Roadside Attractions

Shell Service Station, Winston-Salem, North Carolina. NPS photo

This lesson is part of the National Park Service’s Teaching with Historic Places (TwHP) program.

Have you ever bought your milk while inside a milk bottle? Paid for your gas inside a teapot or a sea shell? Slept in a wigwam? Climbed on a dinosaur? Have you compared your foot size with that of Paul Bunyan? These and many more such activities attracted hometowners and tourists alike as millions of Americans took to the road when the automobile revolutionized American life. Some set off on ambitious cross-country trips; others on jaunts to neighboring states to visit newly opened national parks; and some simply crossed town for Sunday dinner or to pick up milk from the store.

In this lesson, students will examine five examples of roadside architecture built in the 1920s and 1930s and designed to catch the eye of passing motorists—three represented literalism in advertising, one was intended as a political joke, and one was designed to lure the traveler into spending the night in an "exotic" setting. The students also will examine two examples of colossal roadside sculptures that exemplify the concept of boosterism. (Click on the image for the full lesson plan.)

Essential Question

Follow the highways of the 1920s and 1930s, exploring the whimsical, extravagant architecture that came with American auto culture.

Objective

1. To explain the impact the automobile had on business as merchants and city leaders strove to gain financially from increased automobile traffic during the 1920s and 1930s;
2. To define and explain the motivation for literalism in advertising, place-product-packaging, and boosterism, and to compare current examples with those of the 1920s and 1930s;
3. To identify local structures that reflect "novelty" architecture;
4. To list the changes that auto culture brought to their own community.

Background

Time Period: 1920s and 1930s
Topics: The lesson could be used in units on popular culture or the rise of American motor tourism.

Grade Level

Middle School: Sixth Grade through Eighth Grade

Subject

Literacy and Language Arts,Social Studies

Lesson Duration

90 Minutes

Common Core Standards:

6-8.RH.2, 6-8.RH.3, 6-8.RH.4, 6-8.RH.5, 6-8.RH.6, 6-8.RH.7, 6-8.RH.8, 6-8.RH.9, 6-8.RH.10, 9-10.RH.1, 9-10.RH.2, 9-10.RH.3, 9-10.RH.4, 9-10.RH.5, 9-10.RH.6, 9-10.RH.7, 9-10.RH.8, 9-10.RH.9, 9-10.RH.10

Additional Standards

US History Era 7 Standard 3B: The student understands how a modern capitalist economy emerged in the 1920s.Curriculum Standards for Social Studies from the National Council for the Social Studies

Full Lesson Plan