The Surreal History of America's Roadside Attractions
By
The Offing
23d ago· 23 min readenNews
86/100
Golden Brown
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Summary
An essay exploring the history and cultural significance of American roadside attractions—whimsical, fantastical structures built in the 1920s to capture the attention of bored long-distance drivers. The piece reflects on the surreal experience of car travel and the entrepreneurial creativity that produced hat-shaped restaurants, teacup water towers, and dinosaur-shaped souvenir shops.
Key quotes
· 3 pulledSuddenly, more people were careening down long highways, bored, with nothing to do but look out the window, and entrepreneurs got to work, building roadside structures constructed in fantastical shapes.
There's a surreality to elongated car travel—punch-drunk exhaustion lends itself to odd visions, and it feels perfectly natural to
restaurants that looked like hats, water towers shaped like teacups, souvenir shops inside of a dinosaur's belly, and more
Essay - The Offing Magazine
