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BISBEE -- The owners of the Shady Dell, a motel and RV park that has received worldwide attention, are seeking to sell the 1950s inspired retreat.
The property features travel trailers from the '40s and '50s, an original diner trailer, a pleasure cruiser boat, a bus and an original Yellow taxi cab, all on one and a quarter acres. Shady Dell attempts to transport visitors back to the age of formica and Elvis Presley.
Rita Personette and her partner, Ed Smith, didn't start out to create a passion pit for those who grew up in the '50s.
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"It just happened, kind of by accident," recalled Personette.
Smith and Personette were owners of Flying Saucers, an antique shop on Brewery Gulch, and specialized in '40s and '50s memorabilia. Interest in things from that era led to a search for an old travel trailer, or land yacht, as they used to be called.
The couple found their first one in Pomona, Calif., and started to restore it. They needed a place to park it and asked a friend to use their driveway. When they bought the second and third ones, they started to run out of friends who had driveways for storage.
Eight years ago they found Snowbird Haven, which had been a location for different kinds of car camping since 1927, and bought to have a place to store their trailers. One thing led to another, and by the time they had more than one or two refurbished, they decided to try renting them out.
They renamed the place Shady Dell, and it has grown to include eight vintage aluminum travel trailers for overnight rental. Each is fully furnished in period detail down to chenille bedspreads, magazines from the time period, electric coffee percolators, original refrigerators, black and white television sets and record players with records dating back to the '40s and '50s (Elvis, Frank Sinatra, The Ink Spots).
A refurbished 1947 Chris Craft yacht, or pleasure boat, is permanently docked in the trailer park, a fish out of water but a popular location for weddings.
Personette said people can rent the entire park for special celebrations, including birthdays and anniversaries. One woman rents the entire park every other year for her birthday celebration and brings original '50s games. All her guests dress up in period clothes, including poodle skirts.
Car clubs also rent the entire park for parties and park their historically restored cars in front of the trailers and party all weekend. Personette said this usually happens during the weekend of a local car show.
People may party all weekend, but they also must eat, and Dot's Diner, a restored 1957 Valentine original aluminum diner, fits the bill. The original tag certifying it as a Valentine diner is on the wall. It started out its life in '57 as Burger Bar No. 3 on the corner of Ventura Boulevard and Topanga Canyon in Los Angeles. Owner John Hart and his wife, Babe, ran this diner and several others, with this one being his favorite. After the Hart retired, it was moved to make way for a high rise bank building and moved to a remote canyon in California's desert, where it stood forgotten and neglected for 13 years.
Personette and Smith had it transported to Bisbee in 1996 by flatbed truck. It took six months to restore, and re-opened in May 1997. Local favorite diner owner, Dot Bozeman, agreed to be the cook and help them run it, and it became Dot's Diner.
Dot is now retired and today Dot's Diner is run by a husband and wife team, Pat and Heather Grimm, who share Personette and Smith's vision of keeping everything original, down to the waitress uniforms and hairstyles, as well as menu selections.
"We have tried as much as possible to keep everything vintage," Personette said. Even the pleasure boat is decorated with vintage boating items, including original boating magazines from 1947 and '48.
"We try to keep a stock of them as they do get worn out eventually and we replace them with other originals," Personette said.
The owners haven't done any advertising, but word of its uniqueness has spread worldwide. It all started out from an article about it a friend of a friend wrote for The New York Times.
"We have done nothing in the way of advertising. We have approached no one. We were very fortunate early on," she said.
Bill Stein wrote on Nov 22, 2008 7:45 PM: