I am older than you, cause I remember a motel in Ecorse MI that had a sign, "a radio in every room". It stood there for years.
One in Portland that's not long for this world. Trailer park has been cleared of all old trailers and new building is almost complete. Tried to get the sign but it seems the scrap metal guys have already beat me to it...
in my back yard. the olds sign was found by my brother at the old city dump site. it was folded in half and three quarters of it was buried. its a true survivor!
A few I've shot over the past several years. I'm looking for a couple of signs to purchase for my own garage, sadly tho the professional collectors and pickers have driven the prices out of reach, at least for me.
after seeing all this original commercial art that is fading away should be restored. i feel it would be a good community service project for the car clubs to get places that sell paint to donate the right paint to repaint the old automotive advertising and be part of maintaining history. remember when it is gone that is all. the best example i can give and i hope i get to see it is; scientist are in the process of genically engineering the reincarination of the wooley mamouth. as far as other commercial art other organizations could restore that.
Near my home in Chino Hills there is a canyon road (Carbon Canyon) that at one time back in the 30's up until the late 60's was a place called LaVida. It was a hot springs with a old Hotel that burned down about 15 years ago. There was also what became a biker bar in the same area. Anyway I remember a soft drink by the nave LaVida back in the early 60's. This sign painted on the water tank is the same logo. Anyone remember this drink?
I saw this website mentioned in the local paper today: http://www.recapturist.com/ It's a photo gallery of vintage signs of all different types.
Great news for fans of old neon signs here in Portland, OR. The Oregon Leather Company sign I posted a couple of weeks ago hadn't been lit since 1974 but thanks to NBC (which is currently filming the series "Grimm" here in town and laid out their own money) it's lit again. They were filming on the same block and wanted to sign lit for the shot. Very cool!
The Bardahl neon sign in action in Seattle's Ballard neighborhood: http://youtu.be/vfKpqnvyMgw <object width="420" height="315"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/vfKpqnvyMgw?version=3&hl=en_US"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/vfKpqnvyMgw?version=3&hl=en_US" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" width="420" height="315" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true"></embed></object>
The Jalopy Journal
