A CHRISTMAS CARD from the 1930s

If you don't know about Mr. Roberts from my other site you might enjoy going there and doing a search in the search field. Here is a link to one photo of him with a lovely lady in Yosemite Valley back in the 1920s or early 30s.

In the 1930s Mr. Roberts got married to Lolly and this is a card the happy couple sent out one Christmas.




Click on image to see it larger.
___________

New book NOW available on Amazon.
Tattered and Lost: Forgotten Dolls

This one is for those who love dolls!
Snapshots from the last 100+ years of children and adults with dolls. 

Perfect stocking stuffer for the doll collector on your list!

BRIDGES: The Golden Gate Under Construction

Of all the bridges in the world the Golden Gate is the most special and beautiful to me. It's constantly changing and fascinating from all angles. I'll admit, when I'm crossing it I'm silently saying to myself, "Oh please don't let the big one hit now." I do not want my last moments on earth to be spent inside a car falling to the cold water below. Still, the view would be nice which is unfortunately what draws so many suicide victims.

The bridge is constantly being painted, a never ending job. Not a job I could fathom doing thanks to my fear of heights. Even more disconcerting would be to have been one of the men who built the bridge. Click here to see a vintage snapshot of a man named Geo. McLeod working on the bridge in 1936.

Construction began on January 5, 1933. The project cost more than $35 million. The Golden Gate Bridge construction project was carried out by the McClintic-Marshall Construction Co., a subsidiary of Bethlehem Steel Corporation founded by Howard H. McClintic and Charles D. Marshall, both of Lehigh University.

Strauss remained head of the project, overseeing day-to-day construction and making some groundbreaking contributions. A graduate of the University of Cincinnati, he placed a brick from his alma mater's demolished McMicken Hall in the south anchorage before the concrete was poured. He innovated the use of movable safety netting beneath the construction site, which saved the lives of many otherwise-unprotected steelworkers. Of eleven men killed from falls during construction, ten were killed (when the bridge was near completion) when the net failed under the stress of a scaffold that had fallen. Nineteen others who were saved by the net over the course of construction became proud members of the (informal) Half Way to Hell Club.

The project was finished by April 1937, $1.3 million under budget.

With the death of Jack Balestreri in April 2012, all workers involved in the original construction are now deceased. (SOURCE: Wikipedia)

Click on image to see it larger.


Click on image to see it larger.



I have crossed beneath the bridge several times aboard ships; twice heading to Hawaii and twice returning. Even in the fog it's mysterious and beautiful. Imagine actually building it.

HOTEL EMPIRE, San Francisco

You'll never guess the history of this place.

Click on image to see it larger.

It seems funny that a hotel would put out a postcard and then not provide any location information. There is nothing on the back other than "POST CARD" and "PLACE STAMP HERE". I guess they thought the mere mention of its name would be enough.

"Excuse me cabbie, take me to the Empire."

"Sure thing bud."

Well, what if the same guy got in the cab and said:

"Hey cabbie, take me to that church/hotel."

The cabbie, in 1930, would have driven here. Yes, folks it's a church...it's a hotel...it's a church...it's a hotel...it's two...two...two things in one.

Religion: San Francisco Skyscraper-Church

Monday, Mar. 17, 1930

When city land becomes too expensive to build churches upon, a solution is to combine churches and skyscrapers. The Chicago Temple (First Methodist Episcopal Church plus offices, stores) and Manhattan's Broadway Temple (Methodist Episcopal Church plus apartment houses, hotel, stores) are examples. San Franciscans now have a brand new 30-story pyramidal skyscraper-church-hotel to admire —the William Taylor Hotel and Temple Methodist Episcopal Church, on the busy corner of McAllister and Leavenworth Streets.

