Patreon From the Land of Tea Nov 2022 Old California Tea Rooms
From Mystic Tea Room
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* '''[http://patreon.com/catherineyronwode "It's All Ephemera with Cat Yronwode"]''' | * '''[http://patreon.com/catherineyronwode "It's All Ephemera with Cat Yronwode"]''' | ||
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- | [[File: | + | [[File:2023-11-28-Release-FTLOT-Old-California-Tea-Rooms.jpg|right|thumb|300px|Old California Tea Rooms!]] |
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And once again we return to the theme of Tea Rooms by Location. These are old postcards, and each one has a caption explaining it, with some additional text. These images will eventually be on display at the Mystic Tea Room web site. As a Patreon supporter, you have access to them one full year before the public does. | And once again we return to the theme of Tea Rooms by Location. These are old postcards, and each one has a caption explaining it, with some additional text. These images will eventually be on display at the Mystic Tea Room web site. As a Patreon supporter, you have access to them one full year before the public does. | ||
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===Hollywood=== | ===Hollywood=== | ||
- | [[File:Tick-Tock-Tea-Room-Hollywood-California-Linen-Postcard-Front.jpg|center|400px|thumb|The Tick Tock Tea Room at 1716 Cahuenga Blvd., Hollywood, California, was a one-of-a-kind place. It was founded in 1930 by Art and Helen Johnson, a former auto mechanic and a waitress from Minneapolis, Minnesota. The couple came to California, sold their car, and used the money to buy the Laurel Crest Tea Room at New Hampshire and Beverly Boulevard. Unfortunately, the tea room's sign did not come with the tea room, so they took the Tick Tock name from a restaurant in their old home town and hung a cuckoo clock on the wall. Their offer of a 65 cent turkey dinner proved so popular that they sold from 30 to 100 meals a day and had to move to larger quarters twice to make room for all their customers. In 1934 they opened on Cahuenga Blvd. with room to seat 300 people and serve 2,000 meals a day, six days a week. Patrons brought them cuckoo clocks and they hung them up until the walls were covered with them. The food was cooked home-style -- plentiful and inexpensive, changing with the seasons -- and there were fresh flowers on every table. A staff of 75 employees, including at times Art and Helen's five children and 13 grandchildren, worked in the tea room. There were special meals and decorations for every holiday. The couple passed away in the 1980s and by 1988 the Tick Tock Tea Room was no more. This linen-finish postcard dates from the 1940s-1950s. Don't you wish you could visit the Tick Tock Tea Room? Well, i can, in my memory. It was a grand experience to eat there as a child in the 1950s, and i think the world would be a better place if tea rooms like the Tick Tock still existed.]] | + | [[File:Tick-Tock-Tea-Room-Hollywood-California-Linen-Postcard-Front.jpg|center|400px|thumb|The Tick Tock Tea Room at 1716 North Cahuenga Blvd., Hollywood, California, was a one-of-a-kind place. It was founded in 1930 by Art and Helen Johnson, a former auto mechanic and a waitress from Minneapolis, Minnesota. The couple came to California, sold their car, and used the money to buy the Laurel Crest Tea Room at New Hampshire and Beverly Boulevard. Unfortunately, the tea room's sign did not come with the tea room, so they took the Tick Tock name from a restaurant in their old home town and hung a cuckoo clock on the wall. Their offer of a 65 cent turkey dinner proved so popular that they sold from 30 to 100 meals a day and had to move to larger quarters twice to make room for all their customers. In 1934 they opened on Cahuenga Blvd. with room to seat 300 people and serve 2,000 meals a day, six days a week. Patrons brought them cuckoo clocks and they hung them up until the walls were covered with them. The food was cooked home-style -- plentiful and inexpensive, changing with the seasons -- and there were fresh flowers on every table. A staff of 75 employees, including at times Art and Helen's five children and 13 grandchildren, worked in the tea room. There were special meals and decorations for every holiday. The couple passed away in the 1980s and by 1988 the Tick Tock Tea Room was no more. This linen-finish postcard dates from the 1940s-1950s. Don't you wish you could visit the Tick Tock Tea Room? Well, i can, in my memory. It was a grand experience to eat there as a child in the 1950s, and i think the world would be a better place if tea rooms like the Tick Tock still existed.]] |
===Pasadena=== | ===Pasadena=== |
Latest revision as of 05:50, 29 November 2023
In this installment of "From the Land of Tea," we take a sneak-peek look at an upcoming page that will eventually be on display to the public. As a Patreon supporter, you have access to the page one full year before the public does.
- Patreon Release Date: November 28th, 2022.
- Public Release Date: November 28th, 2023.
Please tell your friends that they can subscribe to my Patreon stream for $2.00 per week:
And once again we return to the theme of Tea Rooms by Location. These are old postcards, and each one has a caption explaining it, with some additional text. These images will eventually be on display at the Mystic Tea Room web site. As a Patreon supporter, you have access to them one full year before the public does.
To place this work in context, please read the following introductory pages
Contents |
California
The Tea Rooms of California vary greatly in style, but two aesthetic themes stand out from the rest: The Craftsman or Mission Style Tea Room and the Cantonese Tea Room. California had no Colonial tea room history to exploit, and no great connection to Jolly Old England, but at the height of the tea room craze, Mission style oak furniture, which had first become popular in California, could be found all up and down the coast, and lent itself well to the conversion of small homes, lodges, hotels, and shops into tea room spaces.
The influx of immigrants from China, began during the Gold Rush of the early 1850s and continued on as Cantonese workers came to provide labour on West Coast railroads during the late 19th century. When the development of the railroads was completed and families settled down, this wave of immigration left in its wake hundreds of Chinese tea rooms, restaurants, and gift stores, all along the Southern Pacific line, "On the Road of a Thousand Wonders."
The great earthquake and fire that destroyed much of San Francisco in 1906 struck just as the postcard craze was getting underway, and San Franciscans took great pride in showing the world their rebuilt tea rooms in the form of advertising postcards just as soon as they reopened for business.
Hollywood
Pasadena
San Francisco
Santa Rosa
catherine yronwode
curator, historian, and docent
The Mystic Tea Room