Invisible Themepark

Category: 1950s

Cutaways from the 1950s (1950 to 1959).

  • Super Dome Train Car Cutaway, 1952

    Super Dome Train Car Cutaway, 1952

    Super Dome Train Car Cutaway 1952

    Sightseeing “dome” rail cars were not new in 1952, but to this point these VistaDomes, as they were called, had extended only partially along the length of the car.  With the new Pullman super dome car, this “greenhouse” area now extended 73 feet, the entire length (more or less) of the car, accommodating 68 passengers.

    The half-inch thick glass top was double-walled, air conditioned air flowing through the plenum during hot summer months.

    Downstairs was a 28 seat diner with full electric kitchen.

    The Napa Valley Wine Train is one of the few outfits running Super Dome Cars, though in their literature they mistakenly refer to them as VistaDomes.

    Click to Enlarge to 1251 x 762 px

    Source:  Popular Science, July 1952

  • Two Story Trailer Cutway, 1952

    Two Story Trailer Cutway, 1952

    From the magazine, we’re told that this trailer, from Holan Engineering from Elwood, Indiana, has two stories and an attic, a plastic-tiled kitchen and bathroom, and a living room with a picture window. The trailer is 8 feet wide by 40 feet long.

    What they don’t tell us is that this is a mobile home, not meant to travel any farther than from the dealer’s lot to the mobile home park or vacation spot near the lake.

    The trailer blog Portable Levittown states that this trailer later took the name Ventoura Loft-Liner.

    Source:  Popular Science, June 1952

    2 Story Trailer - 2

     

  • Idlewild (JFK) Airport Air Traffic Control Tower, 1952

    Idlewild (JFK) Airport Air Traffic Control Tower, 1952

    Idlewild JFK Original Air Traffic Control Tower Cutaway

    Originally called Idlewild Airport, it was renamed JFK Airport in 1963, after the President’s assassination.

    This workman-like, competent but hardly spectacular cutaway illustration by Sloane shows the 11-story so-called “supertower” that allowed air traffic controllers in the early Fifties to track and guide up to 1,000 aircraft a day (real capacity was likely much less).

    At the time, Idlewild was nine times larger than its sister airport, La Guardia.  It became so difficult for controllers to maintain control of air traffic at the massive 4,900 acre Idlewild that sometimes, Popular Science reports, a jeep with a tw0-way radio would be sent out to the runways to communicate with controllers at the old tower.

    Source:  Popular Science, June 1952

  • Mercury Moll: Mrs. Linda Plannette

    Mercury Moll: Mrs. Linda Plannette

    Linda Plannette

    We’re barely out of the 1940s–1952, to be exact–and this lovely lady is presaging the Sixties already by wearing cut-off jeans shorts, no doubt called “dungarees” at that time.  She’s a missus, too:  Mrs. Linda Plannette.  Looks like a sunny but cool Spring day in Southern California, judging by the long sleeves.  My guess is that she didn’t traipse around in cut-offs all the time.  Likely, her husband Paul Plannette, wanted to take a picture of the Merc and said, “Hey, how about a little cheesecake in the photo, huh?”  Check out the big fat palm tree in the background.

    Text in this Popular Mechanics piece says that

    Mrs. Linda Plannette…is a spare-time Los Angeles mechanic.  She and her husband put together the souped-up car, using a standard Mercury frame, shortened by 18 inches and a stock 1949 Mercury engine.

    The guys over at Jalopy Journal say she looks like Geena Davis.  I had to pull up a picture of the actress because it’s not a face that I have in my memory banks.  My evaluation:  sure, a little bit.  Davis’ is a standard-issue attractive face.  It’s not worth posting her picture; you can Google her.

    I’d love to know what became of Linda Plannette.  Is she sitting in a nursing home in Indio as we speak?  Or not?  My parents who are in their 80s are still going strong at their own place, no elderly people are they.  Mrs. Plannette would be their age or a bit younger.

    Source:  Popular Mechanics, June 1952

     

     

  • Turtle Personal Tank, 1952

    Turtle Personal Tank, 1952

    As far as I know, this one-man tank never left the mind of Les G. Scherer.

    Scherer designed this personal-sized tank to weigh 7,000 pounds, pack two .30 caliber machine guns, and have 650 ports arrayed around the driver with each port containing a shotgun shell that could be electrically fired.  Main selling point of the Turtle Tank was its low center of gravity.  Like its terrapin namesake, this tank would have been difficult to turn over.

    Click to Enlarge to 934 x 682 px:

    Turtle Personal Tank 1952
    Turtle Personal Tank 1952

    Source:  Popular Science April 1952