A greystone tower with a suggestion of Gothic ornament, it is named for Forty-Niner William ("California") Taylor who chose the longest way to the gold fields— around the Horn. In 1849 that route was safely traversed by 108 vessels. Most of the passengers sought gold. Few of them became either rich or famous, many returned East. William Taylor took a cargo of cut timber with him to build a church. An overpowering man with a stentorian voice, he wore a big, warm beard instead of a shirt. He had been Methodist Bishop of Africa. When he arrived in San Francisco he put his Bible on an overturned whiskey barrel in the middle of Portsmouth Square, bellowed and sang until the saloons emptied to hear him. For diversion he swam regularly across San Francisco Bay, a procedure still regarded as something of an athletic feat. He founded the College of the Pacific (Methodist Episcopal college in Stockton, enrollment about 970), wrote more than 20 books, thundered his old-time religion at Gold Coast sots and socialites.

The building which bears his name cost $2,800,000, contains 500 guest rooms and 32 tower apartments, a famed French chef, a glossy array of electric stoves, refrigerators, semi-modernistic furniture. It is floodlighted at night, has a tapestried lobby. Its seven elevators can reach the roof in 30 seconds.

The church proper, in the Gothic style, will seat 1,500, with a chapel seating 125 more. Two assembly halls may be combined to hold an audience of 1,100 for athletics or theatricals. Four Methodist churches combined to form the new congregation. The pastor is Dr. Walter John Sherman, who devoted ten years to the scheme. Laymen prominently involved: Fred D. Parr, president of Parr Terminal Co.; John H. McCallum, lumberman, president of the San Francisco Y.M.C.A. (SOURCE: TIME)

The depression was not kind to the William Taylor Hotel:

Full of zeal and optimism, in San Francisco ten years ago Methodists of four of the city's biggest churches—Central, California Street, Wesley, Howard Street—sold their properties, pooled $800,000 to form a superchurch which they called Temple Methodist. Their optimism the Methodists expressed by building a 27-story hotel, highest on the Pacific Coast, at Leavenworth & McAllister streets in downtown San Francisco. The William Taylor Hotel, with a cathedral-like, 1,300-seat church concealed in its second, third and fourth floors, would support Temple Church, everyone felt, retire its $1,550,000 in first mortgage bonds at maturity. But more funds were needed and before the hotel was completed in 1930 the Methodists floated a $150,000 second mortgage issue, borrowed $100,000 privately, obtained $534,000 more through mortgages sold to the Methodist home missions board.

Installed in its fine quarters. Temple Church prospered spiritually, but William Taylor Hotel moved into the red, remained there. For a time the Methodists paid interest charges totaling, $135.000 from their own pockets, then let a $500,000 debt accumulate. A bondholders' protective committee foreclosed, bought in the property last November for $750,000. The Methodists, their investment lost for good, were invited to move out of the hotel, their quarters to be used for more lucrative operations, including a garage. Temple Church was as homeless and penniless as any evicted tenement family, but it had kind neighbors. Temple Emanu-El, San Francisco's largest synagog, offered the use of its building on Sundays. A small Methodist church offered the Templers a place to worship in between regular services. And San Francisco's most vigorous Congregational church made what Temple's pastor called an offer of "marriage." Temple accepted. Last Sunday for the first time Methodists mingled with Congregationalists in First Church (2,500 seats), downtown near the swank St. Francis Hotel. (SOURCE: TIME)

And:

In a 1937 auction, new owners acquired the William Taylor for $750,000, changed its name to the Empire and promoted its penthouse as the Empire Sky Room.

Eventually, the Empire also failed. By 1942, it was sold to the federal government and became an office of the Internal Revenue Service.

Since 1978, the once prestigious William Taylor Hotel has been a dormitory for Hastings College of the Law students. (SOURCE: SF Gate)

To see a postcard showing an illustration of the Sky Room click here. Can't guarantee that this link will last for long because it's a card for sale at CardCow.com.

If you are wondering who William Taylor was, wellllllll...

