The Beautifully Modern Municipal Building — Raleigh, North Carolina
Summer 1973 — A day in the life of Ruth and Don and Mother and Claris and Debs. While on a day trip to Raleigh, ‘Debs’ picked up this postcard depicting our city’s ‘beautifully modern municipal building’ and mailed it to friends in Rochester, NY.
July 19th — Hi! Surprised? Traveled to N.C. by train arriving @ Southern Pines about 5 mi. from Whispering Pines where Ruth & Don live — on July 5th. Ruth & I are in Raleigh for the day. She is @ the state library archives looking up geneology for a cousin of Don’s. Mother is fairly well. Ruth & Don will be driving me to Pa. on Aug. 6th. They’ll go on to� visit Don’s sister & Claris will meet me in Towanda. After visiting our cemetery lot near Towanda, I’ll be in Palmyra until Aug. 14th. Will be driving to Syracuse & to Watertown area — Will certainly give you a call to at least say “hi” — I miss having my own car but the gasoline situation inspired my train travel.
Such beautiful country around Whis. Pines. Love it & am being real lazy.
Love — Debs
Raleigh’s beautifully modern Municipal Building, designed by the renowned modernist architect G. Milton Small, was built in 1960. After 50 years of service to the City of Raleigh, it’s fate is now uncertain — it may be destroyed.
This classic photochrome postcard was published by Aerial Photography Services of Charlotte, N.C. in 1966.
It was printed in New York by the Dexter Press.
Thomas Dexter Press�� 1934-1980
West Nyack, NYPrinter of a wide variety of postcards subjects as linens and photochromes. Thomas A. Dexter was the inventor of gang printing. The Company merged with MWM Color Press in 1980 to become MWM Dexter, and they moved to Aurora, MO.
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07/15/2011
The comment about “gasoline situation inspired my travel” made me wonder how much gas was around 1967 (based on the postcard date) and how bad that felt to consumers. I found this handy chart: http://goo.gl/mOem (NY Times) and while it basically says that gas was ~$2.10/gallon, if you look up inflation rates, that’s like saying gas was $14.19 a gallon. Whoa. I’d sell my car, too.
Love the postcards, btw. Thanks Karl :)
07/15/2011
Pahaha, or I could have looked that up for 1973, which is what you said the date was. Which would then be like $1.80 which translates to $9.15. Not AS bad, but I’d still sell my car.
07/15/2011
There’s no way gas was $2.10 a gallon in 1967. I think you might be reading that chart wrong. I remember very clearly when gas first went above $1 a gallon my senior year in high school because the pumps in existence at the time could only read up to 99 cents, so they reconfigured them and you had to pay double what was on them. For instance: gas actually costs 1.10. The pumps read .55. You double that and pay the 1.10.
Here’s a better indicator of US gas prices:
http://www1.eere.energy.gov/vehiclesandfuels/facts/2005/fcvt_fotw364.html
07/17/2011
While the price of gasoline in 1973 rose — my recollection is from about $.19/gallon to $.50/gallon — I believe that the “gasoline situation” the writer refers to has more to do with the “Arab Oil Embargo.” At that time gasoline stations regularly ran out of gas — if you went on a long trip there was no guarantee that you could find gas to get home. At one point one could only purchase it on specific days of the week determined by the final digit on your license plate (even and odd days), and rationing was seriously considered. The Yom Kippur War, and the rise of OPEC crashed together to create quite a “situation”.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arab_Oil_Embargo
07/20/2011
Having lived through that time, and getting my driver’s license in 1974, I’ll never forget those days, and the first gas shortage. I concur with Raleigh Native51, except the price per gallon was more like $.25/gal. Prior to the embargo, you could actually find two stations having a gas wars, and the cost could get lower than a quarter a gallon. But suddenly there was no gas, stations had long lines to purchase what gas they had, and often they would run out before you got to purchase any. It was not uncommon to see signs at service stations saying “no gas”. The price did double to about $.50/gallon and supplies became regular again in late 1974. Although the price doubled, people were more apprehensive about having no gas.
08/10/2015
Thomas Dexter, the printer of the postcard, was my grandfather! It’s always nice to see one of his cards being posted.