I’m now hunkered down for the big winter project.  I’m combing my entire website for dead links to other websites and checking out the map links for ev-ry-thing (2600+ pages) to see if there have been changes (demolitions, removals, repaints, etc.).  As you can imagine, most of the news is not good.  But, these days, anything that’s still in place and hasn’t been touched is good news!

Over the next several months, I’ll be updating my website with the info as I go and posting some of these discoveries here at blog posts.  The focus will be on signs since that seems to be my blog audience.  But I’ll slip in some buildings and statues as well.

So.  Let’s get the ball rolling with the 63 Diner in Columbia, MO which closed in 2015.  These signs hung in there until at least 2016.  But, by this year, they were gone and the building was deteriorating.

I think most of the signs were retro (new/made to look vintage).  The pig might have been vintage.  The atomic sign either came from a Mr. Quick or was modeled after that burger stand chain’s sign.  There was also a cute giant burger & french fries here.  Gone as well.

 
From the Egyptian Revival section at my site, here’s a heartbreak in Los Angeles.  The Ahmed Apartments from 1925 had lots of nice detail.  Until a couple of years ago when some bozo decided to paint and basically ruin it.  Here’s a detail photo I took in 2010:

And here’s the Google Street View tragic view – ugh:

 

That’s enough bad news for one blog post.  Here are some “wins” from the Giant Animals section.  While checking on all the cow head statues, I feared the worst when I saw this at Google Street View for 2017 for Holland Farms in Yorkville, NY:

My photo from 2010:

But after Googling a bit to see what happened (bakery closed or what), I found out that the Cupcake and Chuckie had been restored:
https://www.facebook.com/hollandfarms/photos/a.1128178683878451/1896233233739655/?type=3&theater

Here’s John Margolies’ photo of the sign in 1987:
http://www.loc.gov/pictures/resource/mrg.07511/

*********************

The Giant Horseshoe Crab in Blanchester, OH was also missing at Street View.  My photo from 2009:

A little hunting at Google revealed that the crab is now a feature of a vintage trailer park in Hillsboro, OH:
http://www.ohio.org/blogs/2015/10/worlds-largest-horseshoe-crab-has-new-home

 
Same situation for the Whale Car in South St. Paul, MN.  Missing at Street View so I called the new used car lot biz that’s there now and found out that he’s been moved to the new owner’s location nearby:

 

Let’s end with a sign since that’s what most of you want to hear about.  This sign in Victoria, TX was pretty much destroyed last year by Hurricane Harvey.  The text panel survived but the Indian was completely crumpled.  My photo from 2011:

After corresponding at Facebook for over a year with the owner who insisted that the sign was being “restored”, I had pretty much given up.  But then this news item popped up.  The Indian had been recreated and reinstalled.  Not neon but the style still looks fairly close (although the colors look kinda bright):
https://www.victoriaadvocate.com/news/iconic-sign-returns-to-the-corral/article_47e665ce-f41e-11e8-83e4-3fc7e71b2121.html

More good news/bad news coming soon.  There’ll be another post most likely next weekend.

Happy trails,
dj & the dogs

Hey there!

All of the ~3,000 photos from my June trip are officially up at my website (roadarch.com).  So, if you’re thinking of traveling to Texas or just want to travel virtually, have a look at any of the sections (signs, mid-century modern, eateries, theatres, gas stations, giant statues, etc.) and you’ll find loads of new additions.  There were also some additions to Louisiana, Oklahoma, New Mexico, and Arizona.

In the past few weeks, I took two little daytrips down to the L.A. area.  Here are some funky-blogworthy signs, buildings, etc..  If you didn’t know, the “good stuff” appears at my website and the coarser stuff gets uploaded here.

From Hawthorne — kind of a bizarre circus thingie on top.  Maybe there were horses?  Maybe it revolved?

 

The Custer’s Gift Shop in Covina has been gone for many years.  Nevertheless, the sign hung in there. Here’s a photo I took in 2013:

The central panel has been missing since around 2017.  I don’t suppose any money or effort will be spent to repair it.  I doubt this will be around much longer:

 

From Whittier.  Too late in the day and I got silly shadows but I’ll include this anyway.

 

From Valley Village:

 

The Bootmobile at Victor’s Shoe Repair in Burbank is getting a makeover.  It’s normally red and this looks like a primer coat to me:

 

The Mission Hills Bowl in Mission Hills in its new life as a Ross Dress for Less store:

 

This sign in Los Angeles was built & installed around 2014:

 

Let’s close out this post with some signs from the Valley Relics Museum which recently relocated to Burbank:

Yes, part of the Premiere Lanes sign from Santa Fe Springs:

There will be more posts coming up very soon since my annual website combing project  is underway which leads to all kinds of pleasant surprises (restorations) and, more commonly, devastating discoveries about demolitions, horrible sign updating and removals.  Stay tuned!

dj & the dogs