I’m sure you all can come up with examples of so-called “ghost signs”, but these scattered along this stretch of Broadway, in Albany, NY stand out.
Of course, winter might be the perfect season for this. Like me, everything is in hibernation, awaiting a fresh start in spring. (The really big truck shows up Wednesday.)
Some logos are timeless, a fact that this former cornbinder dealership confirms.
On the other hand, there’s also the danger of outliving the brand you’re advertising.
Seeing these signs on buildings is at once refreshing but also a bit sad all in one. It is good to see buildings that are generally quite attractive or have some desirable traits to them (such as the Mack and IH buildings). On the other hand, the Mack dealer turned Fastenal store is flat depressing. It’s great the building is being used, but it has been so altered it is tough to look at.
Despite all this, it is great to have a glimpse into what was.
That Mack sales building is gorgeous. I hope it gets preserved.
I found an old dealership in downtown Harrisonburg, Virginia. Whoever built it back in the 20s had some cash, as you’ll see.
Another shot of Rockingham Motors:
Better wall art than a Banksy. Thanks Jana.
Very cool. That sort of thing is something I miss living here in San Diego, where an “old” building is a strip mall from the mid-70s…
Even that isn’t safe. Exhibit 1: College Grove. Changed so massively that the only thing I have left is memories of things like KSON at it’s studios downstairs. Now it’s the garden section at Wal-Mart. Bleah.
In San Francisco, the old George Olson Cadillac building is now a cinema, but you can still see the Caddy motifs on the edifice.
You had a lot of heavy duty truck dealerships in that town.
This was under a façade and discovered when the building was renovated, its for a Cadillac dealership that used to be on Lincoln Road in Miami Beach. I don’t know when it closed, but it must have been before the 60’s, because Lincoln Rd had been closed to traffic since then, and converted to an open air plaza/promenade.
There was a Packard dealership in the same row, but nothing remains of the façade.
That is effing fantastic!
+1. Just beautiful!
I had to come back and look at this again. It is astonishingly beautiful. I know Miami is the art deco capital of the US, but wow, wow, wow.
We even have a whole Cadillac hotel.
Everyone liked it so much, I’ll post another shot.
This shot is even better!
Thanks Carmine. That 4 axle caddy is weirdly prescient.
There is a former GM dealership in the town of Perth, Ontario that was converted to shops and offices some years ago. The art deco facade, GM of Canada logo, dealer signage, and service bays were retained in the conversion. It was this original dealership well into the 1980s. The whole town has an original heritage feel, and this treatment fits right in.
That’s very cool.
The old Texaco pumps were there until the early 80s.
Back in the 1970s the federal government saw the heritage value of the town. So, they invested millions restoring it. Business owners have turned 19th century factories into shops and restaurants…
Wow, sounds like a neat town!
The town is considered one of the prettiest in Ontario…
Interesting that there is a Man on a Tractor logo on there as well in the historic photo. I’ve seen more than a few Chrysler Plymouth IH dealers but can’t say I’ve ever seen a GM or Ford franchise that also carried IH in the same store.
Here is the answer and a link Eric…
“The Perkins Building at the corner of Wilson and Peter Streets, has been unique in Perth since its construction in 1946-47. With the end of World War II, there were long waiting lists for new automobiles. Joe Perkins realized the need for a larger garage and showroom space. He combined General Motors and International Harvestor dealerships to appeal to both town and country clientele.”
http://www.urbanmarket.com/all-about-perth/historicbldg.html
Very interesting, thanks for the link.
Well, maybe old Packard signage will have new life if this wretched thing actually makes it into production.
http://www.packardmotorcar.com%2Findex.php%2Fintroduction%2F&h=WAQGm5qBG
It’s a rather strange looking beastie,I think there won’t be many takers due to it’s looks and no doubt gigantic price
I remember seeing that in a business magazine in the late ’90s. Not exactly in the same league as classic Packards, but it did have a genuine V12 under the hood.
Looks eerily similar to a 6000SUX
The old IHC Globe sign is quite the find as they stopped using it decades ago.
