Andrea Hamilton's Web Log

Stella Byam Would Be Proud

By now most Airstream devotees know the story about how Wally Byam, Airstream's founder, created his first trailer in 1929 because his wife, Stella, refused to go camping without a kitchen.  Now fancy foodies reading this month's Saveur magazine will know it, too.

This month's Kitchenwise column, written by Bruce Littlefield, (author of Airstream Living), features the charms and challenges of Airstream trailer kitchens.  Read it here.

Something tells me Stella wouldn't mind tying on her apron and whipping up a little dinner in this new Airstream Signature Series kitchen.  

The Special Powers of Stella May

Shorpy Historical Photo Archive

Talk about being overdressed

That's the original Stella, Wally Byam's wife, in the door of their Airstream on the famous Cape Town to Cairo African Caravan in 1959.  I'd say she's a little overdressed for the party, wouldn't you?  

Next year is the 50th anniversary of that remarkable trip made by Wally and Stella and one hundred other campers in forty-one Airstreams.  They rolled their trailers something like 14,000 miles through ten African countries.  

And Stella managed to keep her lipstick and pearls on.  She must've been quite a gal.

Even Disney Gets It

Scenes from Animal Kingdom:

At first I thought this was "Further", Ken Kesey and the Merry Prankster's bus from the Electric Kool Aid Acid Test.

But probably not.

Then we spotted this lovable landscape prop:

Even Disney gets it.

At the end of the day, as we heard a loud sucking sound at the gift shop cash register, there was Stella. Not my Stella, but a Stella, and I couldn't resist.