Pennies in a Stream

"If you, like me are a fan of humankind’s collective ephemeral detritus, I highly recommend Michael P. Daley's latest triumph Pennies in a Stream. Supper Clubs, Dinner Theatre, Nudie Bars, you name it. Catch you later for dinner and dancing in The Ripple Room?" —Simeon Lipman, Antiques Roadshow

The secret history of mid-century America might've been just another Saturday night after all. Pennies in a Stream haphazardly documents the nation's surreal suburbanesque diversions through an illogical dreamscape of 20th century newspaper advertisements—some might call it accidental backpage genius. Blatant ballyhoo from cocktail lounges, 60s strip clubs, evangelical churches, appliance warehouses, b-movie theaters, and chop suey joints of yore. It is commercial America at its most sublime, boorish, and cosmically mundane—a verifiable discount rack memento mori. This is the expanded second edition offering even more mesmerizing eyebleed action.

"Among much else the book illustrates how for about forty years every motel nationwide once had its own lounge singer or combo, until suddenly they didn’t."—Jack Womack, Let's Put the Future Behind Us and Elvissey