11. Department Store

Frede Vidar | fresco | 10 feet by 10 feet Here is the interior of a typical 1930s department store, even to the details of a soda fountain, a wine shop in the window alcove (which contains only domestic vintages!), fabric counter, clothing departments, a toy shop, customers, and salespeople. Two dispirited young women (one might be Hebe Daum, later the wife of Peter Stackpole) sit in front of a menu offering a special lunch for 25 cents, soup for 5 cents, and chile con carne for 15 cents. At the lunch counter a waitress wears a cap with a Star of David. This is a surprising Jewish symbol, as Frede Vidar frequently expressed pro-Nazi sympathies in 1934. He scratched a swastika on the whitewashed windowpane when he worked on the project, and an SS logo—logo of the Nazi Storm Troupers—is portrayed on the box in the hands of the saleswoman, upper right.