“Where do you see yourself in five years?”
by Paula Bosse
Jack and the girls. …Before.
***
I think this is the Carousel Club. It might not be. The source of this photo is a bad, bad, bad, spammy site with loud commercials. They get no credit from me. “No soup for you!”
*
Copyright © 2015 Paula Bosse. All Rights Reserved.
Splendiforous parking garage, 1945
by Paula Bosse
Here are a couple of ways developers have attempted to cope with the parking needs of downtown Dallas. I’m not sure how long either of these parking garages lasted, but I give them both A’s for effort.
First, 1945: Nichols Bros. Garage & Rent-a-Car Service at 1320 Commerce (just east of Field). Just look at all these amenities — women and chauffeurs are not forgotten.
…Fluorescent lighting — Air-conditioned waiting room for customers — Beautiful powder room for women — Waiting rooms for chauffeurs — Complete facilities for auto storage, washing, lubrication and motor tune-up service.
1945 Dallas directory
I don’t know how long this lasted, but if you’re going to have a garage downtown, it might as well look like that one!
*
Then in 1954, the 8-story Dallas Carpark at Jackson and St. Paul arrived (a second one at Jackson and Lane was under construction that same year). It was a franchise of the Pigeonhole Parking System of Spokane, utilizing “car-parking machines” invented by Leo Sanders of Spokane, Washington. I’m not exactly sure how these worked, but cars were hoisted and lowered on elevators, and the whole parking process, from start to finish, was conducted without an attendant ever actually touching the cars. Again, I don’t know how long this endeavor was in business (at least through the early 1960s), but — parking-garage-history neophyte that I am — I’ve never heard of such a thing. (There’s a video showing how it worked — thanks, “Not Bob” for posting this in the comments)!
*
UPDATE: “Found” film footage of a family’s trip to Dallas in 1962 actually shows this pigeon-hole system in action. The whole short video is interesting, but the pigeon-hole footage is what got me really excited — it begins at the 1:32 mark.
*
A couple of screenshots:
***
Nichols Bros. ad from the 1945 city directory.
The 1951 Universal Newsreel segment can be found on Vimeo here (thanks to “Not Bob”).
1962 YouTube video of found footage can be seen here (thanks to Robert Wilonsky of The Dallas Morning News for posting this link!).
See photos and read about the elevator-centric Dallas Carpark at Jackson and St. Paul in these Dallas Morning News articles:
See several photos of the “pigeon-hole” parking system in other parts of the country in the article “Pigeon Hole Parking — An Amusement Park Ride for Your Car,” here. Here’s one in Portland, Oregon (the Dallas Carpark was 8 levels high):
*
Copyright © 2015 Paula Bosse. All Rights Reserved.
Dallas women at work, 1925 (click for larger image)
by Paula Bosse
Today at look at two ads seeking “young women of high ideals and ambition” to become telephone operators, one of the few careers open to women exclusively.
First, an ad from 1911 for the Southwestern Telegraph & Telephone Company (click for larger image — transcription below).
1911
COMFORT and CONVENIENCE
The new building is equipped with every comfort and convenience for the operators. The entire third floor is set aside to their use, and there are the cafe, the rest room and roof garden. Taken all together the building is a model, designed and planned with the one purpose: That of the helpfulness of service. Representatives of the company feel that environment has much to do with the attitude of the employees.
The Southwestern Telegraph & Telephone Company offers exceptional advantages to young women of high ideals and ambition. The way is open by which a PROFESSION may be mastered under the most pleasant and auspicious circumstances. You earn while you learn.
For information, apply to the principal of the operating school at the “Main” exchange, corner of Akard and Jackson streets, or “Edgewood” exchange on Harwood street, near Grand avenue.
*
Here’s an ad from 1925 for Southwestern Bell Telephone Company, really pushing the idea that working as a switchboard operator is mostly rest and “a variety of diversions — sewing, dancing [!], reading, conversation”... more play than work, really!
1925
WORK AND PLAY IN TELEPHONE LAND
The telephone operator works between rests. Most of the time, it is true, she sits at the switchboard putting up the talk tracks for the subscriber, but in-between-times are periods for recreation, in which she has opportunity for change and relaxation. Attractive rest rooms invite a variety of diversions — sewing, dancing, reading, conversation — or just rest.
Miss Etta Mooneyham, Chief Operator at the Long Distance Office, at 4100 Bryan street, will welcome your visit any afternoon from two to five o’clock.
If you’re lucky, maybe Miss Mooneyham will ask you to dance.
