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Missouri Pacific March 1948 Timetable

Posted on February 4, 2024 by Train LoverJanuary 5, 2024

This edition of MP’s magazine-style timetables had color photographs accompanying full-page articles about Omaha, Dallas, Salt Lake City, and (on the back cover) Mexico. Another article includes recipes for oyster bisque, creole potatoes, and pumpkin pie “recommended” by Missouri Pacific chefs.

Click image to download a 28.8-MB PDF of this 48-page timetable.

In addition to the full-color pages, some pages are tinted in green and yellow. Articles on these pages briefly describe Louisiana, Natchez, Fort Smith Arkansas, and Hutchinson, Kansas. Continue reading →

Missouri Pacific April 1947 Timetable

Posted on February 3, 2024 by Train LoverFebruary 3, 2024

Over the next several months I am going to present around 150 timetables, including more than 50 from the Burlington Route, more than 30 from the Rock Island, and more than 50 from a variety of other railroads. But first I have several of the Missouri Pacific timetables that featured this image of an Eagle streamliner on the cover.

Click image to download a 28.5-MB PDF of this 48-page timetable.

I’ve noted previously that Missouri Pacific timetables from 1947 through mid-1957 were unusual in their extravagant use of color. These were preceded by quite ordinary timetables including one we’ve seen from February 1946 and a similar one I’ve seen dated July 1946. The first that I’ve seen that has the same Eagle cover shown here was dated November 1946. Continue reading →

The Land Where the World Stays Young

Posted on February 2, 2024 by Train LoverDecember 29, 2023

Today’s booklet, which is marked 1929, is clearly a different edition of the one posted here yesterday. Some of the photos are different, the layout is different, the back cover image (shown below) is different, but much of the text is the same in the two booklets.

Click image to download a 12.3-MB PDF of this 16-page booklet.

As in yesterday’s booklet, the cover image only covers two-thirds of the 9″x12″ publication, with the other third used to list White Pass officials and agents. Unlike yesterday’s image, this one has a full range of colors and is signed Segesman. We’ve previously seen three other booklets and a brochure from the White Pass Route whose covers were illustrated by John Segesman (1899-1985), a Spokane native who studied art in Seattle. Continue reading →

Alaska, Atlin and the Yukon

Posted on February 1, 2024 by Train LoverDecember 29, 2023

I’ve presented this booklet before from an edition on archive.org. Whoever scanned it for archive.org cut the cover image in half. I tried to restore it, with less-than-perfect success, then compounded the problem by putting the back cover on the front. Today, I’m rectifying these problems by posting one that I recently acquired.

Click image to download a 10.4-MB PDF of this 16-page booklet.

I had dated the archive.org one to 1923, but I have no idea where I got that since archive.org dated it to 1910. That’s obviously wrong because the booklet refers to 1918 in the past tense, but I can’t find any reason to pin it down to 1923. Tomorrow, I’ll post a different version that is clearly marked 1929, and to be conservative I am tentatively dating this one to 1928. Continue reading →

Jasper Lodge 1967 Dinner Menu

Posted on January 31, 2024 by Train LoverDecember 29, 2023

The photo on the cover of this menu is reminiscent of the image on the 1937 menu presented here a couple of weeks ago. The difference is that the original lodge was shown on the earlier menu while this one has the new lodge that had been built in 1953 after the fire destroyed the original one on July 15, 1952.

Click image to download a 2.0-MB PDF of this menu.

Although most of the Jasper Lodge menus shown here have been cards, this one is not only a folder, it is especially elaborate in that the menu itself is printed on a separate piece of paper that is inserted into the folder. This makes the entire document 8 pages long, although the outside pages of the menu are blank. The menu page is also a little smaller than the cover, so bits of the inside covers are visible when the menu is open. Continue reading →

Trinidad 1952 Dinner Menu

Posted on January 30, 2024 by Train LoverDecember 29, 2023

The cover painting on this menu reminds me of what I call the region series of menus because there is one for the Atlantic provinces, Ontario, the prairie provinces, the Rockies, and British Columbia. The region series menus I’ve seen are dated 1948 and 1949 while this menu is from 1952. At 6″x9″, this steamship menu is also a little smaller than the 6-3/4″x10″ dining car menus of the region series, but I suspect they were all painted by the same in-house artist.

