California-1948: Brick Hotel Building With Ted Fio Rito Band Banner Behind Palm Trees

Archive Intelligence

Archive brief fit

Helps a request for late-1940s American hotel or resort exteriors, and for amateur evidence of a dance band billed by name on a venue.

Period detail

A cloth banner lettered 'TED FIO RITO' names a bandleader active from 1928 to 1971, and the rounded car roofs passing below may show 1940s models.

Home-movie behavior

A traveller points the camera up at the hotel from the roadside and lets it drift, recording the name on the banner as a holiday souvenir.

What appears in frame

A red brick hotel wing with a blue-grey clapboard top floor, white-framed windows, a red roof, a long yellow banner, a palm, a thin-trunked tree and car roofs passing at the bottom edge.

Film character

Soft-focus 8mm colour with a lilac cast in the sky, visible grain, small dust specks and a gentle handheld drift.

Edit role

Works as a short establishing shot or insert that introduces a hotel stay or a big band reference before portraits or pool scenes.

Historical context

The shot shows a hotel advertising a named dance band on its exterior, a common way for venues to promote live music in the mid-twentieth century.

Research note

No people appear, but the banner carries a real performer's name and the building is an unidentified private property, so name and property use should be assessed separately from film copyright.

Research search match

A researcher might look for this as a bandleader's name on a hotel front, a dance orchestra billing in amateur colour film, or a 1940s resort exterior with palms.

Archive pairing path

Pair first with the woman in the striped blouse at the hotel steps and the hillside view over the beach town from this reel, then with other late-1940s resort or big band material.