Owning several sign companies over the past 30 years has lead me to have a little bit of a soft spot for old vintage signs in any condition. I recently took a road trip for vintage signs with a friend to photograph some old signs and fell upon a town smack dab halfway between San Diego and Las Vegas, called Yermo. A town mostly abandoned and so quiet that you can hear the wind blowing rusted metals together and squeaking with each breeze.
This first of the vintage signs, cafe sign sits atop a couple of telescoping steel poles at around 75’ and still has this amazing beauty to it, although the restaurant is long gone. Note the faded pink and blue colors of mid century fashion. Mostly missing neon tubes, some still dangling and blowing in the wind due to the elements.
As the sun warmed our bones, we continued to walk down the dirt roads and tumble weeded surrounds excitedly seeking out worn signs. Some just age gracefully due to the elements of their environment, paint peeling off, full rust exposure and well, burnt out lighting as if the signs say “Hey!, look at me”.
From Yermo we headed through Nevada and up into Utah stopping to shoot pics of all the vintage signs we could find along the way.
We arrived in Price, Utah just before dark and passed by this old theater marquee that was illuminated, but when we came back 30 minutes later the sign was turned off much to our dismay. But we could see the lights still on and someone in the concession. We knocked on the glass and pleaded our case to turn the sign back on. The employee said that it was the last show so no need to keep the sign turned on, lol. but he obliged for us, and we quickly snapped a few of this burnt out relic, certainly not up to it’s old glory.
But this vintage sign across the street turned out to be much more appealing with it mid century bulb lights at the Silver Dollar bar
The return route was to take us through Vegas and a tour of the Sign Museum. Ten minutes prior to the scheduled tour a lightning storm came thundering through canceling it. There’s a reason for everything. Look at the shot looking up the strip from the window of the car.
