Rendering by arist Reese Turner of the
proposed Valley National Bank sign, 1957.
Glen Guyett, 2015.
The sign skeleton tied down until
completion, January 1958.
Top:
William Horner
S
uperb sign design is not only about
readability and attractiveness; it can
also, on rare occasions, be the
difference between life and death.
Such was the case with the 35-foot-tall
Valley National Bank sign that was installed
atop the Professional Building in
downtown Phoenix in 1958. Heralded as
the country’s largest revolving sign, it was
visible to airplanes 10 miles away. The
octagon sign featured the bank’s blue and
yellow eagle symbol, whose 49-foot wing
span turned out to be a lifesaving feature
for one maintenance worker.
The mammoth sign was an apt symbol
of the Valley National Bank’s success after
World War II. The bank grew with the state
and had 51 branches across Arizona by the
late 1950s. Each office displayed the
company’s bird of prey, but none quite so
dramatically as the main bank office in the
Professional Building in downtown
Phoenix.
In recognition of their financial
success, the bank added a glass-enclosed,
executive penthouse to a wing of the
Professional Building in 1958. And to leave
no doubt about the bank’s presence in
Phoenix, the company envisioned the
addition of a rotating sign on an adjacent
upper roof.
The Valley National Bank selected
Myers & Leiber Neon Sign Company, then
Arizona’s largest sign firm, to construct the
advertisement. In the process, the bank’s
symbol received an update from famed
designer Glen Guyette, who worked for the
sign company.
“I had to redraw it; the eagle looked
more like a chicken,” he recalls.
Constructing the 26-ton sign atop a
12-story building was a complex process.
The sign’s steel frame was fabricated by
the Allison Steel Manufacturing Company
in Phoenix. Three colors of vitreous
porcelain enamel panels with six-foot-tall
letters made in St. Louis composed the
sign’s face. “It was one of the few porcelain
signs ever put up in Arizona,” Guyette says.
Lighting was provided by 18 millimeter
white and gold neon tubing, with the eagle
outlined in gold. The illumination was
controlled by an electric eye and timing
device.
Trial run of the rotating sign a few days
before dedication ceremony, April 22, 1958.
Seventy two
Winter 2015
Images courtesy of Arizona Contractor & Community
Sign installation,
January 1958.