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Vintage RV park transports guests back to the 1950s

February 2010 RV Destinations by Rich Howard

A Bisbee, Arizona RV park gives visitors the chance to camp out in vintage trailers and enjoy what life was like back in the 50s.

Shady Dell is Arizona's oldest continually operating trailer park. It was purchased in 1994 by antiques-and-collectibles dealers Ed Smith and Rita Personett when they needed a place to park some vintage trailers they had purchased.

Instead, they decided to reinvent the park as a living museum of the 1950s. "I originally just intended to amass a trailer collection," Smith told the Vancouver Courier newspaper. "But I was also trying to make the mortgage on the place, and the idea came to me that people would maybe stay in them as lodgings. And that's how it started."

Shady Dell has nine trailers that are representative of the midcentury modernism of the 1950s. Everything from decorations (think leopard prints and pink flamingos) and furnishings to black and white television sets, vintage radios and period books and magazines transport visitors back to a simpler time.

Overnight and weekly rentals are available via the website at TheShadyDell.com. ADNFCR-2712-ID-19596423-ADNFCR

Class A	Fifth Wheel	Pop-Up Campers
Class B	Travel Trailer	Boat Trailer
Class C

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Vintage RV park transports guests back to the 1950s

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