William Taylor (1821-1902) was an American Missionary Bishop of the Methodist Episcopal Church, elected in 1884. Taylor University, a Christian college in Indiana, carries his name.

Taylor was born 2 May 1821 in Rockbridge County—home to Sam Houston (b.1796), Robert E. Lee (b.1807), and Stonewall Jackson (b.1824)—in the Commonwealth of Virginia. He was the oldest of eleven children born to Stuart Taylor and Martha Hickman. In his autobiography, Story of My Life (1896), Taylor describes his grandfather, James, as one of five brothers who were “Scotch-Irish of the Old Covenantor type…who emigrated from County Armagh, Ireland, to the colony of Virginia, about one hundred and thirty years ago” (i.e. 1766). The Hickman family was of English ancestry and settled in Delaware in the late 1750s. Both families “fought for American freedom in the Revolution of 1776” and afterward emancipated their slaves. Taylor’s father, Stuart, was a “tanner and currier—a mechanical genius of his times”; his mother was “mistress of the manufacture of all kinds of cloth.” Both parents, he says, were of “powerful constitution of body and mind…their English school education quite equal to the average of their day.”

Conversion to Christ

Before William was ten years old, his grandmother had taught him the Lord's Prayer and explained that he could become a son of God. He longed for this relationship, but was unsure how to obtain it. Overhearing the story of a poor Black man who had received salvation, he wondered why he could not, also. He recounts in his autobiography,

"soon after, as I sat one night by the kitchen fire, the Spirit of the Lord came on me and I found myself suddenly weeping aloud and confessing my sins to God in detail, as I could recall them, and begged Him for Jesus' sake to forgive them, with all I could not remember; and I found myself trusting in Jesus that it would all be so, and in a few minutes my heart was filled with peace and love, not the shadow of a doubt remaining."

He entered the Baltimore Annual Conference in 1843. Bishop Taylor traveled to San Francisco, California in 1849, and organized the first Methodist church in San Francisco. Between 1856 and 1883 he traveled in many parts of the world as an evangelist. He was elected Missionary Bishop of Africa in 1884, and retired in 1896.

Books he wrote include:

Seven Years' Street Preaching in San Francisco (1857)

Christian Adventures in South Africa (1867)

Four Years' Campaign in India (1875)

Our South American Cousins (1878)

Self-Supporting Missions in India (1882)

The Story of My Life (1895)

Flaming Torch in Darkest Africa (1898)

(SOURCE: Wikipedia)

Taylor died in 1902 in Palo Alto, California and is buried in Mountain View Cemetery in Oakland, California. (SOURCE: Taylor Univeristy)

Now, seriously, what do you think this fellow would have thought about having a hotel such as this with his name above the door? With a penthouse! I don't know how many members they had, but this is surely a sort of odd version of a mega-church. A glowing mega-church that looks like Batman should be standing on top of it.

Oh, and by the way, apparently the address is 100 McAllister Street in case you're ever in San Francisco and want to experience it's wonderfulness without the psychedelic sky. To see a current photograph and read a brief blog post about the building click here.

And to think I started to bed a couple hours ago thinking I'd post this card with "Hey, does anyone know anything about this place?" as my message. Why, oh why couldn't I have just scanned a Travel Lodge in Kansas. I'd have been in bed for hours!

I'm going to BUY A PAPER DOLL

These paper people reside inside an old Fannie May candy box bought at an estate sale about two months ago. It was a really intriguing sale with all sorts of goodies. Fortunately for me two guys who got in the door about 10 minutes before me, who are usually buying exactly what I want, were tired, and one had forgotten to bring his glasses. Thus when looking through the box of old photographs the one guy kept muttering that there wasn't anything good, but then he'd add "Of course if I had my glasses...." I sort of hovered, watching what they picked up and put down. I was hoping he'd put the photo box down and I'd zoom in. I nicely said, "Hey, when you're done with the photos I'd like to take a look." He was very accommodating as I continued to hover. Finally I had my shot at the box and I continued to monitor them through the eyes in the back of my head. They continued muttering that there wasn't much to be had, the sellers had not told the truth in their ad, etc. And then I heard it...

