Okay, even surrounded by all my treasures — my bowling trophies, ribbons from dance contests, the collected works of the Lauderdale family — I still like to root around at garage sales and estate sales and see what I can add to what I already own. And sure enough, digging through a box of what anyone else would describe as "old junk" at a garage sale recently, I turned up a single 35mm Kodachrome slide, the one you see here.
Someone had scribbled on the cardboard slide mount "Main Street Memphis," but just a glance at the image told me, nope, this wasn't Main Street.
But they were close. I bought the slide (the asking price was $499 but I got them down to a quarter) and after studying the neon signs very carefully, it didn't take me long at all to conclude that what you see here is actually Union Avenue, looking west from South Second Street. Main Street is barely (and I mean barely) visible in the distance.
It's interesting that, in the one or two blocks dimly visible here, there were two florist shops: the Blossom Shop, owned by Mrs. Lilly G. Lewis and Ronald Wehler, and Memphis Floral Company, operated by W.D. King (and which I have written about before). Memphis Floral was quite an operation. Their ads proclaimed, "Cut flowers for all occasions, potted plants and pottery, floral offerings and wedding decorations." Their motto was "Fresh Flowers Every Day."
Also visible in the photo is the neon sign over the main entrance of WMPS radio station, located at 112 Union, and — look up — there's a neon sign for Memphis Engraving Company. A tiny dab of neon below that particular sign says "5th floor" and sure enough, Memphis Engraving was located on the fifth floor of the Dillard Building, located at 122 Union.
You really had to pay attention to all the street signs in those days.
If you don't know what Memphis Engraving did, their ads listed their services: "Photo engravers, commercial artists, photo retouchers, and commercial photographers." In those innocent, pre-computer days, they stayed very, very busy.
Two of the signs visible here intriqued me. One of them reads "BOOTERY" and I had to look through some city directories before turning up Wener's Bootery, located across the street from WMPS. Despite the name, it was mainly a shoe store, owned by Simon Wener.
And finally, what to make of the mysterious "HAMBURGERS" neon, seemingly floating in space. Well, that marked the location of Krystal Hamburgers, its chrome and white facade shining at the far left of the image, located at the corner of Union and South Second.
Way in the distance, a dim glow reveals the ground-floor showroom of the Three Sisters Building, at Union and Main, and you can barely make out a few lighted windows in that building.
Quite a lot of Memphis — most of the businesses long gone — captured on a tiny piece of film.
