This little station was in a movie filmed in Knoxville. Anyone recall what movie? October Sky or Box of Moonlight? In the movie, I recall there were like 20 Highway direction signs in front of it.

Great vinatge lines.

A phone? I forgot to see if it had a dial tone.

These lights must have shined on a lot of classic cars getting gas…

A few images from our house:

After a long year of working on this, we are nearly done! The fantastic graphic design artists have taken my thousands of photographs of vintage tiki bar ephemera and turned them into dynamic works of art. These things you have seen in the Book of Tiki, Tiki Quest, The Bum’s books and now the wonderful Tiki Modern. So, to simply photograph some very rare mugs and drop them on a background would be, well, already done and semi-boring. The real tiki geeks would dig it if I had the uber-rare items, but most people would not. So, I challenged my artists to do something fun, and creative with these images, and I think they have. Plus, all calendar images were approved by Ms. Swanky who, though she fully understands the tiki aesthetic, is not enthralled with it like I am. She understands a more broad perception that will make this calendar appeal to us tiki freaks, and the general freaks too.

If you look at the calendars in thte kiosk at the mall, you will find they all fall into a few categories:

1. Images of things, i.e. Dogs, Cats, Babes, Hunks
2. Art, i.e. Ansel Adams photos, Picasso paintings
3. Cartoons, i.e. Dilbert, Farside
4. Still Lifes, i.e. staged kitchen cooking scenes, islands, etc.

What we have done with this calendar is combine several of these styles. We have photographs of things, as in postcards, swizzles, mugs and menus of classic tiki bars. Mixed with images of thatch, tapa, etc., blended with custom artwork, and put together into a new image, which is a sort of “still life” of tiki that is more than a sum of its parts.

Quite simply, it is unlike any calendar I have ever seen, both for its subject matter, and especially for its design.

So, head over to the new website and get the only 2008 calendar that matters!

With a title like that, it could be anything, but…

And if you have dirty thoughts, this could lead to many places…

I’d love to cruise around Nassau in that car, and with one of these gals in hats and heels…

I’d visit Cypress Gardens, but I cannot for the life of me figure out what is going on in this picture…

Do a bit of shopping in Nassau. Great bag.

Maybe watch a local show with hot, sweaty, shirtless black men…

Nearly lose my wig when my husband spears a big fish and points it at me…

Listen as Jerome sings another tune. Shake me another Bacardi Cocktail!

Dancing of course…

Flamingos viewed under parasol…

Get a hat that looks like a palapa umbrella…

Or just enjoy the Palm beaches.

Here we see Mr. and Mrs. James V. Barry on vacation in Hawaii in 1964.

Fun was had. In about 150 slides from their trip, this may be the only one where she is smiling…

No, I am not talking about Dick Cheney’s philosophy, but a great website. Retro Views has many original photographs of motels used for postcards back in the day. You can buy pristine copies from them for outrageous prices! This is some serious eye candy, but the Flash site sucks. Some samples:

Via the PCL

This soda shop is not a place made to look like an old soda shop. It is an old soda shop, vintage 1934. I have been here before, but never got pictures of the awesome interior until this trip.

A wurlitzer juke box has a box at every booth. And they work. The music is a weird mix from about 1978. Disco Duck and country you never heard of.

Juke box detail

Wurlitzer

Stools

Doors

These doors have seen a lot of use!

Froot Loops…

My definition of “collecting” has changed over the years. I have been humbled by the vast and cumpulsive collections by people I have met or seen online. I do have a few “collections,” but, nothing that is going to blow anyone away. I suppose I collect vintage lamps, radios, and stuff. But mostly I don’t “collect” those things, I just buy them when I find stuff I like at a price I like. I only really collect Mai Kai and Aku Aku Las Vegas stuff, and a little Don the Beachcomber. Otherwise, it’s just decor. It is not a “collection” and my home is not a museum.

Experiment 33 has posted his collection of vintage barware and started a Flickr group for more to add theirs. I do love the remnants of a lost culture of good drink making. And I have a few of the things pictured myself.

I have had many ice crushers. Hand crank types and motorized ones. These days I enjoy the luxury of crushed ice by way of the fridge door. But, the best other ice crusher is the Oster Snoflake. Not only does it do the job well, but, you can put the crusher over an ice bucket instead of the tray it comes with and make mountains of crushed ice for your party. It does throw out eye piercing shards of ice, like many, but, it’s not too scary. Get one cheap on Ebay.

Oh if we could only travel like this now! I’d be the most popular person on the plane!

I really love Henri Rene’s music. It rewards the listener. It’s slightly akilter. It’s doing little things that are just wonderful and fun. Not in your face. But for the afficianado, it’s music to love. Deeply.

Enjoy the download!

I had seen on Les Jones’ blog that Kay’s in Maryville had closed. On our way to the mountain cabin on Thanksgiving, we drove by to take a look.

Notice the letters on the front door.

Looks like mint chocolate chip to me. I have searched far and wide for an image of the large Kay’s sign with the ice cream cone and the boy on the ladder with the extra long tongue licking it to no avail. The last one I knew of was on Chapman Highway and it dissappeared around the turn of the century.

