On this page we feature other sorts of media about the Palm Springs area including View-Master reels, a promotional film strip, a few slides and yearbooks (coming soon) and even some music. The captions in [brackets], whenever possible, include labels from the original item in “quotation marks.” We add estimated dates and other details. For best viewing experience, choose the 720p or higher setting on the player.Click images to enlarge.
FS#1. [“Palm Springs” 1940.] 35mm. Silent. Faded color. Stereoscopic filmstrip originally produced by Tru-Vue for tourists. Digitized (sadly not stereoscopically) and music added by Melissa.
VM#1. [Sawyer’s View-Master “Palm Springs, California” #186, ca. 1940s.] Silent. By View-Master Manufacturing Inc.
VM#2. [View-Master 3-D Tour, Reel A “Resort Area, Palm Springs, California,” 1978.] Silent. By View-Master Manufacturing Inc.
VM#3. [View-Master 3-D Tour, Reel B “Indio and Coachella Valley, Palm Springs, California,” 1978.] Silent. By View-Master Manufacturing Inc.
VM#4. [View-Master 3-D Tour, Reel C “Aerial Tramway, Palm Springs, California,” 1978 (or 1968? Others in 3-pack say 1978.)] Silent. By View-Master Manufacturing Inc.
Reels VM#1-4 were projected with this 1949 View-Master Projector made by Sawyer’s Inc.
Plaza Theatre Sign, March 30, 1957
Indio National Date Festival Pageant Souvenir Album 1983 featuring John Easton Stuart as Prince Kassim and Kathy Westmoreland as Princess Scheherazade. Produced and Directed by Larry Canady. Listen here on Internet Archive. (We nearly put this album in the “Weird Stuff” category, but it was recorded for the Date Festival.)
Premiere of the film THE TALL “T” starring Randolph Scott, who was also Grand Marshall for that day’s Desert Circus parade.
Slide #1. Palm Springs Airport, 1950s
Slide #2. Barbara & Frank Sinatra and Jill St. John at 1993 Palm Springs Film Festival
Slide #3. Palm Canyon Road Sign, 1973
Slide #4. Palm Canyon (now Indian Canyons) Trading Post, 1973
Slide #5. Indio Date Festival Princesses, 1958
Slide #6. Indio Date Festival Princesses, 1958
Slide #7. Indio Date Festival Princesses, 1958
Slide #8. Indio Date Festival Princesses, 1958
Slide #9. Indio Date Festival Princesses, 1958
Slide #10. Palm Springs Air Museum, 1967
1920s Postcard – front. Caption reads: “Palo Verde trees in bloom on the desert near Palm Springs, California”
ca. 1950s postcard featuring Shields Date Farm and Indio Date Festival Princesses. Back reads “Shields Date Garden. Here amid stately date palms is one of the most popular tourist attractions on Highway 111, between Palm Springs and Indio, California. Visitors enjoy the free color motion pictures on the Date Story and visit one of the most modern showrooms and colorful rose gardens in the state.”
The Miami Herald, September 7, 1958. AP News (feature by John Beckler on Coachella Valley.) “Palm Springs: Incredible Oasis in the Desert” Caption reads: “Wealth and poverty in the famed desert resort of Palm Springs, Calif., are contrasted in these pictures. Top photo shows one of the many plush homes, some costing up to $250,000, that give the city an appearance of a modern Baghdad. Below is the shack home of one of the 2,500 people who perform the menial chores that make the good life possible for wealthy visitors. There is a movement afoot to clear the slum section of Palm Springs to make way for a housing development…” To read more.
1920s Postcard – back. Caption reads: “The Palo Verde (Spanish for Green Stick) blooms in April and is undoubtedly the showiest thing on the desert.” Handwritten note says, “this is typical of the main roads.”
