promoting the golden west: advertising and...

Promoting the Golden West: Advertising and the RailroadAuthor(s): Alfred RunteReviewed work(s):Source: California History, Vol. 70, No. 1, Railroads in California and the Far West (Spring,1991), pp. 62-75Published by: California Historical SocietyStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/25158553 .Accessed: 08/12/2011 12:52

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For their campaigns to advertise western travel adventure, railroad companies

employed some of the leading commercial artists of the nineteenth and early twentieth century. One of the most prolific of these was W. H. Bull, the creator of this 1898 poster promoting the Southern Pacific Company's famed "Sunset

Limited" passenger train between New Orleans and California. Bull's art also

graced the advertising materials of the Union Pacific and other western lines.

Courtesy Southern Pacific Transportation Company.

62 CALIFORNIA HISTORY

Promoting the Golden West:

Advertising and the Railroad

by Alfred Runte

In these days of color television and lifelike pho tography, the unique artistry and elegance of

rail travel promotion have long since been for

gotten. Gone, after all, are America's great trains, those whose arrivals and departures excited daily comment. Explore carefully, then, the following

pages. Note how it used to be during advertising's golden age, the period from roughly the turn of the

century through the late 1950s. This was the time when all advertisers, including the western rail

roads, relied heavily on accomplished commercial

artists. The railroads' objective was simple and

straightforward?to persuade tourists, potential settlers, sportsmen, and health-seekers to book

passage on company trains and coastal steamships. To encourage wanderlust, railroad art and adver

tising called upon many images, from breathtaking scenery to exotic native cultures, to evoke the

desired sensations of mystery, adventure, and inno

cent romance. In the promotion of California in

particular, the western railroads reached into the

living rooms of the American public with the assur

ance that the anticipations of traveling did not

lapse west of the Rocky Mountains. In California were wonders galore, from Yosemite and the High Sierra to the rugged Pacific Coast. Every train to

California was indeed a magic carpet, a means to

one of the most varied and exciting destinations

on earth.

As railroad executives once knew intuitively, the

major selling point of their passenger trains was not speed, but rather high adventure. As much as

transportation, western trains were an experience.

Accordingly, anything that added to the experi ence, most notably the establishment of national

parks, was almost certain to win the support of

leading rail officials. Thus, as early as 1871 and the

discussion of creating Yellowstone National Park,

Jay Cooke and Company, managers and financiers

of the Northern Pacific Railroad extension pro

ject, evinced a strong and growing interest in rail

travel promotion. A $500 loan from Cooke to the renowned painter Thomas Moran?allowing the

artist to travel through Yellowstone?may be said

to have launched the Northern Pacific's distin

guished promotional work.1

In 1892 the Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe Rail

way also invited Thomas Moran west to paint the Grand Canyon. Although the Grand Canyon

would not receive protected status until 1908 as a

national monument, the Santa Fe Railroad, like the

Northern Pacific, proved instrumental in bringing another western wonderland to public attention.2

So too, in California, the Southern Pacific Railroad

began promotion on a grand scale in 1898 with the

publication of Sunset magazine, under the direc

tion of the company's passenger department. True

to form, the very first issue, published in May 1898, featured Yosemite Valley, which the railroad

had already been promoting for several decades.3

Indeed, there is now little doubt that the Southern Pacific Railroad also figured prominently in the establishment of the national park around the valley in 1890.4 As John Muir himself admitted to the Sierra Club at its annual meeting in 1895: "Even the soulless Southern Pacific R.R. Co., never counted on for anything good, helped nobly in pushing the bill for this park through Congress."5

For the next quarter century, the western railroads

loosed a flood of stationery, postcards, calendars,

timetables, guidebooks, and advertisements, each in some way distinctly representative of regional sce

nery and culture. Although people were unaware of

it at the time, the peak in railroad travel was finally reached just prior to World War I; when rail travel

promotion resumed after the war in the early 1920s, automobile travel was already making serious

inroads into rail passenger service. No matter, the

SPRING 1991 63

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Thomas Moran's painting of the Grand Canyon, com missioned by the Santa Fe Railroad, now hangs in the Santa Fe Art Collection at the company's headquarters in Chicago. Courtesy Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railroad

Company.

railroads at least held their own during the decade. But then came the disruption of rail service caused

by the Great Depression and the demands of World War II. Consequently, not until the late 1940s were

the lines fully prepared to attempt recapturing the business they had long since lost to America's love affair with the private car.

