Neon Road Trip

By John Barnes

Take to the road to discover the history and artistry of North America’s disappearing neon signs.

Neon Road Trip chronicles the history of the commercial neon sign with a curated collection of photographs capturing the most colorful and iconic neon still surviving today.

The vivid photographs are arranged according to the signs' imagery, with sections such as Spirit of the West, On the Road, Now That’s Entertainment, and Ladies, Diving Girls & Mermaids. Sixteen of the most iconic landmark signs include brief histories on how that unique sign came to be. A resource section includes a photography index by location and a Neon Museums Visitor’s Guide.

John Barnes studied art, graphic design, sculpture and photography, earning a BFA degree in documentary photography from the University of Delaware 1984. He worked as a commercial advertising photographer for over fifteen years both on the east coast and in San Francisco, and has been a fine art photographer for the last 30 years. He recently spent the last two years traveling around the United States and Canada photographing iconic neon signs. John resides in Seattle but spends most of his time traveling taking photographs.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Gibbs Smith
• Release date: Mar 3, 2020
• ISBN: 9781423654087

John Barnes

John Barnes (b. 1957) is the author of more than thirty novels and numerous short stories. His most popular novels include the national bestseller Encounter with Tiber (co-written with Buzz Aldrin), Mother of Storms (finalist for both the Hugo and Nebula awards), Tales of the Madman Underground (winner of the Michael L. Printz Award), and One for the Morning Glory, among others. His most recent novel is The Last President (2013).

Book preview

Neon_Road_Trip_Cover.jpgPhoto of neon sign.

Tropic Cinema, Key West, FL.

Photo of neon sign.Photo of logo.

Digital Edition 1.0

Text and photographs © 2020 John Barnes

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced by any means whatsoever without written permission from the publisher, except brief portions quoted for purpose of review.

Published by

Gibbs Smith

P.O. Box 667

Layton, Utah 84041

1.800.835.4993 orders

www.gibbs-smith.com

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Barnes, John, 1955- author.

Title: Neon road trip / John Barnes.

Description: First edition. | Layton, Utah : Gibbs Smith, [2020]. |

Includes index. | Summary: "Neon Roadtrip chronicles the North American

history of the commercial neon sign with a curated collection of

photographs capturing the most colorful and iconic neon still surviving

today. The vivid photographs are arranged according to the signs

imagery, with chapters such as Spirit of the West, On the Road, and

Ladies, Diving Girls & Mermaids. Fifteen of the most iconic signs are

also accompanied by their own carefully researched and unique histories.

Includes a photography index of neon signs by location and a Neon

Museums Visitor’s Guide"--Provided by publisher.

Identifiers: LCCN 2019022783 | ISBN 9781423654087 (ebook)

Subjects: LCSH: Neon signs--North America--History. | Neon signs--North

America--Pictorial works.

Classification: LCC TK4383 .B37 2020 | DDC 659.13/6097--dc23

LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2019022783

This book is dedicated to Sarah Barnes

Photo of neon sign.

French Cleaners, Oakland, CA.

Contents

Introduction

A Brief History of Neon Signage

The Four Gases Used in Neon Signs

The Art of Doing Business

Divers, Mermaids & Ladies

Eat, Drink & Be Merry

On the Road

What a Zoo

Now That’s Entertainment

Spirit of the West

Neon Museums

Photo Index

Acknowledgments

About the Author

Photo of neon sign.

Gunther’s Ice Cream, Sacramento, CA.

Introduction

This neon road trip began, for me, in Sacramento in 1978 while pursuing my bachelor of fine arts in photography. Like a lot municipalities around the country at the time, Sacramento City Council had proposed an ordinance that would restrict the use of neon lighting in exterior signage. The publicized argument against neon signs was that they were a distraction to motorists—but the real reason was the exodus of residents to the suburbs. The sudden loss of business revenue and foot traffic left most urban city centers looking vacant and run-down, and city planners across the country were desperately looking for solutions to reverse that trend.

As an artist and documentary photographer, I could appreciate the simple graphic beauty and brilliant colors that are the trademark of most iconic neon signs. It seemed to me that not only were these iconic signs part of our cultural heritage, they were also an unrecognized folk art form: even the simplest signs took skill and artistic sensibility to produce, and they were beginning to disappear. As the city council sought to eliminate these works of art, I began to photograph what I considered iconic or graphically interesting neon signage around Sacramento.

In the years that followed, my interest in neon grew and I continued to photograph both interesting and historic signs at home or abroad. A couple years ago, I visited the Boneyard of the Neon Museum in Las Vegas. During the tour it dawned on me how much of our neon heritage we have lost. The next evening I went out in search of the remaining neon signs—in a city that was renowned for neon—and found only a few. Back in Sacramento, I discovered most of the signs that I had photographed years earlier were gone. Thankfully, the Tower Theatre and Tower Records signs were still intact, along with Gunther’s Ice Cream, the Club Raven, and the Crest Theatre.

Over the next two years, I traveled around the US and Canada searching for and documenting the remaining iconic neon signs. The process involved a lot of research and a lot of cruising around at night looking for working signs. This book is a chronicle of that trip: a curated collection of photographs that capture the most colorful and iconic neon signage in North America still surviving today.

Photo of neon sign.

Tower Theatre, Sacramento, CA.

Photo of neon sign.

Wool Growers Restaurant, Bakersfield, CA.

A Brief History of

Neon Signage

Beginning in the 1930s to about the mid-1970s, neon signs were a ubiquitous icon of the American highway and urban scene. Traveling along America’s highways at night, neon signage would emerge on the horizon every few miles with the promise of food, drink, and a good night’s sleep—their luminous brilliance competing with the stars to light up the sky. In small towns and big cities, practically every mom-and-pop motel or store had a