Library, Central University Libraries, Southern Methodist University; more info on this photo is here.

More on architect George L. Dahl can be found at the Handbook of Texas, here, and at Wikipedia, here.

Read more about the history of FM radio in Dallas — including histories of WFAA-FM and KZEW — at the indispensable website of local broadcasting history — DFW Retroplex, here.

3 Comments

May 21, 2017

Ewing Avenue, Oak Cliff

Stately and serene Oak Cliff… (click for larger image)

by Paula Bosse

Another lovely hand-colored postcard from the C. Weichsel Co. — this one shows a sleepy, gauzy-looking Ewing Avenue in Oak Cliff, probably around 1910. According to the 1910 Dallas directory, Ewing Avenue stretched from S. Jefferson (now E. Jefferson) to 18th Street (it may have extended beyond that, but 18th Street was, apparently, the city limits).

If anyone knows the location of this view or the owner of this house, please let me know. I don’t think any part of Ewing — North or South — looks like this anymore!

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Postcard found on Flickr, posted by Coltera (sorry, did not note the link).

6 Comments

May 11, 2017

A Bird’s-Eye View of the Central Business District

The Statler Hilton and the Merc at dusk… (click for larger image)

by Paula Bosse

I’ve recently experienced a long, long involuntary separation from my beloved laptop (the welling anxiety! the withdrawal pangs!), but now it’s back home from the shop, resting comfortably and ready to go back to work.

Here is a “welcome back” shot of the Dallas skyline, with a view to the southwest: the neon begins to come on in the CBD as “magic hour” arrives.

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Postcard image posted on Flickr by the ever-reliable Christian Spencer Anderson (aka Coltera), here.

5 Comments

February 3, 2017

Happy 3rd Anniversary, Flashback Dallas!

Cook Collection/DeGolyer Library/SMU

by Paula Bosse

Today marks the third anniversary of this blog. It seems like I’ve been doing this a lot longer, if only because I’ve been pretty immersed in it for the past three years. I say this all the time, but researching and writing about Dallas history is one of the most fun things I’ve ever done. I’ve written 851 posts about Dallas’ past (compiled in a continuously updated list which can be found at the link on this page) — about big things and small things — and I’ve learned more about my hometown in the past three years than I had in all the years before I started doing this. It’s gratifying to know that a lot of people out there read the blog: as of this morning, the number of followers of this mini archive stands a few short of 7,400. I sincerely appreciate all of you who read, comment, and share my posts. Thank you!

On to Year 4!

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Postcard (postmarked 1909) from the George W. Cook Dallas/Texas Image Collection, DeGolyer Library, Central University Libraries, Southern Methodist University; more info on the postcard can be found here.

It shows Main Street looking east toward the white Praetorian Building in the background, Dallas High School (Crozier Tech), the Old Red Courthouse, and the Park Hotel (better known to most of us as the Ambassador Hotel on S. Ervay), built in 1904 as the Majestic Hotel and then renamed by new owners as the Park Hotel in June, 1907. Someday I’ll write more about this history of this still-standing 113-year-old building — it’s just one of a dizzying number of subjects I’ve researched pretty thoroughly but haven’t gotten around to writing about yet — there are just too few hours in the day…).

Click postcard to see larger image.

10 Comments

January 12, 2017

“Howdy from Dallas, Texas” … and An Announcement About Bookmarked Files

by Paula Bosse

“Howdy,” from the home of the Republic Bank Building, SMU, North Central Expressway, the Statler Hilton, the Majestic Theatre, and the Cotton Bowl.

Also, “howdy” from me, along with a notice that I have begun the long, arduous task of migrating files from one big cloud to another big cloud. This will be a problem only for those who might have bookmarked PDFs or some of the photos or files I’ve linked to. This won’t change URLs for individual posts, because if that were the case, I’d be sobbing uncontrollably in a padded cell, trussed up in a straitjacket, unable to do necessary things like TYPE. So … it could be worse.

This will probably affect very, very, very few of you — I, on the other hand, will be absorbed in this tedium for quite a while, rushing against a deadline.

Please don’t hesitate to bring broken links, etc., to my attention. And if you’ve lost something formerly bookmarked, let me know, and I’ll help you find out where it’s living these days.