I may have posted about this sometime ago, but my favorite all-time ghost dealership sign was on the Packard building in Santa Monica, which later became the Simonson Mercedes Benz dealership on Wilshire Blvd. Sadly, the original Spanish revival building burned down in 1986, but was rebuilt to the same (although udated) architectural specs as the original. The “Packard” letters remained above the entry archway until the building was destroyed, although I don’t think they were restored (CA Guy, you would probably know). I always loved seeing the proud old Packard name still retained on the original building, having become the home of an equally prestigious marque. Incidentally, Simonson Mercedes Benz was one of the few Studebaker-Packard dealerships in the country to take on the MB franchise in the late ’50s, hence its survival today as one of the premier MB dealerships.
The rebuilt Simonson Mercedes dealership today.
Indianapolis has a building downtown that was a large Ford dealership that went back to the Model T era. The facade remains mostly intact, though the building has housed a plumbing supply business for years.
You remind me that we have some old dealer and manufacturer facades around here and I need to get busy with my camera.
Please do! I like old buildings almost as much as old cars.
There is a former Packard dealership in downtown Dayton, Ohio, that has been restored and is now a Packard museum
There’s an old Chevy dealership in Rochester, NY that now serves as a coffee shop. It’s nice to see an old building like this preserved but such a shame that so many were destroyed.
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/c/c8/Rochester_-_Spot_Coffee.JPG/800px-Rochester_-_Spot_Coffee.JPG
Here’s the photo
Wow that is a very cool building and great that they have even kept the clock.
Fantastic building. You don’t really see too many true art deco/moderne survivors (vs. re-skins), not least because people weren’t building a lot of new dealerships back then. When we switched our 4-story red brick and industrial sash main building from Ford to Chrysler-Plymouth in 1938, 1st floor showroom facade was covered in maroon Carrara glass, but the interior retained it’s 1919 furnishings, minus the portrait of Henry Ford.
Here’s a pic, from ’53 or ’54, judging by the Plymouth in the showroom window. It’s still around, but we stopped selling cars in 1967.
The former Studebaker headquarters building in South Bend still stands. Until a few years ago, it was used as office space by the Sough Bend public school system. A lot of the original Studebaker fixtures reman, such as door knobs with the “S” logo and a mural depict the development of transporation.
Pix of the interior here
http://www.denisandsara.com/pooh/2001/c/std/l.htm
I love those. Plenty around here in Melbourne, including recommissioned buildings, new uses, restored, etc…
The first one I saw was the old Victoria Bitter factory. The Porsche dealer nearby kept the chimney stack.
I also love what seem to be 50-60’s style houses.
‘course the mother lode is the old Auburn Cord Duesenberg headquarters building in Auburn. The terrazzo floor is original, and bears the scars of the building’s life as a factory. Most of the light fixutres are original too. According to the guide I asked, the light fixtures were found in a storage closet when the building was aquired to be the musuem
I’ve got to visit this place, it looks incredible, and the whole thing has the eerie “The Shining” like quality to it, like a haunted car dealership frozen in time. It looks like an awesome place to see.
I’ve got to visit this place, it looks incredible,
The ACD’s web site says allow 3 hours. I say allow at least double that. Depends on how much of a gear head you are. Upstairs the executive offices have been restored. There is one room just of engines, from the Cord, Duesenberg, an Auburn V12. and a couple that Auburn built under license. There is also a central room upstairs with a variety of makes, including a Hupp Skylark and Graham Hollywood, which were made from the old Cord 810 dies.
But when I first walked in to the main floor showroom, the space itself stopped me in my tracks.
There is another auto museum directly behind the ACD, housed in the other two surviving buildings from the original Auburn complex. The building with the arched roof is the old parts and service building where customers could bring in their cars for service. Next to it is the experimental building where the Cord L29s were built as well as the 100 preproduction Cord 810s needed to qualify the car for the New York auto show.
We have Ragtops, in Palm Beach, nowhere near the quality of the Auburn-Cord Museum, but still interesting this was a Cadillac dealership in the 40’s, its a collector car dealership today, but the showroom still has lots of the 30’s and 40’s features, including a huge fireplace on one end, they still have a massive cars sized freight elevator too, that was used to raise cars up to the 3 story garage/service area, pretty cool.
