OZARKS TOURISM OF THE 1940S CAPTURED ON CLOTH

 James Fork of the White  No Responses »
Apr 052023
 

Souvenir cotton card table cover designed and printed by Steve Miller, 1940s.

Artist Steve Miller created most of Jim Owen’s advertising. He also designed the logo for an Owen dairy milk bottle which is today a pricey collector’s item. Miller was from Kirksville and after teaching in Mexico and Columbia, Missouri, became enamored with the Ozarks, setting up shop in Branson in 1941. Probably the card table sized cloth map, depicting the rustic recreational attractions of the Shepherd of the Hills Country, is from the ‘40s. We’ve found it printed in both red and blue.

Miller’s hillbilly motifs are rendered with the graphic sophistication of a New Yorker cartoonist. More than any artifact in our collection it this textile illustrates the connectivity of the various country attractions of early Branson. The place’s rusticity is artfully depicted. Miller was a fan of days and ways gone by but had a modern design flare. Cartooning gave the old-time attractions a pop culture, post-War look. “Nostalgia Heightens Interest in Ozarks” was the headline of a 1972 Springfield News-Leader article about a speech given by Miller, then the artist-in-residence at the School of the Ozarks.

Miller was mindful of the region’s traditional image. In 1949, he created the giant Nativity scene still used at Christmas on the bluff across Lake Taneycomo from downtown Branson. He joined the staff at the School (now College) of the Ozarks in 1962 where he taught, and curated the Ralph Foster collection of Ozarks artifacts and firearms. His works permeate print media of the region. He died in 1972, survived by wife, a son, and a daughter.

The tablecloth illustration is from See the Ozarks: The Touristic Image, an all color book of advertisements and souvenirs depicting early Ozarks tourism promotions and the image it created for the region. The book provides rich images and a unique aspect of history of Shepherd of the Hills Country, Eureka Springs, the Big Springs Country, Lake of the Ozarks, and more recent developments in this unique region – to answer the question: “What lured generations of travelers to the Ozarks?”

Lens & Pen Press is having a half-price sale for all titles. See the Ozarks: The Touristic Image, is now available on our website at www.dammingtheosage.com for $12.50 (half the original price of $24.95), postage paid. See the Ozarks: The Touristic Image is a  96-page all color, hardbound book.

 

TAKE AN AUTUMN FLOAT WITH “SHERIFF WHITE RIVER” JIM OWEN

 Uncategorized  No Responses »
Dec 072022
 

A Jim Owen mailing piece by Steve Miller – the go-to commercial artist in the Branson area as its reputation as a tourist destination grew in the post-World War II era prosperity. His deft drawings imparted a lively pop look.

A small mailing piece drawn by Steve Miller for “White River” Jim M. Owen proclaimed, “THE BIG BASS ARE ON THE MOVE and the months of October and November are the two greatest months of the year to take an Ozark Float trip.”

Branson artist Miller’s cartoons of the native fish are silly. Oddly he proclaims, “Spike Channel, alias ‘The Cat’” is a “plug-snatcher.” Rarely are catfish taken on artificial lures, but then cartoonists have a license to distort. Still, it’s a catchy 1950s style graphic and on the flip-side is a bit of descriptive prose, reminiscent of the Arcadianism of the early railroad advertising, but toned down: “Smooth water, fast water, wide stream, narrow stream, rapids, racy riffles, tumultuous torrent, foam-flecked glides, deep holes that fair breathe of big bass . . . all this and more you will find . . . “

Both Owen and later John Morris promotions mixed contemporary media looks with splashes of the Ozarks’ earlier romantic imagery. Overall, Owen’s services were attuned to real sporting needs and featured documentary photographs – Spike the Plug-Snatching Channel Cat excepted. It’s a neat trick to continually update advertising to accommodate evolving public taste without destroying the region’s long-time, old-time image.

 

Lens & Pen Press is having a half-price sale for all titles. James Fork of the White is now available on our website at www.dammingtheosage.com for $17.50 (half the original price of $35), postage paid. James Fork of the White: Transformation of an Ozark River, 352 pages with more than 400 color illustrations, examines the entire watershed of the famed Ozark float stream, a tributary of the White River.

“Staff” of Jim Owen’s Float Service

 Uncategorized  2 Responses »
Jul 112018
 

Owen and his band of guides, raconteurs and artist Steve Miller hang out in front of Owen’s Hillbilly Theater in downtown Branson.

Owen’s roster included many who had pioneered floating the James and White back in the days when city folks detrained at Galena. Few guides worked full time. Some continued to offer their services to Galena operators. The Branson businessman’s aggressive advertising reeled in the most clients and in the twenty-six years he packaged trips he would use almost every river man at one time or another. Jim Owen became an institution, but some of his guides had reputations for their fishing acumen, campfire cooking skills, or country wit. A jokester himself, Owen encouraged colorful rustic behavior that fulfilled visitors’ expectations of being escorted downstream by a tractable variety of hillbilly.

James Fork of the White (p. 235)

James Fork of the White is available on this website, on amazon.com and at Barnes & Noble.