Relaxing in one of the “attractive rest rooms” (1925)
***
1911 ad appeared in the Dallas Morning News on May 29, 1911; 1925 ad (containing the photos at the top and bottom) appeared in the 1925 edition of “The Oak,” the yearbook of Oak Cliff High School (later renamed Adamson High School).
I’ve been fascinated by telephone operators my whole life. Ever wonder why operators have historically always been women? Watch an entertaining 5-minute video about why women took over the profession, here.
Also, read an interesting New York Times article about “telephone girls” (June 11, 1899), here.
Lastly, because I really want to post this ridiculous screenshot of what 19th-century operators apparently wore at some point, an AT&T industrial film called “The Nation at Your Fingertips”can be viewed here. (The few seconds showing this operator who surely would have experienced crippling next pain for the rest of her life begins at the 3:43 mark.)
See an earlier, related post — “Telephone Operators Sweating at the Switchboard — 1951” — here.
Click pictures for larger images.
*
Copyright © 2015 Paula Bosse. All Rights Reserved.
Oak Cliff’s landmark hangout (click for larger image)
by Paula Bosse
When J. D. Sivils (1907-1986) and his wife, Louise (1918-2006), brought their “Sivils” restaurant to Dallas in June 1940, their Houston drive-in of the same name had already been featured as a Life magazine cover story, garnering the kind of incredible national publicity that any business owner would have killed for! And all because of their carhops — “comely, uniformed lassies” whom Mrs. Sivils insisted on calling “curb girls” (which might have a slightly different connotation these days…). Life — never a magazine to overlook pretty young girls in sexy outfits — not only devoted a pictorial to the “curb girls,” they also put one of them (Josephine Powell of Houston) on the cover, wearing the Sivils’ uniform of (very, very short!) majorette’s outfit, plumed hat, and boots.
Feb. 26, 1940
Louise Sivils and a prospective “curb girl” (Life)
Four months after the blitz of national attention the drive-in received from the Life story, Sivils came to Dallas. The drive-in was located in Oak Cliff at the intersection of West Davis and Fort Worth Avenue on “three acres of paved parking space.”
The day the drive-in opened, a photo of the not-yet-legendary Sivils appeared in The Dallas Morning News (see “Sivils to Open Dallas Place Thursday,” DMN, June 27, 1940). Other than this, there is surprisingly little in the pages of The News about this drive-in’s opening — surprising because it became such a huge part of the lives of Oak Cliff’s teens in the ’40s, ’50s, and ’60s. It’s one of those places that seems to have reached almost mythic proportions on the nostalgia scale.
Sivils didn’t quietly sneak into town, though. Take a look at this very large, very expensive newspaper ad, which ran the day before OC’s soon-to-be favorite hang-out opened. (Click for larger image.)
June 26, 1940
*
Nationally Famous for Food and LIFE
SIVILS COMES TO DALLAS!
Texas’ largest drive-in
Opens tomorrow
(Thursday 3:00 PM)
You’ve heard about “Sivils”! You’ve read about “Sivils” in LIFE Magazine and you’ve seen a beautiful “Sivils Girl” on the cover of LIFE Magazine! But now Dallas has a “Sivils” all its own! Come out tomorrow. See Texas’ largest drive-in. Enjoy “Sivils” famous food and ice cold beer or soft drinks. “Sivils” special ice vault assures the coldest drinks in town!
75 Beautiful “LIFE Cover Girls” to Serve You
All Kinds of Ice Cold Beer and Soft Drinks
Juicy Jumbo Hamburgers
Fried Chicken
Tenderloin Trout Sandwiches
K.C. Steaks
Pit Barbecue
All Kinds of Salads and Cold Plates
Delicious Sandwiches
Complete Fountain Service
Sivils – “Where All Dallas Meets”
At intersection West Davis and Fort Worth Ave.
Three Acres of Paved Parking Space
*
100-150 “curb girls” were employed by Sivils at any given time in those early days, and it was open 24 hours a day. The place was hopping. Sounds fantastic. Wish I’d seen it.
via Flickr
eBay
Below, a scanned menu (click to see larger images):
via eBay
***
Top postcard from the Boston Public Library Tichnor Brothers Postcard Collection on Flickr, here.
Read the 4-page Life article (and see several photos of the Houston “curb girls”) here (use the magnifying glass icon at the top left to increase the size of the page).
Interesting quote from that article:“They work in 7½-hour shifts, six days a week, for which they get no pay but average $5 a day in tips.” Doesn’t sound legal…. (The Inflation Calculator tells us that $5 in 1940 money is equivalent to just over $83 in today’s money.)
