We’ve seen this cover before on a 1935 breakfast menu. Although this menu, whose scans were donated by a Streamliner Memories reader, has a print date of June, 1934 on the back, the inside menu is undated and may have been used later in 1934 or early 1935.
Click image to download an 3.5-MB PDF of this menu.
Unlike some menus I’ve found in what I call the Art Nouveau series, this one has both an a la carte and a table d’hôte side. The table d’hôte side includes seven entrées: salmon, ham, lamb chops, chicken pie, mushroom omelet, roast beef, and assorted cold meats, all of which came with soup, salad, vegetables, potatoes, bread, dessert, and beverage. It also offers a sirloin steak, for one or for two, with potatoes, salad, bread, dessert, and beverage — but no soup.
The a la carte side has more than 50 items on it, depending on how you count, including 18 entrées, five different ways of serving potatoes, and several different kinds of teas. Appetizers include olives, India relish, Chow Chow relish, and gherkins.
Curiously, Union Pacific issued three different Art Nouveau menus with slightly different versions of the scene on the cover of this one. The photo in what may have been the first one was taken from a slightly lower elevation and was hand colored by someone who had never been to Zion, as the colors are too dark. The second one, issued in 1930, is much brighter and shows a road, but no vehicles, in the middle ground. The one shown here has two vehicles on the road and is marked “natural color photograph,” suggesting the colors were more accurate than ones that were hand colored.
The reader who contributed this menu said that her grandfather was a student and a member of the debate team at Utah State University in 1934. He may have collected this menu on a debate trip to the San Francisco Bay Area.