It brought out some fans. Here on the door is a long letter telling about this family’s long history with Kay’s. I ate there a few times myself over the years.

Did I say week? I meant that figuratively.

This is one of several images I have from the Ilikai. I have a lot of what appears to be a sort of evening torch lighting ceremony out front, and then a few precious images like this one, of the rooms. One even of the famous clam shell bathroom sink!

After a long day on the islands, you just gotta flop down in purple velvet luxury! Those lamps are over the top! I want one!

A recent find by Ms. Swanky. Well, let’s say this is your living room. You decided to carpet the place with a thick thirsty yellow towel, and you need to plan a party. And the monster that inhabits the yellow pillow on the couch isn’t helping.

Ah, here you are in your humble abode.

You know how to serve up a traditional meal.

Complete with shotglass full of smokes.

And you have a great new room to show off. So the very best thing you can do is invite Victor Bergeron over and throw a luau…

If that’s not ol’ Trader Vic, they sure got a good likeness…

Note on the Polynesian party: “…the exotic decorations are easily obtained and emulated…”

The Watauga Building - which at one time was a hotel, at the corner of Gay and Park Avenue.

Finding this place took some detective work and help from the community. First was Park Avenue. The answer to that came on the forums: 

In the late 1850s-1880s, this street was called Craig Street in the town of Shieldstown, east of First Creek, and was called Park Street in the city of Knoxville, west of First Creek. The streets were in separate towns, neither was a main thoroughfare, there was no bridge over the creek, and the streets did not meet. The main streets out to Chilhowee Park were East Fifth and Linden, and the early streetcars, horse-drawn, took these routes in the 1870s and 1880s.In the 1880s or 1890s, Brian Branner, mayor of Knoxville, who lived on Craig Street in Shieldstown, renamed Craig Street after his mother Magnolia Branner. At some point Park Street in Knoxville was renamed Magnolia, probably to match the rest of the street. This would most likely have been after the bridge was built over First Creek connecting the streets, after trolleys were running out Magnolia Avenue, or after Shieldstown and its subdivisions, known as Park City, were incorporated by Knoxville.

Margery Bensey
Park City

That placed the Watauga at the corner where Regas is today, but across from the Regas is Whist Court, which is not at all right and the other two corners were leveled for the Interstate. Being that the Regas is only two stories, the Watauga must have been destroyed right? Take a look at the picture:

Notice a remarkable resemblance? Were there two buildings built with the same plans, one 2 stories and one 5? The answer came from Jack Neely:

As weird as it seems, the current Regas building in fact does comprise the first two stories of the old Watauga Hotel, one of several hotels that used to be clustered near the Southern station. The three upper floors were razed in the early ’60s because they were empty and considered a fire and crumbling hazard. In those days, there wasn’t much motive to fix them up. Regas wasn’t always there–it started as the ‘Ocean Cafe,’ on Gay near old Commerce. But it has been there since the early-to-mid 1920s. It was originally in a much smaller luncheonette-sized space of the Watauga, but radically remodelled in the ’50s, I assume about the time the Watauga closed, taking up most of the floor.

Thanks for your interest,

Jack Neely

The Watauga lives! The whole thread is HERE 

I have been sharing a few of the images from my slide collection here on the Blather for a bit. I am going to take the set of the best slides with me to Hukilau and have a showing of them over the weekend. It will probably occur late at night, in the room in which everyone is congregating. So just look for Pablus or the giant batch of rum cocktail mixed by Basement Kahuna after the main event somewhere in the Bahia Cabana. I’ll be there with the vacation slides of a few dozen trips to the islands taken 40 years ago…

I posted this topic earlier and it turns out I was wrong. Mark said he thought the Dwarf was at the corner of Merchants and Clinton Highway. That seemed wrong to me because that building looks nothing like the postcard. A reader on the Swank Forums did the research and it turns out that is one of the locations. It has been very heavily renovated!

Before

Here is the building now. 

The poster also gave me an address for the other Dwarf Restaurant on Clinton Highway and a look at Google maps and I knew it was correct. I also recalled the buildings, as I pass the daily and it was all coming together. The address I had on the postcard was just plain wrong and sent me on a wild goose chase.

Here you see on the left, the Dwarf building and right of center, the Tate Motel office building and the cleared lot where the motel rooms were. Luckily, Google maps uses older images so this is pre-junk yard.

Here is the best image showing the two buildings in their prime. This is in the mid-1950s and it appears the Tate did not have the office building yet. You gotta love the sign!

Why a dwarf? It predates that Travelocity thing by a few decades. 

Here is a later image of the Tate Motel and it looks like the restaurant is no longer the Dwarf. Also note the office building is there.


And here is a postcard of just the Tate Motel with no office. Look at the size of the trees to see this is an early image.

Here is a very early linen card. The roof sign attracted barn-stormers.

“Chicken in the basket” is a take off of the popular “Chicken in the Rough.”

Here it is today. The Dwarf and the Tate. I didn’t bother (or dare) poke around for remnants of the past. Not much to find I am sure and they would not welcome me.