We have Ragtops, in Palm Beach,
Neat architecture! Stucco with a tile roof? I would have expected that to be in San Diego or LA. Spanish Colonial really common around there?
Dug out my season one DVDs of Burn Notice a few days ago. Love the art deco beachfront hotels they used a lot in that series. ….for the non fans, Burn Notice was shot around Miami.
There was an era where Spanish-style architecture in homes and commercial buildings was a big deal , in the 20’s-30’s was probably it peak, most of Coral Gables in Miami is Spanish revival.
Steve is right, the showroom is stunning. This was the corporate headquarters showroom, and I would guess that E. L. Cord pulled out all the stops as he never did anything in a small way. It has been a number of years since I was there, and I need to do something about that.
The Ford dealership in downtown Johnstown, PA (across the street from the Point Stadium) was originally the Cadillac dealership, Johnstown Automobile Company. Evidence is shown by the Cadillac crests in the brickwork of the outside walls.
Interesting article. In my home town a few dealerships have moved out from the middle of town but the buildings remain, I am not sure of the signage though. The old Holden dealership is in a heritage listed building that pre-dated automobiles so I don’t expect it would have any ‘built-in’ signage. The Ford dealership was built more recently (1970s) and has been largely vacant for 10 years due to wrangling over planning. There was a small Subaru dealership that was demolished for a McDonalds about 20 years ago. Another former dealership is now a restaurant I understand, and a motorcycle dealership is now a bakery. The latter has had a second storey extension and a lot of change, I think a small part might still be recognisable. It is not easy to identify old locations via google because street numbers have changed, but there is an active historical society plus my father knows a huge amount about the history of the town.
A lot of the much-older original buildings dating back to the 1870-80s have been retained because they had light industrial use for say 80 years after their original purpose was no longer needed, and typically there weren’t a lot of changes made to the structures. From the 1970s it has become a tourist area – mind you I was astonished to hear an 1867 hotel owned by the local council for 40 years as an historic building was recently gutted internally to suit the current lessors.
Yeah, I’m not sure about this heritage facade, gutted interior thing. Unless done extremely well I think it reduces these buildings to novelty items.
I actually think Australians are more preoccupied with preserving mediocre colonial structures than they are prepared to protect some of our modernist masterpieces. That’s not to say I think colonial stuff is irrelevant; of course the masterpieces should be preserved if possible.
But I’m not one to try and hold back progress.
For many years, in my hometown of Worcester, MA, there was a Chrysler-Plymouth dealer named Bancroft Motors. They were located near downtown, just a couple of blocks away from the city common. At some point in time (maybe the ’70s?), they added a Datsun/Nissan franchise, and later (after Chrysler had bought AMC) they added Jeep as well.
Over time, most of the dealerships located near downtown closed, or moved to outlying areas of the city, or the suburbs. Bancroft was one of the last holdouts. I don’t remember exactly when they closed, but it was within the past ten years. IIRC, they sold the Nissan franchise to someone else (who built a new location in the suburbs), moved the rest of their brands to another location in the city which had been vacated by another dealership (more on that in a minute), then closed completely a couple of years later.
After Bancroft Motors moved from its original location, the building was renovated for re-use. As part of this, a facade was removed from the front of the building. This exposed the original brickwork, revealing the words “CHRYSLER IMPERIAL PLYMOUTH VALIANT” painted in different-colored letters above the showroom windows. I don’t know when the facade was put up, but I have no memory of ever having seen the original brickwork with the brand names painted on it (I was born in 1970). The brand names would seem to have been painted in 1959 or 1960, as the 1960 model year was the only period when Valiant was considered a distinct brand in the U.S.
