Getting a Lift with Electro-Data (Los Angeles)

It wasn't just the old-timey fonts that caught my attention (although that was part of it) but the name of the company, Oliver and Williams, which I'd never heard of. These days, Otis is the only company that comes to my mind when I think of elevators. It's delightful to think that there might have been a time when multiple companies competed for business. When I Google the name, I find a YouTube video that claims Oliver and Williams elevators are "EXTREMELY RARE," and an elevator wiki (!) that doesn't even mention it. Nice to see that the Electro-Data Elevator Systems lives on at the Beverly Laurel Hotel in Los Angeles.

Hotel Closed (Midtown, Manhattan)

I pass this corner almost every day but never noticed until today the "Hotel Closed" signs in almost half the windows. There's no obvious clue from street level that it was a hotel. I wonder why someone felt it was important to tell passing birds, and the rare New Yorker who might bother glancing up, that it was once a hotel and that it is, in fact, closed.

Green (not), Dallas, TX

The Marriot on North Pearl Street has--what else?--an ice skating rink in its air-conditioned atrium. And people wonder why America is in decline.