Sivils closed in 1967, possibly because Mr. and Mrs. Sivils wanted to retire, but it seems more likely that Oak Cliff’s being a dry area of Dallas since the 1950s was killing its business. Check out the News article “Big Head Expected as Oak Cliff Beer Issue Foams” by Kent Biffle (DMN, Aug. 17, 1966) which appeared just months before another election in which the “drys” outvoted the “wets.” (More on Oak Cliff’s crazy wet-dry issues, here.)
J. D. Sivils was interviewed in a short documentary about Dallas carhops, filmed in the early 1970s. In it, he talks about the early days of Sivils and — best of all — there is film footage galore of the drive-in from his collection. Watch it in my previous post — “‘Carhops’ — A Short Documentary, ca. 1974” — here. (Below a screenshot of Sivils from the film.)
Read the article “Carhops, Curb Service, and the Pig Sandwich” by Michael Karl Witzel (Texas Highways, Oct. 2006) in a PDF, here (increase size of article with controls at top of page).
Another Flashback Dallas post on drive-in culture — “Carhops as Sex Symbols — 1940” — is here.
Click pictures for larger images.
*
Copyright © 2015 Paula Bosse. All Rights Reserved.
Schlitz on its way…
by Paula Bosse
The carhop is an oddly American invention — and it began here in Dallas in the 1920s, with boys and young men serving customers in cars at J. G. Kirby’s Pig Stand drive-in restaurants. In 1940, Sivils hit Dallas, but this time with young women as servers — young women in skimpy outfits. There was no looking back — from then on, pretty girls showing a lot of leg and hoping for big tips carried trays of food, soft drinks, and beer to cars full of waiting customers.
One of the few remaining “old school” drive-ins is Keller’s on Northwest Highway, still doing good business today. Around 1974 or 1975, SMU film teacher Pat Korman made a short documentary about Dallas carhops past and present (the result, it seems, of reading a Dallas Morning News article by Rena Pederson). He interviewed B. J. Kirby (owner of Kirby’s steakhouse on Lower Greenville and son of Jesse Kirby, founder of the Pig Stand pig-sandwich empire, which, as legend has it, had the very first carhops), J. D. Sivils (owner of Sivils drive-ins, who, along with his wife, was an important figure in the evolution of curb-side dining), and Jack Keller (owner of Keller’s Hamburgers). The three businessmen reminisce about the early days of drive-in restaurants in Dallas as a lot of cool historical film footage unspools and photographs from the ’20s to the ’50s are flashed on the screen. Also interviewed are four women carhops who were working at Keller’s at the time, talking about their jobs.
It’s a cool film. Big cotton-candy hair, accents you wish were still around, and cans and cases of Schlitz, Schlitz, Schlitz.
The 14-minute film is in two parts on YouTube. Here is the first part:
*
And here is the second part:
*
Below, screenshots of the interviewees.
Sandy
Shirley (as of Jan. 2015, she’s been a fixture at Keller’s for 50 years!)
Rita
Nancy
B. J. Kirby
J. D. Sivils
Jack Keller
No. 5 — 80¢
***
“Carhops” — filmed sometime in the early ’70s — was directed by Patrick Korman, shot by Ron Judkins, and produced by Don Pasquella. It premiered at Jesuit High School in April 1976. The film is on YouTube in two parts, here and here. (By the way, if you look at the YouTube comments under part two, you’ll see a comment from Sandy herself. She’s still looking good in the avatar photo.) (The music at the beginning and end of the film is great! I’m pretty sure it’s the legendary steel guitarist Ralph Mooney and the equally legendary guitarist James Burton; I love those guys! I urge to go get a copy of their album “Corn Pickin’ and Slick Slidin.'”)
Rena Pederson is thanked in the credits. She wrote a great article in The Dallas Morning News called “Carhops Fading, Those Were the Days” (Aug. 25, 1974) — she interviewed many of the same people seen in the film.
The Keller’s Northwest Highway location celebrates its 50th anniversary this year. Shirley — one of the carhops featured in the film — has worked there since it opened in 1965. As of Jan. 2015, she was still there! Go by and see her! Check out a Lakewood Advocate story on Shirley, here.
Also, take a look at a Dallas Morning News article on Keller’s 50th anniversary, here — scroll down to the slideshow to check out some great photos from its early days.
Read about sexy male carhops who plied their trade in skimpy outfits — a short-lived fad in Dallas inspired by the success of drive-ins like Sivils — in my previous post “Carhops as Sex Symbols — 1940,” here.
