James J. Hill is well known for having built the Great Northern and for revolutionizing the railroad business in many ways. But he was also an egomaniac who alienated many of his subordinates (such as Henry Minot). He also spent … Continue reading
Tag Archives: Travel brochure
Unlike the brochures presented over the past few days, this one says very little about its purported subject, California. Of eighteen photos in the brochure, exactly zero depict California. Instead, they all show the Great Northern way across the country, … Continue reading
Fifty miles long and as little as one-third of a mile wide, Lake Chelan is “a stupendous and splendid fjord,” says this brochure. It was hard to reach in the 1920s and remains little known outside of the state of … Continue reading
Tacoma was the “lumber capital of the world” when this brochure was published. That’s no longer true, but it still has a reputation of being more of an industrial city as opposed to Seattle’s high-tech economic base. Tacoma is also … Continue reading
This brochure describes some of the landmarks and sights in Spokane which, when the brochure came out, had a population of about 110,000 people (it is double that today). One of the landmarks is the Davenport Hotel, “one of the … Continue reading
Superficially, this looks a lot like yesterday’s brochure about Portland. However, it appears to have been written by a different member of Great Northern’s marketing team. Instead of suggesting a ten-day tour, this brochure focuses on Seattle’s rapid growth, mild … Continue reading
This brochure starts out aiming to sell Portland as a location for conventions but ends up suggesting a ten-day tour of the Portland area. The tour includes four days in Portland, two on the Columbia River Highway and Mt. Hood, … Continue reading
In 1925, Chicago had twelve times as many people as St. Paul — 3 million people vs. a quarter million. But in the late 1920s St. Paul Union Depot (SPUD), which was completed in 1924, hosted almost as many trains … Continue reading
Just a week ago, we saw an issue of West, Southern Pacific’s periodical for travel agents, that featured the Shasta Dam under construction. It wasn’t dated but I estimated it was from 1941. Click image to download a 3.6-MB PDF … Continue reading
The title of this issue of West is “Many Thanks” and page 2 specifically is headlined, “To a sailor at Pearl Harbor” while page 3 is headlined “To the newspapers.” But in fact, this issue doesn’t thank the sailor or … Continue reading