Royal Blue

Royal Blue, a photo by William 74 on Flickr.

A vintage Selz Royal Blue Shoes sign, in the town of Chenoa, Illinois, right along historic Route 66. This is a bit of a cheat-it's a restoration of an old Selz sign that was uncovered when a building was demolished. Although it is starting to fade and flake again-I wonder if they'll restore the restoration?

Shoes

Shoes, a photo by William 74 on Flickr.

Aurora, Illinois is a pretty big city, and was once a major hub for the Chicago, Burlington & Quincy Railroad. The downtown area is full of old buildings, many of which haven't been over-restored or heavily altered. There are only a few ghost signs, and one of the better known is "shoes". This building is on Broadway, just east of the Fox River. There's some writing near the top (I think it says "felt" somewhere), and there's a twin on the other side, but it's hard to see and shoot.

I have it on fairly good authority that this used to be the location of Van Ham Shoes.

Adams Shoes

Adams Shoes-Chicago, IL, a photo by William 74 on Flickr.

Vintage Chicago signage. Adams Shoes is long out of business, but it's storefront remained mostly unchanged for years. Check out the font on the yellow sign-it pretty much carbon dates it to the early sixties, maybe earlier. This sign also includes a smaller neon "Adams" sign on the front corner of the building. All of it was in pretty good shape, and probably looked awesome lit up at night.

I shot this several years ago-I don't know if any of the signs are still extant.