Photo by Taryn Burkleo
GOOD FINDS
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BY MEGAN PETERSON
sign of the
PAST
Y R E K A S I G N R E S T O R AT I O N
IN 1891, the first “electric spectacular” was installed in New York City – a 50-foot-high by 80-foot-wide outdoor sign containing 1,457 attention-grabbing lamps. Soon after, night display advertising spread like wildfire, igniting the distinctly American era of illuminated signs. The merchants of Yreka jumped on the bandwagon and purchased a sign from the Federal Electric Company of Chicago. They gave it to the city and installed it in June 1917. At the time, the arched sign cost $300 (the equivalent of about $6,700 today) and displayed Yreka’s name in lights at the corner of Main and Miner Streets. “Arch signs welcomed visitors, advertised the town and instilled a sense of pride in their community, showing that the city was progressive. Yreka was halfway between Portland and San Francisco and was a stopping place for many travelers. It was only appropriate that Yreka have a
sign,” explains Joan Favero, a longtime Yreka community member who has been involved with the sign’s preservation over the last four decades. But as two-lane roads gave way to wider highways, arched signs became obsolete. “So many of the signs that were all along old Highway 99 were just taken down and forgotten about or taken to the junk pile because it would have taken quite a bit of restoration to expand over the street with the widening of the highway,” notes Favero. Yreka’s sign was no exception, getting taken down around 1935 and abandoned in a maintenance yard.4 continued on page 40
AUGUST 2020
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