Their efforts were nonetheless sincere and monu

mental. By the early 1950s the western trains

had been completely reequipped with new sleep ers, coaches, diners, and?most significant of

all?vista-dome lounges and coaches. Predictably,

railroad promotion itself returned in all its color and elegance. Once more advertising focused on

western scenery and the national parks, further

highlighting the trains themselves as magic car

pets of romance and adventure. Perhaps the coun

try's all-time favorite train was the new California

Zephyr, inaugurated in 1949 as a joint venture of the

Chicago, Burlington & Quincy, the Denver, Rio Grande & Western, and the Western Pacific rail

roads. Its 2,000-mile journey from Chicago to Oakland included such breath-taking scenery as

Colorado's Front Range and California's Feather

River Canyon. Well into the 1950s, the California Zephyr set the standard for the restructuring and

redesigning of every classic western passenger train.

[Text continues on page 73]


Railroad Advertising of the Far West:

A Portfolio

Founded in 1898 and managed until 1914 by the South- HH^J ([ jf ll ^1 fW^ Cn^ ̂Hl^l ern Pacific Company, Sunset took the lead in the Bj^^^. [\

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CALIFORNIA HISTORY 65

NATIONAL PARK f NATIONAL PARK * Northern Arizona Northern Arizona

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Railroad advertising rarely achieved greater color and ^BH^^^^B^^^^^^^^Î^^^^B^Î elegance than when the national parks were the objects ^Hk^^^^^^Î^^^^^^^^^^BIIS^H of promotion. In addition to promoting the national ^flSH^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^HP*9i parks of California, principally Yosemite, the Southern B9ttH?^^^^^^^^^^^^^^B^^^BiiiSl Pacific supported the establishment in 1902 of Crater B^^^t^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^HS^BIB Lake National Park, Oregon, and the railroad made l^S^r^^^^fl^l^^^^^^l^HwSRI the new park a favorite attraction to lure tourists to HB% ^ r^^^^BH^^H^^^^^^BBBII the Pacific Northwest, as in this 1916 travel brochure ^HB^ ^v^^viÎHMh^^^^^^HP^V

(right). In California, the Southern Pacific and the ^^^Bfa^Hm!^^^5^^S!^PÎ^ra^B Santa Fe competed for Yosemite-bound traffic, and ^5^^^BXBhM1^ w3B^ both roads publicized the park lavishly. In Arizona, |BI|^|mW^B|||BIm however, the Santa Fe enjoyed exclusive rights to IÎÎUi^^^^^SBlEI^^^^BSH^^B carry rail passengers to the South Rim of the Grand ^^^^^^^^^BBBP^VII^ÎIHQQ! Canyon via its branch line from Williams to El Tovar. H^^^^^^^ÎÊ^^tS^ÎI^RSH Accordingly, the Santa Fe, by means such as this 1953 R^Ci^^^H^^HV^^BK^^îwW^^

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Canyon. Courtesy California State Railroad Mf?? I^^pJf^^BH^

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Whenever there was a special occasion where large numbers of people would gather?a festival, world's fair, trade exhibition, or major convention?one or

more of the western railroads was sure to be among its principal supporters and publicists. During the 1915 season, the Union Pacific and other lines saturated the traveling public with advertising for the Panama Pacific International Exposition in San Francisco and the Panama California International

Exposition, held simultaneously in the newly constructed Spanish-Colonial-Revival style buildings in San Diego's Balboa Park (left). In 1939, the Santa Fe portrayed San Francisco's Golden Gate International

Exposition as a display of all that was progressive and futuristic (above). Courtesy California State Railroad

Museum, Sacramento.


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Among those who produced main-line landscapes for the major western railroads, few are better remembered than the artist Maurice Logan, who worked especially for the Southern Pacific, as in this painting of a South

west Indian woman he did for the cover of a lavish

large-format pictorial "View Book" (right) of scenes

along the railroad's famed "Sunset Route" between New Orleans and San Francisco, ca. 1920. Logan

con

tributed paintings of numerous other California and far western subjects for railroad advertising pamphlets in the 1920s and 1930s, including one of Arizona dude ranches (lower left, 1928) and one of the coast along the Santa Barbara Channel (upper left, 1927). Courtesy

California State Railroad Museum, Sacramento.


