Re: '52 Imperial Parade Phaetons

Posted by Leeedy On 2018/8/11 13:44:49
Quote:

ECAnthony wrote:
Leeedy - Is this the theater you were talking about? This was taken during a 1953 Packard sales meeting.


Ohhhh yes! That's the beautiful United Artists theater in its glory years. The building it is in was the National Headquarters building for AAA Automobile Club where I used to work. And these Packard guys are boarding what look like GMC Greyhound charter busses on Bagley Avenue. This was one of the streets of dreams in downtown Detroit when Packard was also in its heyday.

That UA marquee illuminated beautifully at night and had a lot of brushed stainless steel on it. Note the Marilyn Monroe and Jane Russell reference ("Some Like It Hot"?). The open space between the buildings (to the right of the UA Theater in the photo) was a parking lot where I sometimes parked my new GTO convertible when I was working here for AAA. Note at least three of the Packard guys boarding the bus are wearing "spectator shoes." Snappy dressers, they.

Building directly behind the first charter bus was a big hotel (don't recall the name) where many of the rooms were occupied by full-time residents. Directly behind our viewing angle (back over our shoulders) here was an even bigger and very deluxe hotel that eventually became the Detroit home to famous Trader Vic's Restaurant-as in Beverly Hills (the marquee was done up in fake bamboo). Yessss, there was a time in Detroit...

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