"Hey, do you want this box of paper dolls?" said the one guy to the other.

I about broke my neck. I never find paper dolls at estate sales. Never! I see these sales on ebay all the time where someone just happened into an estate sale and bought a ton of mint paper doll books. I don't go to those kind of sales. Never my luck. Anyway...

"No, I've sort of stopped buying paper dolls."

The fellow then saw me standing with the photo box in my hands, salivating, wondering what was in the white candy box he was holding. He said, "Are you interested?" I hope my grab wasn't too rude. I looked inside and was delighted! Lovely old 1930s dolls, clothes, accessories. Lots of goodies, most not completely cut-out. 

Now comes the problem. Who are these people? I know from the style they're from the 1930s, but for the life of me I cannot find them in any of my Mary Young paper doll reference books. I'm sure they're in there, but I'm just not finding them. So if someone out there in the darkness staring at their screen can give me a hint I'd be most grateful. I'd like to mentally name them other than "Fanny May Wedding Party" which I'm sure is a very sweet (sorry) name, but I need to know the facts. 

And yes, there is a groom. Now mind you apparently the company figured he wouldn't get played with much because he's on the same paper as the clothes, unlike all the other dolls which were punched out from the cover. Poor groom. I imagine not many survived. Ain't that always the way when you get this many women in a room with one guy? Okay, the fact that he is slightly effeminate...pretty much the given with paper dolls. The guys almost always look like one of the girls. I guess they were less threatening. I really don't know. 

Click on any image to see it larger.

Oh yeah, amongst the photos they passed up, the "famous" melon eating pig I posted at my vernacular photography site.  I left that sale a very happy girl.

UPDATE: Thanks to Linda at The Paper Collector who has identified the set as Wedding of the Paper Dolls from 1935, published by Merrill Publishing. It was illustrated by Lucille Webster. A reprint of this was available several years ago, but I haven't seen it recently. Now that we know the name of it keep your eyes open for the repro. The illustrations really are lovely!

MONEY money MONEY

It's all about money. It's always about money.

Someone doesn't have any. Someone has barely enough. Someone has too much. Money is fascinating. Money corrupts. Money soothes.

As a child I loved playing with money. Lightweight aluminum coins and fake paper money. I'd put it in my toy cash register, shut the drawer, pull the handle and do it all over again. And a jar of pennies was heaven. Line them up, stack them and knock them down. A few in my pocket and I'd run across the street to the candy store after school and buy something sweet to eat on the bus home. Or just hold a bunch of coins in my tightfisted hand and shake them listening to them clang against each other.

My parents were children of the depression and their feelings about money were different than mine. They were fearful of the lack of money and so they saved. They were not extravagant. I grew up to be mostly the same. I fear being without and imagine myself in a dark hotel room with a single bulb with a thin string hanging from the ceiling over a barren table. Outside the window is a buzzing broken neon sign flashing "OTEL." That's how I grew up imagining my life without money. That's my nightmare scene in the lizard part of my brain.

These days money is what has all of us fearful and angry. It's the way of money.

This booklet from the 1930s belonged to my mom. I no longer remember where she got it, but I think in the 1930s for a brief period she worked for the National Cash Register Company. I would sit for hours looking at the maps and photos imagining myself playing with money from all over the world. Playing with the fancy cash registers. And then of course when I got to school and had to do reports about exports from countries I'd get this little book out to help.





I still enjoy looking through the booklet, only now with a critical eye and a somewhat snarky attitude. Some of it haunts me because of a world long gone. Countries no longer under colonial rule. Countries that were about to face devastating war. Countries that would be broken in two. I've only included a few countries to be viewed.

Click on any image below to see it larger.

And now, a little song, a little dance, a few coins down your pants.