John Margolies Roadside America photography

[EndtheMadnessNow]

The culture of the American road has been much celebrated, AND much criticized. Lawrence Monsanto Ferlinghetti (March 24, 1919 – February 22, 2021) saw the rise of the automobile and the construction of the interstate system (which began in the 1950s) as a new form of punishment inflicted on the populace. Driving in their cars, "strung-out citizens" were now...

They still are ranged along the roads 
          plagued by legionnaires
                    false windmills and demented roosters
They are the same people
                                    only further from home
      on freeways fifty lanes wide
                              on a concrete continent
                                        spaced with bland billboards 
                        illustrating imbecile illusions of happiness

Lawrence Ferlinghetti, “In Goya’s Greatest Scenes We Seem to See...” from Coney Island of the Mind (1958). Poem link


The architectural critic and photographer John Margolies (1940–2016), on the other hand, saw there could also be home-made beauty in the buildings and signs locals built on the American roadside. For almost forty years, starting from the mid-70s he began to photograph sites during long road trips, since he was concerned these sites would be displaced by the growing modernist trend. He was credited with shaping postmodern architecture and recognizing buildings that would be added to the National Register of Historic Places through his documentary work. He documented the most remarkable examples he found, publishing some of his discoveries in books and consigning the rest to an archive, which has now been purchased by the Library of Congress who, in a amazing gracious move, have lifted all copyright restrictions on the photographs (though art works shown in some photographs may still be under copyright).


John Samuel Margolies was born on May 16, 1940, in New Canaan, Connecticut. His father was a grandson of Moses S. Margolies, a well-known Russian-born American Orthodox who served as senior rabbi in NYC.

From 1969 to 2008 John Samuel Margolies photographed the eccentric roadside architecture and ephemera of the US. Starting in 2007, the Library of Congress began to acquire his photographs, and created the public domain John Margolies Roadside America Photograph Archive in 2016, consisting of 11,710 scans of color slides taken by Margolies. Here's some highlights...

If you're familiar with Ferlinghetti's poems you will most likely not be surprised to see Margolies’ archive offer up no end of "false windmills" and "demented roosters".







But the billboards he preferred to photograph illustrated relatively humble "illusions of happiness".




Probably one of his favorite roadside phenomena to document, however, were novelty buildings. He especially liked structures that mimicked their own shape or function, whether this was as witty as a car wash shaped like a whale or as uncomplicated as a coffeehouse shaped like a coffeepot.





The Teapot Dome scandal was a bribery scandal involving the administration of United States President Warren G. Harding from 1921 to 1923.

Almost all of Margolies’ work was done in the interest of preserving images of what would otherwise be lost to time. Even his first book, published in 1981, was mournfully called The End of the Road: Vanishing Highway Architecture in America. From the start, Margolies knew the quirky motels, miniature golf courses, diners, billboards, and gas stations were being endangered by franchising and changing fashions — not to mention changing patterns of automobile traffic. For decades now, most drivers have, of course, opted for the high speed-limits of superhighways and the convenience of service areas, leaving the old local highways in the lurch.

Drive-in Theaters...




Diners...



Today, this collection of Marogolies’ photographs offers an invaluable tour of the diverse vernacular architecture and signage of North America. Some of these wonders remain, while others have gone the way of the dinosaur — which, as it happens, remains one of the American roadside’s most frequent denizens.




I think it was renovated some years back and is now called "Outlaw Trail RV Park" and it's the Utah entrance to Dinosaur National Monument.




Browse/download: John Margolies Roadside America photograph archive (1972-2008)

In order to search only Margolies archive you must precede your keyword(s) with "mrg" such as "mrg billboard".

Around 4800 photo's at Library of Congress Flickr site (lower resolution)

[BIAD]

Absolutely fantastic! We need more like these!

[sailorsam]

great stuff!  thanks for sharing

lot of potential banners here