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Published in The Seattle Times online on July 11, 2024
and in Pacific NW Magazine of the printed Times on July 14, 2024

Billboards in 1937 and 1957 pitch alluring automotive emotions

By Clay Eals

If you’re guessing that this week’s first “Then” photo evokes the tense emotions of the Great Depression, your instincts are right-on.

A multi-floor mass of dirt rises next to a set of side-by-side hotels offering “housekeeping rooms” at a nightly rate of “25 cents and up.” Even more prominent — and perhaps poignant — is a lineup of nine parked cars, seemingly spiffed up and ready to roll. Driverless, as if on display, they’re backed by the imposing symbolism of an unrelated billboard boasting commercial bliss: “Drive a Bargain / Nation-Wide Clearance Sale.”

It was an auto row on a street of dreams. So exactly where is this setting?

We’re looking southeast along Fifth Avenue, just south of downtown Seattle. Out of our view, above and behind the photographer, are the still-present 1910 Yesler Way overpass and elegant 1891 Yesler Building. But elegant this scene is not.

The year is likely 1937. The cars, pointing north, are (from left) a 1926 Chevrolet, 1929 Chevrolet, 1936 Ford, 1929 Chevrolet, 1927 Chrysler, 1928 Chevrolet, 1936 Chevrolet, 1929 Chevrolet and 1934 Plymouth. Most are not owned by adjacent residents. Instead, labels on seven of the driver-side doors indicate they are property of the nearby Seattle Health Department, which was busy that year addressing water sanitation, smallpox vaccinations and infant medical crises.

The West Coast-based Foster & Kleiser billboard promotes R&G Used Cars, located six miles northwest in Ballard. “R&G,” according to a 1937 Seattle Times ad, stood for renewed and guaranteed. “An R&G used car is one which HAS TO BE a real buy because it is guaranteed. … Prices on all makes and models are lowest in years. … Terms to suit your own budget.”

Perhaps the final sentence of that pitch rang truer in a more prosperous time 20 years later, as seen in our second “Then” image from Dec. 29, 1957. Same block, same buildings, similar lineup of cars, this time pointing south: (from left) a 1948 Oldsmobile, 1950 Ford, 1955 Chevrolet, 1946-48 Plymouth, 1950 Plymouth, 1951 Kaiser, 1950 Chevrolet, and 1950-52 Plymouth.

And yes, the same billboard. This time, however, its spiel is not for used vehicles. Instead, it’s a new car with fashionable fins: “Cadillac — Motordom’s Masterpiece for 1958!” The backing buildings eventually were razed, a spectacular fire destroying the one behind the billboard in February 1970.

Today, the mound and billboard also are gone. The modern 7-floor, 88-unit Tobira complex (built as the Empress Apartments in 2001 and converted in 2007 to condos) anchors the scene. Southbound cars whiz along the arterial, their drivers likely focused only on what’s ahead.

WEB EXTRAS

Big thanks to Bob Carney, automotive informant extraordinaire, for his invaluable help with this installment!

To see Clay Eals’ 360-degree video of the “Now” prospect and compare it with the “Then” photos, and to hear this column read aloud by Clay, check out our Seattle Now & Then 360 version of the column.

Below, you also will find 47 historical clips from The Seattle Times and Seattle Post-Intelligencer online archive (available via Seattle Public Library), Newspapers.com and Washington Digital Newspapers, that were helpful in the preparation of this column.