“Southern Pacific of Mexico has just completed connection of its lines between Tepic and Guadalajara, opening a route of great importance for commerce and travel from the United States, via Tucson and Njogales, Arizona, through to Mexico City and the interior of Mexico,” reports page 5 this 1927 booklet. That may have been exciting news for U.S. residents who wanted to visit Mexico, but why did SP spend four pages on other stuff before announcing this?

Click image to download a 12.7-MB PDF of this 32-page booklet.

The beautiful cover painting by Maurice Logan, shown above, is actually the back cover. The inside back cover is the usual list of Southern Pacific ticket agents. This not only includes agents in Mexico City and Monterey, Mexico, but also Liverpool, London, Paris, Milan, and Turin, Italy. SP must have thought Europeans would be particularly interested in visiting Mexico.

The front cover, or page 1, shows photos of ox carts used to transport goods “nearly everywhere in Mexico” contrasted with Pacific Fruit Express refrigerator cars being loaded with Mexican fruit bound for U.S. dining tables. Pages 2 and 3 are a lengthy essay about agriculture on the West Coast of Mexico. While some U.S. tourists might find this mildly interesting, it would have been better located in the back of the booklet, not at the beginning. Page 4 is a map highlighting SP’s route from Nogales to Guadalajara, with a couple of branch lines.

Finally, page 5 begins a travelogue to the “strange contrasts” found in Mexico, which continues, with photographs, through the rest of the booklet. This is the heart of the booklet, which I would have started on page 1 (or page 3 as I would have put Logan’s painting on page 1 and probably move the full-page photo on that is page 30 to page 2). Despite its peculiar arrangement, this is a fascinating booklet.