Click image to download a 938-KB PDF of this menu.

Dated November 19, the menu was probably used on a winter cruise rather than a regularly scheduled voyage. The left inner page is a programme of mainly classical music (probably recorded). The dinner menu on the right included a choice of four appetizers, three soups, two fish, three entrées, two vegetables, browned or mashed potatoes, a joint course of prime rib, salad, dessert, cheese and fruit, and demitasse. Continue reading →

Jasper National Park 1948 Brochure

Posted on January 29, 2024 by Train LoverDecember 29, 2023

Intensely decorated with red and yellow on one side, but only yellow on the other, this brochure also has an image of Jasper Park Lodge that resembles, but is not identical to, the one on a 1937 menu shown here a few days ago. With advances in color photography between 1937 and 1948, it is more likely that this is an actual color photo while the 1937 image was probably a colorized black-and-white photo.

Click image to download an 2.2-MB PDF of this brochure.

The brochure lists a sampling of many of the activities popular in Jasper Park, including motor drives, saddle trips, hiking, and mountain climbing. It notes that people could also buy one- to four-day all-expense tours that included meals, lodging, and motor drives. Saddle trips were $5 a day; lodging on the American plan (meals included) was $20 a day for two without a bath and $26 with. Multiply prices by ten to approximate today’s U.S. dollars.

Bermuda and the West Indies

Posted on January 28, 2024 by Train LoverDecember 29, 2023

In an effort to keep British possessions in the Caribbean loyal to the mother country rather than the much-closer United States, Canada agreed to offer steamship service to the West Indies. This was farmed out to Canadian National just about as soon as the railway was created in 1919. For a time CN also had ships from Canada to Australia, but these lost so much money that those routes were abandoned.

Click image to download a 4.1-MB PDF of this 16-page booklet.

In addition to merchant marine, CN offered cruises to the West Indies. This booklet generally describes 11 of the most important Caribbean ports reached by CN ships from Halifax (in winter) or Montreal (in summer). The booklet is nicely decorated with some pages printed in red and silver and others in blue and gold.

Mount Edith Cavell 1947 Lunch Menu

Posted on January 27, 2024 by Train LoverDecember 29, 2023

We’ve previously seen paintings of Mount Edith Cavell on the cover of a 1927 dining car menu and on various CN booklets used to advertise Jasper Park. Based on the date, the image on this menu appears to be a color photograph, but it could be a colorized black-and-white photo.

Click image to download an 1.3-MB PDF of this menu.

The unpriced lunch menu offers lots of choices: three appetizers, three soups, eight entrées, two vegetables, three kinds of potatoes, five desserts, and no beverages. The only thing missing is a salad.

Indian Chief and Canadian Mountie Menu

Posted on January 26, 2024 by Train LoverDecember 29, 2023

This menu was used at a 1947 conference of the National Life Insurance Company of Montpelier, Vermont. The illustration shows an obviously staged and heavily colorized photo of an Indian and a Royal Canadian Mountie and their horses, with the Indian submissively dismounted while the Mountie disdainfully looks away.

Click image to download a 224-KB PDF of this menu.

The National Life Insurance Company must have been especially cheap as this menu offers absolutely no options: one appetizer, one soup, one entrée, one style of potato, one mix of vegetables, no salad, one dessert, and one beverage. Tea wasn’t even offered as an alternative to coffee, though I suspect someone who really wanted it could probably have gotten it at no extra charge. The dessert, African puff glace, was probably similar to what New Orleanians call beignets, or puff pastries, and the glace was probably a sweet sauce. Continue reading →