*
Copyright © 2015 Paula Bosse. All Rights Reserved.
“Dallas Terminal” / ©Dolph Briscoe Center for American History
by Paula Bosse
A few photos of Love Field, hangars, and American Airlines airplanes, all taken in 1951 by Russell Lee for a story in Fortune magazine.
***
Photos ©Dolph Briscoe Center for American History; all photos are by Russell Lee from the collection of his photographs at the University of Texas at Austin. I am unable to post links because I can no longer find them on the website (!).
This time pictures aren’t larger when clicked. All apologies to fans of the wonderful Russell Lee, for these less-than-crisp images.
*
Copyright © 2015 Paula Bosse. All Rights Reserved.
by Paula Bosse
Every once in a while, I notice that an old post is getting a sudden increase in hits. Currently, it’s the one I wrote about J. C. Hibbard’s Gospel Lighthouse Church in Oak Cliff. I’m not sure why so many people are currently flocking to this post from last year (it’s had over a thousand views in the past couple of days), but I’m certainly glad that this architecturally unusual building (which, by the way, still stands) is getting a little attention. It was so cool-looking in old photos that I drove over to Oak Cliff to look at it in person, and I encourage others to do the same!
Read about this church and see several images inside and out, here.
*
Copyright © 2015 Paula Bosse. All Rights Reserved.
The back side of Elm, looking east…
by Paula Bosse
Elm Street gets all the glory as Theater Row, but what about Pacific? It had those very same theaters. …Sort of. Pacific gets overlooked a lot. When I see photos like this one — which shows Pacific Avenue looking east from Bryan — I always think of it as a photo showing the back side of Elm rather than as a photo showing Pacific. Always a bridesmaid, never the bride.
This photo was taken only a few short years after the Texas & Pacific railroad tracks were removed from Pacific, making it into an automobile and pedestrian thoroughfare only — no more frightening, smoke-belching trains rumbling right down the middle of the street. The city was hoping that Pacific would become a heavily commercial area like Elm, Main, and Commerce, but it never really reached those lofty heights.
I’ve always wondered if the theaters that lined Elm ever considered having entrances/box offices on both Elm and Pacific. I think that they were really only willing to slap a few posters and paint their names on their back, Pacific-facing walls. Elm Street was glitzy and glamorous. Pacific was not. Back in those early days when people were still trying to get used to Pacific Avenue being newly liberated from its railroad tracks, it might have been seen as something of an afterthought — as more of a very wide alley with traffic than as a contender for one of Dallas’ major streets.
But back to the theaters. In the photo above, we see the Old Mill at 1525-27 Elm (where “The Snob” was playing, featuring John Gilbert and Norma Shearer), the Capitol at 1521-23 Elm (which had Alla Nazimova in “The Redeeming Sin”), and the Jefferson Theater at 1517 Elm (featuring Harley Sadler’s repertory company appearing in “Honest Hypocrites and Saintly Sinners” between vaudeville acts). All of these were playing in May, 1925.
It’s interesting that the only business seen here on the south side of Pacific that had an address on both Elm and Pacific was Van Winkle’s Book Store (before it moved a couple of doors up Elm, it was at 1603 Elm/1614 Pacific). Note the sign advising “Free Passage to Elm Street” — several businesses allowed people to cut through their stores to get to the next street over because the blocks were incredibly long and would sometimes have necessitated pedestrians going three blocks out of their way just to get to their destination.
Other notable landmarks in the photo above: the Medical Arts Building (on the left) and the Dallas Athletic Club.
Here’s a view of Pacific from around the same time, looking west, from about Harwood.
1930
Most interesting detail in this photo? That Murphy Door Bed Co. sign!
***
Top photo from Lost Dallas by Mark Doty (Charleston: Arcadia Publishing, 2012).
*
Copyright © 2015 Paula Bosse. All Rights Reserved.
Maybe they should have worn those spurs on the field…
by Paula Bosse
That first season … oh dear. My Thanksgiving post from last year contains a few Dallas Cowboys stats that might make you cringe; read it here.
*
Copyright © 2015 Paula Bosse. All Rights Reserved.
by Paula Bosse
The celebration of Thanksgiving was a hard, hard sell to the Southern states. Read my previous post about why it wasn’t until Reconstruction that Texans finally decided to participate in the national holiday, here.
Happy Thanksgiving!
*
Copyright © 2015 Paula Bosse. All Rights Reserved.
Flashback : Dallas 