1940 Caribbean Yearbook - Cristobal High School - Panama Canal Zone

Item CZYB40  

This Item was Sold on 8 August 2018 for $26


Similar artifacts for sale are often found on the Canal Zone Yearbooks web page. 

Historical Pricing information for this item and similar artifacts can be found at: Historical Artifact Prices.


This is the 1940 Caribbean yearbook from Cristobal High School, located on the Atlantic side of the isthmus of the Panama Canal Zone in the town of Cristobal. This is an over sized yearbook with the cover dimensions of 13.5" X 9.5". The contents include the faculty, freshmen through senior students and then every issue of the school's " Trade Wind " publication from October 1939 through May 1940. The end of the yearbook has cool ads for familiar places like the Tivoli Hotel and the United Fruit Company and drinks like Coca Cola and Orange Crush. The " Trade Wind " was a newspaper that covered school and local events including news about sports, school functions and photos. Fascinating reading for anyone who attended Panama Canal Zone schools or is interested in the history of Panama during this period. I was delighted to find three of my teachers in this yearbook - Mr. Paul Beck who was the Principal when I attended CHS, Mr. Carl Maedl who was also a Principal at CHS and Mr. Oswald Jorstad who taught me how to play the Clarinet in 1961. Some of my classmates' parents are listed in this yearbook. The cover has wear, but it is otherwise in remarkably good condition. The binding is in excellent condition. The pages are starting to yellow, but are otherwise in very good condition. There is no writing on the pages, so this may have been an unused reference copy for the Panama Canal Zone School System.. A rare and very collectable document about the history of the Panama Canal Zone.

This yearbook was part of the Panama Canal Museum archives. When the museum closed down, I gave the museum a large donation in exchange for some of their yearbooks. I already have a copy of this yearbook in my personal collection, so I am selling this copy to recover some of the money from my donation.

Many of the yearbooks from the Panama Canal Zone have been digitized and are available as free downloadable JPGs on the University of Florida's archival website, but you cannot search the text on graphics and reading jpegs on iBooks is not easy on your eyes. You can also purchase xerox copies of yearbooks from Classmates.com for about $80, but it is much better to purchase an original copy of this yearbook to keep in your own collection.



How to Order | Collectable Artifacts | Panama | Canal Zone Yearbooks | Historical Artifact Prices | contact: Ted Bailey