SUNSE^O U T FI


Perhaps the most lavish of railroad advertising art promoted the famous passenger trains that carried travelers to the Far West, often

in the lap of luxury. Above is the cover from an early-twentieth-century pamphlet

depicting the "Overland Limited," a cross

country train jointly operated by the Southern Pacific and Union Pacific railways,

as it traversed the Lucin Cutoff across the Great Salt Lake. Below is a brochure (ca.

late 1930s) that tried to lure passengers aboard one of the new streamliners of the

period, the "City of Los Angeles," operated jointly between Chicago and Los Angeles by the Chicago & Northwestern and the Union Pacific. In addition to sumptuous

food and sleeper service, the train offered

passengers the comfort of air conditioning, the convenience of a passage of a mere

thirty-nine and three-quarter hours, and such amenities as valet service, clothes

washing and drycleaning, haircuts, shampoos, facial massages, and attendance

by a registered nurse/stewardess. Courtesy California State Railroad Museum, Sacramento.

Overland

LIMITED EXCLUSIVELY FIRST CLAS&r^

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Industrial design, like experience advertising, is a nearly-forgotten art. During the height of the streamliner era (1935-1965), the western railroads celebrated the aesthetic beauty, not just the efficient operation, of their

passenger trains. Top: The conviction that

technology might complement the western

landscape is gloriously represented on the cover of this 1949 pamphlet inaugurating the

Western Pacific's famed "California Zephyr," while the advertising text proclaimed that

"Every mile is a scenic thrill, when you ride the California Zephyr." Bottom: A 1950

SouthemPadficbrochurepromised California travelers a choice from the company's many sleek streamliners. Courtesy California State

Railroad Museum, Sacramento.


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Railroad commercial art depicting the varied attractions of California was certain to include the romance of early Spanish colonial settlement, as suggested by a 1950s Southern Pacific pam phlet featuring restored Mission Santa Barbara and Hispanic cultural survivals in the region (lower). Female charms also typically adorned the pages of railroad advertising. The sedate,

maidenlike figure pictured on an early-twentieth century Union Pacific booklet (upper) contrasts

with the lively dancer on the cover of the more modern Southern Pacific pamphlet (lower) and testifies to the changing attitudes toward

women in American culture. Courtesy California State Railroad Museum, Sacramento.

SANTA SANTA BARBARA BARBARA

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By I960, the vista dome in particular was standard

equipment on every major route. "Look Up; Look

Down; Look All Around," the Zephyr itself proudly admonished its patrons. Truly, in the invention of

the vista dome, the western railroads had found

the perfect marriage between the best in regional scenery and the best in rail passenger design.6

But suddenly, that heritage became history. Virtually overnight, America's railroads had a

change of heart about their passenger business.

Put simply, the trains failed to make a profit on all but the most popular routes. It was partly, critics

charged, the railroads7 own fault. They scrapped many basic amenities and the lure of adventure

advertising just as their new equipment and pro motions were starting to work. In either case, even

among the few western railroads still committed to

rail passenger service, only one or two name pas

senger trains survived by the end of the 1960s. Since May 1, 1971, a nationwide rail passenger

network has survived under the National Rail

road Passenger Corporation, popularly known as

Amtrak. In testimony to the continuing popularity of its long-distance western routes?now rented

from the original railroads?fully three-fifths of all Amtrak revenues are generated outside city corri

dors. In the West, the average distance traveled is

1,000 miles; in the Northeast Corridor between

Washington, D.C, and Boston, it is barely 100. In other words, ridership in the West is ten times

more lucrative per passenger than ridership in

the Northeast. To be sure, the twenty percent of

Amtrak's business that generally travels in the West

and South is worth far more to the company than

all of the rest of Amtrak's riders combined.7 If Amtrak were a private corporation, its response

would be obvious?to place its greatest emphasis on the long-distance trains, those that are the least

sensitive to delays, operating constraints, and air

line competition, but that still generate the largest revenues. But Amtrak is quasi-public, not private. Its management feels compelled to invest in poten tial voters as well as

self-supporting riders. As long as half of Amtrak's total ridership comes from the

Northeast Corridor, politics more than economics

will determine which portion of the country receives the most service.8

Perhaps this scenario was inevitable; still, rail

passenger enthusiasts cannot help wondering what

would happen if Amtrak gave the western trains the attention their historic significance suggests they in fact deserve. The western trains are already sold out for the summer season months in advance.

