One more old Denver ’50s burlesque ad…. and just because it will be the only time I get to post something Bettie Page-related on The Eye.

Unless you’ve been under a rock for the last 25 years, you will recognize the famous risque model Bettie Page. But what a disappointment it must of have been for the traveling businessman to visit Denver, see this ad and head over the Chez Paree and find out that Bettie Page doesn’t dance there and never danced there.

Bettie Page was a photography model, not a traveling dancer likes the ladies in yesterday’s ad. The Chez Paree must have ‘borrowed’ one of the (now) famous Bunny Yeager jungle photos of Bettie for this advert. And this is 1958, one year before she retired from the business.

I believe the Chez Paree location is still there, I think it is the building on the corner of Court Place and Broadway, to the right of the old Duffy’s Shamrock, near the Brown Palace!

(sorry if this offends, back to historical architecture tomorrow!)

Since I have my drawing up of The Tropics, I thought I would post another ad, this time with an all-star name-dropping of famous burlesque dancers, Tempest Storm, Blaze Starr and Lily St. Cyr. These were all big names in 1962 when this ad came out and today are all easily “Google-able”.

The Girl In the Gilded Cage was none other than club owner Warren St. Thomas‘ own wife, dancer Tiger Lily!

It’s astonishing to me that ads like this were commonplace in the Rocky Mountain News and Denver Post back then, but this ad actually comes from an issue of the Hotel Greeters Guide and Denver Daily Doings weekly magazine.

(Hope this does not offend, I am posting another one tomorrow!)

Troutdale In The Pines ad from 1958.

Troutdale was a three story hotel, built in 1920 with 6,000 wagonloads of local rock. A 4th story was added in 1927. The hotel had a large lounge, a dining room that seated 250 and a dancing pavilion called the Rainbow Ballroom (which you can see in the ad hanging over the lake.)

The first floor had private dining rooms, a billiard room, a bar, a barber shop, a drug store, kitchens and a bakery, guest rooms were on the 2nd, 3rd & 4th floors.

I am guessing, but I would assume the architect was J. B. Benedict, who designed many similar stone based buildings in the Front Range.

Famous guests included Teddy Roosevelt, Greta Garbo, Douglas Fairbanks Sr., Mary Pickford and the Marx Brothers!