Trailer Trad Collecting: Vintage Souvenir Glasses (Reshown)

Vintage souvenir drinking glasses from the 1930s through the 1960s pack a lot of nostalgia into a little eight ounce cup. Get a load of how small serving sizes were in the 1950s! These glasses not only serve as reminders of travel back then but they often say a lot about what states and tourist attractions were like. Important industries back then might be long gone for example. Using bright primary colors and mid-century graphics, they illustrate how trains, cars or passenger liners conveyed tourists to wonderful, arcane destinations like Cypress Gardens FL or Oil City PA.
What did states think of themselves and how did they wish to be remembered? For Minnesota, it meant a huge Paul Bunyon and a gopher (or is it a badger?) dressed in hunting gear carrying a shotgun, I guess.
Some of these glasses illustrate specific tourist attractions of the day. Many 'tourist traps' were set up in the 1920s to attract the legions of new motorists and to increase traffic on newly constructed highways. Postwar families needed places to take children when on vacation.

Sun Valley Idaho looked like a lot of fun-even back then! If you couldn't afford the train fare to Sun Valley, there was always Luray Caverns in Virginia.

For the ultimate in extreme family entertainment, let's load up the car and head to the 'Land of Make Believe.' -And, no, that's not located in Washington, DC.

These glasses can be found fairly readily at antique shows and flea markets and shouldn't set you back much more the $5 each. -Not bad for a little geography lesson that you can drink out of.