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Title: Houston Street Map - Info Map
- Author: Gulf Tourgide Bureau
- Date: c.1940
- Condition: Excellent - Folds as issued.
- Inches: 23 1/8 x 17 3/8 [Image]
- Centimeters: 58.73 x 44.13 [Image]
- Product ID: 308663
This striking mid‑century Gulf Oil street map offers a detailed visual record of Houston’s rapidly growing urban landscape around 1940, with an intricate grid of streets, rail lines, bayous, and developing residential districts, plus an extensive street index for quick reference. The front emphasizes the expanding city limits and major transportation arteries, reflecting Houston’s transformation into a modern oil and port city.
The verso doubles as a promotional “What to See in Houston” guide, with a bold star motif, vignettes of key civic monuments and attractions, and a smaller regional road map pointing motorists toward the city. Period advertising panels highlight Gulf dealers, services, and products, making the piece both a functional navigator for motorists and an evocative piece of Houston and petroleum-industry ephemera.
Background on Creator
The Gulf Tourgide Bureau was an in‑house travel and publicity service created by Gulf Oil Corporation to support America’s growing culture of automobile tourism in the early to mid‑20th century. It produced free road maps, city plans, and sightseeing brochures that motorists could pick up at Gulf service stations, both to aid navigation and to promote Gulf-branded gasoline and services.
Operating from the 1910s through about the 1960s, the bureau’s output combined practical way‑finding with optimistic imagery of modern cities, highways, and Gulf’s role in regional development, making these pieces important artifacts of early car culture and oil‑industry marketing.