Whether it's a sparkling silver Airstream or the busted 1986 Fleetwood Bounder used for cooking meth in Breaking Bad, the RV has a hold on the American imagination. Here is manifest destiny made practical -- and sometimes stylish -- for middle-class families. Vintage trailer collector Phil Noyes has taken his love for the vehicle and turned it into Trailerama, a 192-page book filled with colorful images of trailers. Culled from ads, postcard, sheet music, and more, they run the gamut from the earliest mobile coaches in the 1930s to the roving behemoths that came to dominate the market in later decades. Though rising gas prices may have cooled our collective ardor, Noyes documents the country's still smoldering love affair with life on the road.
This 1950’s postcard stated: “For a most enjoyable, carefree, low cost vacation, rent a trailer like this for just $35.00 a week”
The Hollywood Trailer Company built some of the finest coaches of its day during the golden age of travel trailers, the 1930’s
Actress Ida Lupino loved her 1937 Halsco Land Yacht and was certainly one of the first starlets to be able to utter the words, “I’ll be in my trailer!”
Talk about streamline design at it’s coolest! They weren’t lying when this brochure claimed “the world’s most beautiful trailer coach home.”
The Covered Wagon Company was started in 1929 and built trailers until 1945. They were the first trailer manufacturer to go public on the NY stock exchange;
The travel trailer was a popular subject for postcard companies and were often risqué and included some fairly raunchy images for the day. This one actually sports a very poignant little poem
A happy family captured in the full glory of Kodachrome
The travel trailer did not escape the greeting card companies. This cutie was printed in mid-thirties
This little graphic is from a 1950’s Kaiser steel ad, promoting the wonders of aluminum
I’ve always worried that these kids may have had a spate of bad luck soon after this photo was snapped
Teardrop trailers are the epitome of cute/cool and this 1930’s beauty even has a pop up roof
This Japanese made 1950’s tin toy has all the goodies, from the cool station wagon with the motorboat on the roof to the spectacular trailer, replete with graphics of a happy family peering out the doors
