auto touring america’s national parks: the photography of h.a. spallholz

In 1919 there were just 6.7 million cars in America. There was no interstate system. The national park system was thirty-seven years young.

In this fledgling environment for long-distance travel, H. A. Spallholz and family set out from Salem, New York, to see America’s national parks. In his 1917 Haynes Roadster, Henry packed his family and a camera and headed west. From storied New England through Great Plains grasslands, up the Rocky Mountains and down the west coast, this book documents firsthand what America looked like from very early highways and byways.

Collected here into a book for the first time, the Spallholz photographs are a fascinating picturesque time capsule of early twentieth century America. See its cities and monuments. See Yellowstone Park pristine and wild. See the dirt and muddy roads that connected our states and metropolises and the tremendous challenges that came with traversing them. See a young family energized and beleaguered by the length of the journey: 10,400 miles.

These family photographs were lost for a generation before they were uncovered by Art Vaughan, a hobbyist photographer who was stationed in Portland, Maine, with the Coast Guard. He found the glass slides and original lantern slide projector in a Salvation Army shop. Years later, when he posted some of the photographs online, the Spallholz descendants recognized their grandfather’s photographs and contacted Mr. Vaughan. This serendipitous story, some fifty years in the making, is documented herein.

This book provides a unique view across generations of American travelers and belongs on the coffee table of anyone who loves photography, American history, and the great outdoors.