ONE OF THE BEST USA TRAVEL PHOTO ALBUMS - 1927
(AUTOMOBILE TRAVEL). A RIDE THRU U.S.A. - 1927. An exceptionally well-annotated large photo album recording the 14,422 mile transcontinental sojourn of three young men in their 1927 Dodge Fast Four through campsites, the Northern U.S., several National Parks, the West, Southwest, and Southern States, before returning back home to Brooklyn, N.Y. The three men are identified with photos as Bill, Fred and George.
This nicely annotated and large photo album featuring 638 photographs and real photo postcards, traces the adventures of three young men from Brooklyn, NY, at the end of the Roaring 20’s hitting the road to “See America First.” As Americans increasingly followed the paths of the vast open spaces, they took advantage of rapidly improving road networks, as well as campgrounds, service stations, and other roadside services to fill the needs for the intrepid automobile campers. Stopping in 69 different camps,
covering 14,422 miles in less than 3 months, and fixing 9 flat tires, “The Gang” Bill, Fred & George launched their trip across the Northern States driving through New York with stops in Niagara Falls; Detroit, Michigan where they visited Ford’s Highland Park Plant; followed by a stop in South Dakota’s Black Hills to visit a garden party hosted by President Coolidge and the First Lady. Other stops included the Tri-State Roundup rodeo in Belle Fourche, SD with several photos of Native Americans in traditional dress, views of the Shoshone Dam and Shoshone Canyon, and Cody Road on the way to Yellowstone, as well as extensive images of their visit to Yellowstone.
They stop on to swim in the Great Salt Lake, in Salt Lake City, UT, drive the historic Columbia River Highway down past Mount Hood and up to Mount Rainier National Park, and proceed on to camp in Vancouver, WA, and travel through Portland where they snap a photo of the Paper Mill at Oregon City along the Willamette River Falls. The trio’s West Coast camp stops also included Yosemite National Park, San Francisco, a sparsely developed Beverly Hills, CA in Los Angeles, where the star-struck visited the homes of Buster Keaton, Rudolph Valentino, Tom Mix, Charlie Chaplin, PicFair (Mary Pickford & Douglas Fairbanks), Marion Davies, and others. After their side trip to Tijuana, Mexico, they drive across the Imperial Valley in 120 degree heat, and continue with visits to the Grand Canyon, Cliff Dwellings near Flagstaff, AZ, and the Petrified Forest, and Painted Desert. Their Dodge Fast Four
named “Old Faithful” manages to wade through flooding in Louisiana near New Orleans, and then they tour through Mobile, AL, Pensacola, FL, Tampa, FL, bathe at Miami Beach, and even drive on Daytona Beach. A couple of the photographs depict the African-American “Negro Village” in St. Augustine, FL.
The “See America First” campaign emerged out of the confluence of the “Good Roads” movement, the expanding interest in early automobile travel, and the land promotional efforts by businessmen and boosters to encourage tourism from the East to the West, by advertising the opportunities, resources, and grandeur of the American landscape. The slogan was adopted by the railroads, the National Parks concessionaires, guide book publishers, automobile and rail tour operators, and commercial clubs appearing on posters, brochures, postcards, decals, colouring books, puzzles, and souvenirs of all types. Automobile travel, encouraged and facilitated by massive road building and improvement projects across the United States during the opening decades of the 20th-Century, enabled travelers of limited means the ability to experience the grandeur of the American countryside, and still drive themselves, and even camp in their automobile.
Oblong folio. 15.5 x 11.25 in. [92 pp (unpaginated).], on thick black paper stock. With 638 silver gelatin photographs and real photo postcards, many w/ photographer’s imprint & caption w/in negative, sized from 1 x 1 in. up to 5 x 7 in., with majority 2.75 x 4.5 in., neatly executed annotations & locations
in white ink throughout, 1 large colorized photo map, w/ route in ink, camping stops all neatly noted w/in caption box, and mileage, sized 8.5 x 12.75 in., 4 color-printed postcards of the grand canyon, all mounted. Contemporary decorated half-calf over ribbed leather post-binder, screw-posts at gutter margin, expected minor wear to post-binder. Overall an exceptional automobile trip photo album in vg cond.