No less than in the past, tourists heading west by rail revel in the beauty of the landscape, in the life and changing kaleidoscope of new people and

Typical of early graphic art used by California railroads is this 1880 brochure produced by the Central and Southern Pacific railroads to advertise the tourist attractions of central and northern California. Courtesy California State Railroad Museum, Sacramento.

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SPRING 1991 73

places. Granted, the riders are modern, but their

emotions and expectations are very much the same.

It follows that the heritage of discovery, not simple economics, is Amtrak's true hope for profitability and viability in the years to come.

California in particular is still fortunate to enjoy some of the best of Amtrak's trains. Although bear

ing little resemblance to the original configuration of five vista domes (and no longer routed through the Feather River Canyon), Amtrak's version of the

California Zephyr remains one of the most popular rides in the country, offering the American River

Canyon, Donner Pass, Donner Lake, and the

Truckee River Canyon in grand compensation for its historical passage of the Sierra farther north.

Similarly, the Coast Starlight, operating between Los Angeles and Seattle via Oakland, parallels the

rolling breakers of the Pacific Ocean for 110 miles between Oxnard and Surf, California. Sixty and

more years after Maurice Logan produced evoca

tive paintings for Southern Pacific Railroad pam phlets, the coast route continues to thrill more

than a half million rail passengers annually.9 The point again is that traveling by rail is still

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Sunset Magazine booth of the Harriman Lines (Southern Pacific and Union Pacific railroads) at the international exposition in London, 1909. Since their founding in the early 1860s, both the Southern and Union Pacific companies provided patronage for important western artists to document construction and to furnish images for advertising. The great photographers Alfred Hart and Carleton Watkins often worked for various Southern Pacific lines, while Andrew J. Russell photographed the building of the Union Pacific's portion of the first transcontinental

railway. Later, in 1898, the Southern Pacific founded Sunset as its leading instrument of regional advertising. The magazine commissioned or purchased work by the best writers and artists. To lure tourists to journey to the American West, the magazine's 1909 London booth displayed a

Watkins photograph of Vernal Falls in Yosemite National Park (framed and hanging above the

doorway) and two paintings (the cowboy and the Indian mounted on a horse) by the great western artist Maynard Dixon, a frequent contributor to Sunset. Courtesy Southern Pacific Transportation Company.


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considered by its patrons to be an experience. So

too, the examples of railroad art reproduced on

these pages have long been referred to as "expe rience advertising." The financial motives of the

railroads and the practical uses of rail travel for the

passengers are deliberately absent or understated.

It is the scenes, the experience, that are meant to

do the selling. Such attempts at understated selling are still

common to the travel industry; however, color pho

tographs have replaced paintings as the primary means of illustration. Lost, as a result, is some

thing of that former sense of anticipation, that

wonderful feeling of fantasy that only works of art can fully arouse. Unlike modern photography, the

paintings of yesteryear heightened one's expecta tions of mystery and romance. Photography can

be too revealing, robbing its subject matter of all

powers of suggestion. Such is the price of accuracy. Indeed, with tour

ism everywhere on the rise, transportation compa nies might well reconsider those colorful lessons

from the past.10 Tourists still seek romance and high adventure. When the railroads of North America

A billboard along San Francisco's Main Street in 1949 advertised the Southern Pacific's new streamliner service to Portland, for a fare that certainly evokes an

earlier era. Courtesy California State Railroad Museum, Sacramento.

knew how to market such intangibles, profits rather than losses were consistently the rule. Only the commitment to imaginative advertising, not the

public's appreciation of it, has somehow slipped away. It follows that the road back to profitability

?and adventure?lies in the truth of that once

familiar slogan: "Getting there is half the fun."@

See notes beginning on page 138.

Alfred Runte is a public historian and author living in Seattle. A specialist on the national parks, he received his Ph.D. in history from the University of California, Santa Barbara.

His highly-acclaimed National Parks: The American Expe rience (University of Nebraska Press, 1979) has now appeared in a second, revised edition (1987), and he has also recently revised his popular Trains of Discovery: Western Railroads and the National Parks (Roberts Rinehart, 1990). Runte's latest work is Yosemite: The Embattled Wilderness (Uni

versity of Nebraska Press, 1990).

SPRING 1991 75

promoting the golden west: advertising and...

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