3 Comments

January 4, 2017

Let the McClure Electric Co. Solve Your “Current Problems” — 1952

The lightning bolt on the sign is a nice touch…

by Paula Bosse

This is one of those idealized postcards from the ’40s and ’50s in which everything looks more pristine and perfect than was ever possible in real life. I love the postcard-version of this building, located at 2633 Swiss Avenue. And, glory be, it’s still standing — it just doesn’t look anywhere near as nice as it does in this postcard. (Why must people paint brick buildings? It looked so much better in 1952 when it was brand new. Today it looks like this.)

The McClure Electric Co. — which started life as the Emerson-McClure Electric Co. in 1922 — moved into their swanky new digs at Swiss and Cantegral in early 1952 and remained in business there until at least 1966. In the early ’70s, the building was home to Jim Dandy Fast Foods/Jim Dandy Fried Chicken for several years. Later, it appears that it might have been split up into office space. Currently it seems to be a fruit and vegetable produce company.

And that poor building has lost all its character.

1952 ad

Swiss & Cantegral, 1952 Mapsco

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Sources & Notes

Postcard found on Flickr.

More on the McClure company’s grand opening at this Swiss Avenue location can be found in the Dallas Morning News article “McClure Electric Company at Home in Modern Plant” (DMN, Feb. 1, 1952).

2 Comments

December 24, 2016

The Over-the-Top University Park Christmas Display Featuring Big Tex and a Six Flags Spee-lunker

Big Tex on the roof, a “Spee” to the right (click for larger image)

by Paula Bosse

You may have heard about Wayne Smith’s annual spectacular Christmas display in the 3600 block of Southwestern in University Park — the one with a cast of thousands, including a previous head of Big Tex, what seems like hundreds of illuminated Santas, Dracula, Moe Howard, and a former denizen of Six Flags Over Texas’ “Cave”/Spee-lunker ride. Before I get back to the “Spees” (the name the creatures have been given by their surprisingly enthusiastic fan-following), here’s a wider shot of a photo I took during last year’s holiday season. (Click it!)

(And this gives you only an inkling of what’s actually there. I LOVED it! I waited until after Christmas — in fact, after New Year’s — to wander around — I can only imagine how backed up with looky-loos the street gets closer to Christmas.)

Back to the Spees. The Cave water ride debuted in 1964 and was an immediate hit. When it opened, there were 28 of these creatures who, according to the original marketing, “came from innerspace.”

They are 30 inches high and they play harps, do the Twist, play cards, hammer cave crystals into rock candy and engage in a shell game — turtle racing.

This ride was always one of my favorites (probably because it provided a brief, cool respite from the glaring sun and the blasting heat that plagued my annual summer visits to Six Flags).

The Spee-lunkers left Six Flags a long time ago, so it’s nice to see that one of them is still entertaining local crowds, right next to another beloved DFW icon, Big Tex … along with a phalanx of festive Santas!

Lest you think the publicity mill wasn’t working all angles of this new attraction, we see below that one of the Spees got a visit from, of all people, TV-darling Donna Douglas who played Elly May Clampett on The Beverly Hillbillies.

photo and article, Hood County News Tablet, June 4, 1964

August, 1964

Grand Prairie Daily News, May 25, 1977

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Sources & Notes

Photo of Wayne Smith’s Christmas display taken by me on January 2, 2016. The house is in the 3600 block of Southwestern, between Baltimore and Thackery. Since the display is probably visible from space, there’s no way you can miss it.

Postcards found on eBay and Google.

Every year TV crews descend on Smith’s house to do a story. Watch one from this year — from CW33 News — here.

For those who might like more info on the Spee-lunker attraction/ride (which, by the way, is classified as a “dark ride” in amusement park lingo) at Six Flags Over Texas, here’s a bunch of links:

Weird video and music (and history!) by a superfan, here
Article by the same guy who put the above video together, here
Spee-lunker vignettes described here
Google images aplenty, here

More on the new ride can be found in the Dallas Morning News archives in the article “$300,000 Hole: Six Flags To Open Cave Ride” (DMN, May 24, 1964) — accompanying the article is an amusing photo captioned “Gail Powers yelps in mock fear as lobster seizes her hand.”

A shout-out to Wendy Cook who, when I posted the top picture to the Flashback Dallas Instagram feed in January, pointed out to me that the Spee-lunker was even in there. She recognized him right away, but with so much visual overload, I hadn’t even noticed him! Thanks, Wendy!

See stuff bigger — when in doubt, click it!

Category: Postcards

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