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Scaffold Signs (page 5)

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Martinsville City of Mineral Water
Martinsville, IN
The Martinsville City of Mineral Water sign was built around 1930. It was paid for with public donations. At that time, the city was a health resort featuring mineral baths. The sign was restored in 2001. It was restored again in 2017 with LED bulbs. For more, see this website. [map]

Wrecks Inc.
Whitestown, IN
Wrecks Inc., an auto salvage business, went out of business around 2004. These photos are from 2010. The billboard sign shown on the left is gone now. The neon sign was built in 1958 and it is still there although it is no longer lit. Originally, there were older wrecked cars installed on the posts in front of the sign. These photos are from 2010. By 2015, the wrecked cars were gone. In 2018, it was announced that the property would be turned into the Maurer Commons. The sign will be restored and incorporated into the project. Nothing had happened yet as of 2022. [map]

More Indiana:
General Electric (Fort Wayne) [gone]
Perfection Bakeries (Fort Wayne)
Walker Theatre (Indianapolis)
Colgate Clock (Jeffersonville)

Hotel Jayhawk
Topeka, KS
The Hotel Jayhawk was built in 1926. The original rooftop sign did not feature a jayhawk. It was a simple text sign on rectangular shaped scaffolding. It was most likely a bulb sign. The two, identical neon signs which exist today were installed on the roof by 1935. One faces the south, the other faces east. The signs are 35 feet tall. The hotel closed in the mid-1970s. In 1982, the building was renamed the Jayhawk Tower and converted into office space. At that point, the signs' letters were changed from "Hotel" to "Tower". The signs were restored in 1999. They were repainted again in 2010. A Jayhawk is a mythical bird which is part blue jay and part sparrow hawk. The bird has been associated with Kansas since the 1850s and became the mascot for Kansas University's football team in 1890. The bird was first depicted in a KU newspaper in 1912. The Jayhawk logo has changed many times over the years. The version which appears on the Jayhawk Tower signs was used from 1923-1929. For Jayhawk statues, see these in Lawrence, KS. For more, see these websites: 1 and 2. [map]

Hotel Parrish
Pratt, KS		 Ellis
Ellis, KS
The Hotel Parrish was built in 1930 as the Hotel Roberts. It became the Hotel Parrish in 1957 and this sign was adapted then. The owner had another Hotel Parrish in Great Bend, KS. This hotel operated until 1974. The building is now used for apartments. For more, see this website. [map]

The Ellis sign is installed on the roof of the Ellis Railroad Museum. I don't know how long it has been there but it could be from the 1910s or 1920s. [map]

Drury Plaza Hotel Broadview
Wichita, KS		 Osage Apartments
Arkansas City, KS
This Drury Plaza Hotel Broadview sign was built and installed in 2011 when the hotel was renovated. Lit with LED bulbs, it is meant to simulate the hotel's previous sign. The Hotel Broadview was built from 1921-1922. There was a rooftop scaffold, incandescent bulb sign reading "Broadview." By the 1940s, there were two scaffold signs on opposite corners of the building reading "Hotel Broadview." Those signs were still there in the 1960s. For more, see these websites: 1 and 2. [map]

The Osage Apartments was built as the Osage Hotel in 1920. By the 1930s, there was a large neon projecting sign near the top of the building. However, there were no rooftop signs. I don't know if one was added later or if these two signs on opposite corners of the building were installed in much more recent years. In 1991, the hotel was converted to apartments. [map]

Beechcraft
Wichita, KS
The Beechcraft airplane manufacturing company was established in 1932 in Wichita. This sign is one of two installed on both sides of a runway bridge at the Beech Factory Airport. The airport was built for the Knoll Aircraft Company in 1928. It has been owned by Beechcraft since 1940 and these signs might have been built then. If so, these plastic faces must have been added later. For more, see this website. [map]

More Kansas:
Sunshine Biscuits (Kansas City) [gone]
H.E. Lee Flour Mills Co. (Salina)

Derrick Truck Stop
Greenwood, LA		 Lamp Lighter Lounge
Metairie, LA		 Hotel Pontchartrain
New Orleans, LA
This Derrick Truck Stop sign is probably from the 1950s. The neon is now missing from the channel letters. [map]

The Lamp Lighter Lounge sign is probably from the 1950s. [map]

The Hotel Pontchartrain was built as an apartment building in 1927. In the 1940s, it was converted into a luxury hotel. [map]

Falstaff Brewery
New Orleans, LA
2010: 2019:
The former Falstaff Brewery features a 185-foot-tall sign tower. It was built in 1952 and operated as a weather beacon until the brewery closed in the 1970s. The building remained vacant until 2007 when conversion into apartments began. In 2011, the weather-forecasting sign was restored. The tower and weather ball are lit in the same weather-predicting color patterns as they were originally. The Falstaff letters indicate changing temperatures. When they are lit from bottom to top, it means temperatures are rising. When lit from top to bottom, it indicates temperatures are falling. When the letters flash, there is no change expected. The 11-foot-tall steel letters were replicated to conform with local regulations. The requirements included that the sign would need to withstand 130 mile per hour winds.

The sign's weather ball was also refurbished. It provides further weather information. Green, red, and white neon are used to predict rain, showers, approaching storms, cloudy or fair weather. Weather beacons and weather balls were particularly popular in the 1950s and 1960s. Dozens of them were built in the U.S. and other countries. Two weather balls from this time period are still operating in Flint and Grand Rapids, MI. The Falstaff Brewery Building also has a Gambrinus statue on the roof. For more, see these websites: 1, 2, and 3. [map]

Hotel Monteleone
New Orleans, LA		 Herrin Storage & Transfer Co.
Shreveport, LA
The Hotel Monteleone opened in 1886. This sign is probably from the 1930s or later. [map]

The Herrin Storage & Transfer Co. was established in Shreveport in 1911. This warehouse is still operating as an Allied Van Lines location. This sign is probably from the 1950s or 1960s. [map]

Mid-City Motor Hotel
Shreveport, LA
The Mid-City Motor Hotel was built by the early 1960s. This sign is probably from then or earlier. The building is now for apartments. [map]

More Louisiana:
Kean's (Baton Rouge) [gone]

Scaffold Signs
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Scaffold Signs
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