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1952 Pictorial Tourist Map of Utah Printed on a Napkin
Utah-bestops-1952$125.00
Title
A Map-kin of Best Stops.
1952 (undated) 13 x 13 in (33.02 x 33.02 cm)
1952 (undated) 13 x 13 in (33.02 x 33.02 cm)
Description
A scarce cartifact, this an 1952 map of central and western Utah, from Idaho to Colorado and the Nevada border, printed in two colors on a diner napkin. This 'Mapkin' represents a pictorial icon of the pre-interstate road trip, focusing specifically on the region from Las Vegas and the Grand Canyon in the south, to Logan, Utah and the Idaho border in the north. It is visually entertaining, depicting not only the roadside cafes and motels advertised within the map but also wildlife, cowboy scenes, and such entertainments as a fellow floating in the Great Salt Lake enjoying a newspaper titled 'You Can't Sink'.
Road Trip Eats
The region's natural monuments were the draw for postwar tourists, but the primary focus of this map is on the area's restauranteurs. Throughout are interspersed a charming array of iconic travelers' destinations: historical sites and monuments, natural landmarks, and recommendable eateries to support the hungry tourists en route between. The map marks attractions along the main highways, prior to the development of the interstate system which would bypass many of these towns altogether. Primarily, the map focuses on locations along Route 91 between Las Vegas and Ogden, and Route 89 from Kanab to Logan Canyon.A Changing Culinary Landsacpe
Pictured in Salt Lake City is 'Harman Cafe Do Drop In' advertising double hamburgers (and Car Service!) The restaurant started as a tiny, eight booth restaurant run by Pete and Arline Harman. In 1951, they replaced the building with a larger structure, re-naming it 'Harman's Cafe.' A fateful meeting that year with North Carolinian Harland Sanders led to a franchise deal, and by mid-1952 the cafe was heavily promoting its new 'Kentucky Fried Chicken,' becoming the first restaurant of that global brand. This map captures the restaurant on the cusp of that change. Another featured locale is Brigham City's Howard Cafe and its 'Tropical Room'. Although Howard Cafe had been there since 1949, it was not until February of 1952 that its palm-tree-laden 'Tropical Room' opened.Bygone Roadside Restaurants
Few of the establishments memorialized here would have so grand a fate. Most are gone, even the Bryce Canyon Cafe, 'one of the oldest and finest cafes in southern Utah' according to the map. Ross Cafe in Ogden 'Famous for Pies - same chef 35 yrs Same Pie Cook 30 years' dated back as far as the mid-twenties, when the Cafe was known as 'Ross and Jack Cafe,' until a 1947 falling out between the owners led to the physical partitioning of the restaurant into separate establishments.The Business At Hand
The 'mapkin' was intended as an advertising work, so consequently the businesses named on it were ones that were in operation at the time. Therefore, despite the piece's lack of a date, we can make a confident assessment based on its content. The 'Do Drop Inn' wouldn't change to 'Harman's Cafe' until 1951; the absence of any sign of its change to Kentucky Fried Chicken makes a date after 1952 unlikely. Likewise the presence of the abovementioned Howard Cafe's Tropical Room sets a hard early date of February 1952 for this piece.Natural and Man-Made Wonders
The Grand Canyon marks the southern border of the map, but it is not the only attraction depicted here. Zion National Park, Bryce Canyon, Mount Timpanogos, and Cedar Breaks National Monument are all marked. But man-made wonders are also highlighted: Hoover Dam and Lake Mead, the Bonneville Salt Flats Speedway, and the 'World's Largest Open-Pit Copper Mine' also make appearances.Publication History and Census
This mapkin was produced in 1951 or possibly 1952 by the Best-Stops Mapkin Div, of Salt Lake City, Utah. The company (formerly the BESTops Travel Service) relocated to its Beason Building address sometime around 1950, which coincided with a shift from the screen printing seen on earlier examples of the company's output to the halftone printing exhibited here. The map is numbered 103. We have identified 'Mapkins' numbering as high as 143. Apart from the November 9, 1973 notice in the Salt Lake Times of the business' suspension by the Utah State Tax Commission, we are unable to find any evidence of this firm beyond its output, which primarily focused on the American Southwest. Only one of these is listed in OCLC, focusing on New Mexico attractions, in a solitary example. Given the purpose and general life expectancy of the diner napkin, as a form, the scarcity of these objects is perhaps unsurprising.Cartographer
BestOPS (fl. 1948-1952), a.k.a. Best Stops Travel Service, was an American map-centered advertising company that arrived, and vanished, in the period following World War II (1939 - 1945) but preceding the c. 1955 explosion of the Interstate Highway System. The company's sole apparent product was a series of maps printed on diner napkins - hence, Mapkins - intended to promote roadside restaurants and cafes along the scenic routes to America's national parks and wonders. Thus the mapkins capture the moment in American automotive history in which newly prosperous families took to the roads and ate their way across America, one diner at a time.
The company's address - always printed on the Mapkin - appears briefly to have been in Portland, Oregon but then to have relocated to Utah. A few show an address in Provo, but the majority we have identified show one of several addresses in Salt Lake City; after 1951, mainly in the Beason Building. Most of the Mapkins can be dated, with reasonable confidence, based on the rapidly-changing landscape of the restaurant trade. Our research suggests that most were printed between 1948 and 1952.
The Salt Lake City directories of 1951 and 1952 are illuminating. The '51 directory includes an entry for BestOPS Travel Service, naming a Dorius E. Black as manager. In 1952, the directory names instead 'Best Stops Travel Service;' Black is listed as Vice President and Sales Manager, with its president listed as Lincoln C. White. Lincoln Carter White (1919 - 1986) was a successful Salt Lake City jeweler, who had offices in the Beason Building that correspond to the address found on Mapkins after 1951. We suspect White not to have been the creator of the Mapkins, but an investor.
Dorius Ether Black (March 15, 1918 - June 29, 1985) is a better candidate. Before his wartime service in the navy reserves, he had travelled abroad as a missionary. We see no indication of his profession between 1946 and 1950; The 1950 Census listed him as separated, and living in Provo with his mother and siblings. His profession was listed as a salesman with 'Travel Service,' with two younger sisters working as stenographers for the same. Up until 1951, BestOPS Travel Service operated via post office box addresses, in Provo, Salt Lake City, and briefly in Portland, Oregon. We suspect that Black started BestOPS and ran it out of his mother's house, with the assistance of his sisters, while he travelled around the country selling his mapkins to various diners en route. As a LDS missionary, he may well have been traveling as a proselytizer at the same time. In 1951 or 1952, he sold the business, or a share of it, to White: perhaps with an eye to providing a home for his fiancee, whom he would marry in 1952. White's involvement brought changes to more industrial printing methods, slicker branding, and a less-confusing business name - while as Vice President and Sales Manager, Black continued to travel and work his sales contacts. But before long, his travels for Best Stops brought him to Florida, and he decided to stay there - first in St. Petersburg, where he would begin work for a brokerage, and then to Orlando. Without Black, Best Stops appears to have ceased producing new Mapkins. White seems to have kept the business until it was struck from the Utah tax rolls in November 9, 1973, but while it appears likely that Best Stops would have contiued trying to sell its back stock, we have seen no Mapkin that could credibly have been made any later than 1952 or 53.
We would like to extend our gratitude to Doug Misner, Library and Collections Manager of the Utah Historical Society, for his crucial assistance in identifying the individuals behind these fascinating pieces of cartographic Americana. More by this mapmaker...
Condition
Very good. Original folds present. No soup.