BajaNomad

PHOTOS: Driving down Baja in 1949

David K - 10-6-2013 at 09:34 AM

In the Autumn of 1949, two young guys fresh out of WWII, headed south in a CJ-2A Jeep to visit every mission site in Baja California! Their photos are an important look back in time to the land we love. They returned in the Spring of 1950 having traveled thousands of miles by Jeep, horseback and foot to see and photograph every mission known to them to exist.

Marquis McDonald with Glenn Oster wrote the 1968 book 'Baja: Land of Lost Missions' about their 6 month adventure nearly 20 years earlier.



The entire photo collection is not in the book, but instead online, see link at bottom...

Excluding the most of the mission photos, here are other sites as they headed southbound...

Ensenada:



Near Laguna Chapala (yet that is Hwy. 1 in 1949... to late 1973):



Hwy. 1 near Punta Prieta:



Entering San Ignacio:





Road to Santa Rosalia:







Mulege:







Bahia Concepcion/ El Coyote:



Rancho La Presa (near Dolores Chilla/ La Pasion):



La Paz:



Hwy. 1 near San Antonio/San Bartolo:



Santiago (newer church on mission site, note bells):



The tip, 1950:



More photos from Marquis McDonald taken 1949-1950: http://libraries.ucsd.edu/speccoll/baja/mcdonald/index.html

Vince - 10-6-2013 at 11:04 AM

Nice to have those old photos. The road in 1949 is not too different than in 1963. On Coyote Bay, the beach palm trees are still there. The huge difference would be what is under the water now compared to then. There must have been many more fish and sea life in 1949. Thanks, David

BajaBlanca - 10-6-2013 at 12:34 PM

QUITE AMAZING !!!!

David K - 10-6-2013 at 05:36 PM

The only older book than McDonald's mentioning driving down Baja, with photos is Erle Stanley Gardner's first Baja book, 'The Land of Shorter Shadows' c1948. Maybe a look at a few photos from it would interest Nomads?

A few books were written in the 50's and 60's, as it seemed nearly anyone who was brave enough to drive from the border to Cabo San Lucas when it was mostly dirt roads, wrote a book or magazine article about it!

My dad didn't, but we were mentioned in an article in Sunset Magazine by a couple of guys who we saw a few times on our drive in '66. They had a Studebaker pickup truck and we saw them a couple of times during the month we drove to the tip, then back to La Paz to ferry across to Mazatlan for the drive back. I am so glad I remeber that and our other trips of the 60's +.

Ateo - 10-6-2013 at 06:08 PM

I love old pictures. My Dad gave me an old book about the Ranchos of San Diego. Tons of old pictures of Coronado, Jamul, Ramona, Poway, O'side - you name it.

Mexitron - 10-6-2013 at 06:19 PM

Nice! Thanks for posting those David. Is the hill to the left in the Ensenada photo the one that was blasted away for the breakwater?

David K - 10-6-2013 at 06:26 PM

I think so Steve... or close. That close pier is where the breakwater is now perhaps?

liknbaja127 - 10-6-2013 at 06:28 PM

Great pics. Thanks Dave, as always love your history! My parents also did the same trip, 1970, but we started on the mainland side, taking the ferry
to La Paz going south to Cabo, and back up through the Baja. I can't remember all of it, I will ask my mother, if she has any pics from the trip.
I think I was to young to really appreciate the whole thing, but really, love it now! Doing a small trip to Mikes next weekend!

David K - 10-6-2013 at 06:48 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by liknbaja127
Great pics. Thanks Dave, as always love your history! My parents also did the same trip, 1970, but we started on the mainland side, taking the ferry
to La Paz going south to Cabo, and back up through the Baja. I can't remember all of it, I will ask my mother, if she has any pics from the trip.
I think I was to young to really appreciate the whole thing, but really, love it now! Doing a small trip to Mikes next weekend!


Awesome! Please share anything... the past is getting further away, every day! :light:;)

Fred - 10-6-2013 at 07:27 PM

Thanks you the pics David.

Curt63 - 10-6-2013 at 09:33 PM

Great stuff!

David K - 10-7-2013 at 08:40 AM

Did some page flippin' last night, and I do have one even older book about a drive down the peninsula... the trip was made in the 1941 before we got in the war... Besides the Malaria in Mulege, there was a concern about German N-zi spies in Baja. The book is 'The Land Where Time Stands Still' by Max Miller, published in 1943. The cover (no dust jacket) is simply a small drawing of a cardon cactus. I have posted the following photos out of it before, when talking about San Borja in 1941... (there are many more photos)



BajaRat - 10-7-2013 at 09:15 PM

thanks again :cool: