Sundays with McQueen
Above: Actor Steve McQueen and his first wife, actress Neile Adams, explore the open desert near Palm Springs on a windswept afternoon in May 1963.
Peter Stackpole/The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Peter Stackpole/The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
land, ho!
The May 22, 1950, edition of Life magazine documented the growing trend of sand sailing: “The dry, bare sands around Palm Springs, Calif., have recently been brightened by the colored sails of a small fleet of boats that have never been near water. … They are built by a boating enthusiast named Ray Miller. … Movie stars who come down from Hollywood for the weekend rent his craft for $2.50 an hour and stage impromptu races at Palm Springs.”
Photo by Loomis Dean/The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
the first golf cart
Golfers line up in their golf carts for a portrait at Thunderbird Country Club in Rancho Mirage in 1956. While Thunderbird was not the sole inventor of the golf cart, these originated the popular two-passenger style. As the story goes, in 1951, Eddie Susalla, Thunderbird’s associate golf professional, came up with the idea after seeing a man navigating Long Beach sidewalks in a gas-powered cart. Susalla invested in the same vehicles for Thunderbird and equipped them for golf.
PHOTO COURTESY palm springs life archives
the desert loved lucy
Lucille Ball, pictured in March 1963 with daughter Lucie Arnaz, waves to spectators on Palm Canyon Drive during the Desert Circus parade. Ball was a frequent Palm Springs visitor and, during her marriage to Desi Arnaz, built their family home at Thunderbird Country Club in Rancho Mirage. She was active in the community, regularly participating in events like Desert Circus, and served as the honorary mayor of Rancho Mirage twice before the city’s incorporation: first from 1958 to 1965 and again from 1971 to 1973.
PHOTO COURTESY palm springs life archives
kings of cool
Dean Martin, Frank Sinatra, and Sammy Davis Jr. light up the stage at the annual Palm Springs Police Show at the Riviera Hotel, March 1964. The gala, hosted by the Palm Springs Police Officers’ Association, was among the desert’s most anticipated fundraisers of the decade.
Photo courtesy File Photo/Desert Sun-USA TODAY NETWORK.
bikini ban
Palm Springs police chat with sunbathers during spring break in 1988. In the wake of the ’86 riot, the city had outlawed skimpy bikinis in hopes of driving spring breakers elsewhere.
PHOTO COURTESY Eyre Powell Chamber of Commerce Collection/los angeles public library
view from the high tower
Three unidentified women chat in the tower of El Mirador Hotel, circa 1930. Opened on Dec. 31, 1927, the getaway quickly became a hot spot for Hollywood stars and other cultural icons, including Mary Pickford, John Barrymore, and Salvador Dalí. Today, it is the site of Desert Regional Medical Center — the tower is the only original architectural element that remains standing today.
PHOTO COURTESY palm springs life archives
the man on the tram
“The easiest work in the world is up in the air. If you know what you’re doing,” Freddie Beavers told Palm Springs Life in 1966. The longtime mechanic of Palm Springs Aerial Tramway had worked on projects across the country, losing his arm during the construction of a dam in San Diego, before landing in the desert. “It’s pretty obvious as you watch Freddie Beavers, the one-armed wonder of the Palm Springs Aerial Tramway, go about his ticklish task with single-handed, sure-footed aplomb,” the article affirms, “he knows what he’s doing.”
PHOTO COURTESY Allan Grant/The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock.
SUN AND SANd TRAPS
Comedian Bob Hope smashes one out of a bunker during the Palm Springs Golf Classic of 1962. The event was renamed the Bob Hope Desert Classic in 1965, eventually evolving into the current PGA Tour tournament, The American Express, held each January at PGA WEST in La Quinta.
PHOTO COURTESY palm springs life archives
mad max
In the dunes surrounding Palm Springs, a man traverses the sand with a cigarette in hand while a Chevrolet Corvair bounds down the hill. Outtakes reveal the car ultimately crashed into the soft sand. The year is unknown.
PHOTO courtesy palm springs historical society
the driver in car 23
James Dean, seen here in a checkered cap, participated in his first automotive race in March 1955 against the backdrop of the San Jacinto Mountains. The eighth annual Palm Springs Road Race was held on a 2.3-mile course at the Palm Springs Airport. Dean won the six-lap qualifier in his Porsche Speedster and placed third overall. When the winner was disqualified, the 24-year-old took second place.
PHOTO COURTESY Security Pacific National Bank Collection/los angeles public library
spikING IT
A woman kneels beside a barrel cactus in the 1920s, pretending to fill a small chalice with giggle juice. In reality, barrel cactuses are high in acids and alkaloids that are not only unpleasant to consume but toxic. With the exception of one barrel species (the fishhook), ingestion can cause illness and even temporary paralysis.
PHOTO COURTESY Eyre Powell Chamber of Commerce Collection/LOS ANGELES PUBLIC LIBRARY.
horned toad races
In the 1930s and ’40s, local villagers became enamored with racing desert creatures — horned “toads” (really lizards), turtles, chuckwallas, and even camels. Here, a group watches over the starting line at a derby held at the Desert Inn.
PHOTO courtesy palm springs historical society
Shirley’s place
Shirley Temple and her family frequented the Desert Inn in Palm Springs, where they favored a certain bungalow. In December 1937, owner Nellie Coffman
named the space after Temple and invited the 9-year-old to make it official by striking a milk bottle against one of its columns. The event was recorded
by Fox Movietone News and played on cinema screens across America.
PHOTO COURTESY william horace smith/library of congress
A siesta for albert
In 1931, Albert Einstein contemplates relativity in the San Jacinto foothills overlooking Palm Springs. He and his second wife, Elsa, visited friends in the area on a few documented occasions in the early 1930s. Of the Nobel Prize–winning physicist, cowboy and future Palm Springs Mayor Frank Bogert once said: He was “the nicest little guy you’d ever want to meet.”
