Bekins Sends Yakima a Map, with Skiers

Both the cover photo and the back advertisement are printed in a single blue ink over cream stock. The interior map itself isn't visible in this scan — only the outer panels are framed — but the cover promises a street map of Yakima, and the back panel carries the contact details: 1891 North First St., Yakima, phone GL 3-8242. The ski photo is a clear bid to associate Bekins with outdoor leisure in the Cascades foothills — an unusual angle for a moving company, but one that makes sense in the Yakima Valley, where the mountains are a short drive west.

Bekins was founded in 1891 in Sioux City, Iowa, by brothers Martin and John Bekins, originally as a furniture-moving business using horse-drawn vans. The company reached the Pacific Northwest by 1903, eventually placing branches in Seattle, Spokane, Tacoma, and smaller cities including Yakima. Giving away complimentary city maps — printed with the local office address — was a standard marketing practice for moving and storage firms in the mid-twentieth century: the customer kept the map, and every consultation reinforced the brand.

The telephone number GL 3-8242 is a reliable dating clue. The "GL" prefix is a letter-prefix telephone exchange — a two-letter code assigned to a local switching office, typically named after a word (here possibly "Glenwood" or "Glencourt"). These prefixes were in wide use from the 1920s but began disappearing when the telephone industry pushed all-number calling, a conversion that rolled out city by city from 1958 and was largely complete by the mid-1960s. The current phone number at this Yakima address is 509-453-8242 — the final seven digits match — which places the GL format in the pre-conversion era, most likely the 1950s to early 1960s.

The ski photo on the cover gains specific meaning once you know the geography. White Pass Ski Area, about 53 miles west of Yakima on U.S. Route 12, opened in January 1953 and quickly became the default ski destination for Yakima residents. Older areas like the Yakima Ski Bowl near Chinook Pass, built by the Civilian Conservation Corps in the 1930s, also drew valley skiers. The two figures on the cover — skiing in tandem, in heavy parkas and tapered pants consistent with 1950s ski fashion — are unidentified and may be stock photography. The effect is aspirational: here is a map of where you live, handed to you by the people who will move your things, topped with an image of where you would rather be on a winter weekend.