State Fair of Texas

Entrance to State Fair - circa 1910

Unnamed avenue in Fair Park - card postmarked 1908.

Bird's eye view of the Amusement Park - card postmarked 1906.

Larry's Dining

Located at 5315 E. Grand, right where R.L. Thornton crosses Grand nowadays. The name on the matchbook says "Larry Walker's Dining Room", but I could only find references to "Larry's Dining", owned by Larry Walker, and only from 1938 to 1940. In 1940 the No. 1 Dinner at Larry's included a Fancy T-bone steak, fried potatoes and salad for 45 cents. The restaurant was slated for a complete remodel in early 1940 and after that I found no more references to the place.

Larry Walker also ran Dallas' largest Christmas tree business at 4005 Oak Lawn Ave. from 1932 to at least 1946. In 1946 the site also hosted Weber's Root Beer Stand, which was listed as Larry's Root Beer in 1948. In 1954 the Christmas tree business was run by someone else, and Larry's Root Beer had morphed back to Weber's Root Beer.

Shamburger's Select Business College

Circa 1928. "The School of Efficiency" taught the following subjects: Shorthand, Touch Typewriting, English, Spelling, Court Reporting, Legal Forms, Business Correspondence, Punctuation, Secretarial Duties, Office Training, Tabulating, Care of Machines, Bookkeeping, Commercial Law, Business Writing, Finger Drills, Comptometer, Dictaphone, Multigraph, and Two weeks in Office. Day and Night School.

Yeah, I guess you'd have to attend day and night to get all that. Looks like you'd be a lawyer and a C.P.A. as well as a secretary. I'll have to find out what a comptometer is. I wonder what the difference was between business correspondence and business writing?

The building located at 5101 Columbia Avenue was built in 1925 and is still standing. The two-story 6400 square foot structure currently functions as a 20-unit motel, is valued at $275,000 on the tax rolls, and according to this image from Google Maps, it may be for sale.

Greyhound Bus Terminal

Corner of Lamar and Commerce Street in Downtown Dallas, circa 1960.
Photo by Leonard Raef

Tropicana Inn

Artist's rendering of the motor hotel at 3939 North Central Expressway, U.S. 75 North at the Haskell St. exit. Below, the real thing, circa 1960. It was part of the Western Motel network. The copy from the postcard reads in part: "3 minutes from downtown Dallas. 97 rooms, air-conditioned for year 'round domfort. Restaurant, banquet rooms, swimming pool, TV, muted background music. All the facilities and services of a downtown hotel with a resort atmosphere. " Phone LAkeside 6-8881

Finally, a newer piece of advertising touting All Color TVs and Direct Dial Phones. Same phone number, but updated with the area code, probably from the 1980s. The building is now gone, and the site has been excavated in preparation for new construction.

The Blue Front

One of the oldest and longest continously operating restaurants in Dallas, The Blue Front was located in a narrow blue-painted brick building at 1105 Elm Street. William G. "Papa" Schliepake was a German immigrant who started the place in 1877. He died in 1956, but his son Willie carried on as owner and chef. The family continued to run the restaurant until at least 1975, when it seems to have relocated to one of the underground venues on a revamped Elm St. There are no current listings for either the cafe or the Schliepake family in the current tax records.

Paul Crume, who wrote the "Big D" column for the Dallas Morning News for 24 years, had this to say about The Blue Front in 1960:
        They have said of Willie Schliepake that he is the only bull with his own china shop. Willie is chef at the incomparable Blue Front restaurant, and he is not inclined to look with charity on any variation in the quality of the polish sausages or he customers.
        The Blue Front, of course, is on lower Elm Street. A customer came in during the week from the upper part of town and complained about the trouble he had in parking.
        "Willie, why don't you have a parking lot?" he asked.
        Willie greeted the suggestion with a scornful humph.
        "If we had a parking lot," he said, "we wouldn't need a restaurant." 

Reader Al was kind enough to send a photo of this anniversary fob.

 

Baylor Hospital

circa 1958, on Gaston Ave.