I thought about taking a picture at the time, but never got around to it (this was before I discovered CC). The building was eventually painted, covering up the old brand names. I wasn’t the only person that took note of the old signage while it was exposed, however, as there is a picture of it posted here:
http://www.moparmax.com/columns/magnante/vi_8-4.html
Another old dealer in Worcester was Edward Buick-GMC, located on Shrewsbury Street, in a building that dates back to the 1920s. At the time Bancroft Motors moved from its original location, to make a long story short, Edward sold its Buick and GMC franchises to someone who moved them elsewhere, then sold its property to Bancroft Motors. After Bancroft closed a couple of years later, the building was renovated, and the former showroom is now occupied by a restaurant. The large showroom windows have been retained, including smaller stained glass windows at the top etched with old-style “Buick” script. This is the best picture I could find online; the windows are at upper left, with the Buick script backwards because the photo was taken on the inside looking out:
http://photos.masslive.com/4502/gallery/volturno_pizza/index.html#/5
There is a building on W117th Street in Lakewood Ohio that this on both pilasters:
My former home, Durham, NC, seemed to have quite a few of these. Probably the most elaborate, which I unfortunately don’t have a photo of, are two next-door neighbors–the 1924 Alexander Motor Company and 1926 Johnson Motor Company on Main Street, both impressive Beaux-Arts structures designed by prominent local architects (Milburn and Heister, and George Watts Carr, respectively). Both buildings survive, in slightly altered form, but are used for county offices these days. The Alexander building still has a huge Ford logo embossed in the center of the facade. Fascinating how much quality went into these dealerships at the time–both very grand-looking buildings, unlike today’s dealerships which all seem to fade into the background behind acres of parking so all the inventory can take the attention out front.
As to “outliving the brand you’re advertising”, consider the next one in Durham, like the above comment a former Studebaker dealership. The brand logos are subtle, not over-large and easy to miss if you’re not paying attention–but what a lovely piece of decoration upon closer inspection!
Another one, this one from nearby Oxford, though of a bit of a different nature–a ghost sign for a ghost brand in front of a ghost building (the building is long gone, only the sign remains). When was the last time you saw anything advertising Opel?
The picture makes it look like the church took on selling Buicks as a permanent fundraiser.
That’s what I was thinking too? Was the sign moved? Or did the church replace the dealership? Where did the dealership sit?
That’s a rare sign, those are the original GM dealer signs before the more common “big square” on a pedestal ones that are still used today.
All good questions–wish I knew the definitive answer, but I’d never been to Oxford until a few years ago. The church looks to be nearly 100 years old so it didn’t replace the dealership for sure, but other than that, it’s detective work. The sign sits on a fenced vacant lot between the church and the house down the road. What I can piece together is this: I looked up “Yancey Chevrolet” which is what the faded top panel of the sign reads, and came up with an address that is directly behind this vacant lot. A large bank sits there now, but it’s obviously of modern construction. A smallish old building next to the bank, on the corner, still bears a “YANCEY” sign. So I suspect the dealership sat on that lot, and this sign marked the back entrance to it. It may have been located in the older existing building but it seems more likely it was demolished.
Former Pittsburgh Ford Assembly Plant and Showroom (1914) 5000 Baum Blvd. Now owned by the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center
Artist’s rendering of the original.
Mercedes-Benz of Pittsburgh, formerly a Packard dealership
4709 Baum as a packard dealership. This is 3 blocks from the Ford Plant.
Thanks for posting this picture of the dealership my grandfather and his brother in law owned. Coyne and Evans. I have never seen a picture of this dealership and was looking it up online.
Former Joe George Edsel dealership, South Park, PA
What a sad looking Mitsu dealer. Then again, the only place I ever say a Toyota dealer go bankrupt was in Pittsburgh. That said, my last couple of trips back I’ve seen plenty of foreign iron on the local roads.
Heres something a little different, the Studebaker Proving Ground near South Bend Indiana. STUDEBAKER was written on the site in trees.
Now that’s cool. The kind of detail that is completely invisible from the ground, but unforgettable from the right vantage point.
Not all that ghostly, here’s one from Tucson Int’l Airport. It’s on the Eastern side, and
hasn’t suffered that much from when I first saw it in ’92.
Still OK in 2011.
It’s gone now, but the old GM assembly plant in
Fortitude Valley in Brisbane had ghost signage for Chevrolet,Pontiac, Oldsmobile & Buick. And Bedford trucks.