Our Detroit knight collected one more item on his trip back from the 1949 mason’s convention: a combination itinerary-map from the Santa Fe. The itinerary has room for a nineteen-leg trip, with spaces for the railroad, train number, dates, arrival … Continue reading
Category Archives: Santa Fe
Over the last couple of months, we’ve tracked a train charted by the Detroit Knights Templar to the 1949 mason’s convention in San Francisco. Following the convention, the group went to Los Angeles, probably on the Southern Pacific coast route, … Continue reading
We’ve seen timetables like this one from the early 1960s. This one from 1949 came with the other materials saved by one of the Detroit knights attending the San Francisco mason’s convention. Click image to download a 8.8-MB PDF of … Continue reading
A few weeks ago, I presented some menus from a 1937 American Express Banner Tour, noting that the tour had started by taking the Santa Fe from Chicago to Los Angeles. The tour must have taken an “Indian Detour” to … Continue reading
Soon after the war, Santa Fe/Fred Harvey began using menus with colorful paintings on their covers. But in 1946 their menu covers were plain, with little more decoration than the name of the train and a Santa Fe logo. This … Continue reading
The image in Santa Fe’s 1982 painting depicts a Navajo hogan or lodge. The painting is by D. (for Duncan) Alanson Spencer (1911-1999). He was born and trained in Los Angeles, where he painted scenic backdrops for MGM and other … Continue reading
For Santa Fe’s 1981 calendar it used a painting by Frederic Mizen, an artist that Santa Fe relied on heavily for its commercial art in the 1950s and 1960s. We’ve seen his work at least a half a dozen times … Continue reading
The painting on Santa Fe’s 1979 calendar is by Claudine Morrow, one of the younger painters from whom Santa Fe purchased artworks. She was born in Kansas in 1931 and, as near as I can tell, is currently living in … Continue reading
In 1977, Santa Fe was out of the passenger business but still doing car maintenance work for Amtrak. It sometimes adding pieces of southwest Indian art to passenger car decor, much to Amtrak’s annoyance as the company wanted all of … Continue reading
We’ve previously seen children’s menus that doubled as cowboy and Indian maiden masks that were used at the Grand Canyon. This mask of an Indian chief was used at a Fred Harvey restaurant on the Illinois Tollway, but I’ve seen … Continue reading