It's hard to tell, but the letters on the photos look a bit like Venus Bold Extended. Unfortunately, I don't know of a digital version of this, but it's the basis of one of Macromedia's custom corporate fonts, so you can get an idea what it looks like from there ads, etc.
Here's a scan from an old type specimen book:
Yes, I was thinking the same thing about Venus Bold Extended, but I am not sure about the A and Y, it's difficult to say with this size.
I know two digital versions: Mickey Rossi's Fly Trap Wide and Soo Extended.
...Soo Extended.
Ha! I forgot about that one. I'm into model railroading somewhat and remember running across that once. As I recall, that was done by Rick Johnson, who often does these amazing technical illustrations for Model Railroader magazine. Not the most faithful version I've seen of a font, but it does have a full character set and decent spacing (not usually true of free fonts).
speaking of Macromedia font...
i thought it was Vonnes they used...
thanx for showing me Venus (no.. not the tennisplayer!!)
ahhh... good i thought i was going blind or getting too old
Right, Vonnes was based mainly on Venus, with a bit of Monotype Grotesque thrown into the mix, I think.
Totally agree, Vonnes is very similar to Venus Extrabold Extended, like Dave Jeffery says in this
article about fonts in Granada Television:
"There is, however, a very visible variant of Venus (including Venus Bold Extended) in use by Macromedia for their corporate identity. It is called �Vonnes�, and was especially designed for them by Font Bureau. All �Vonnes� really is, is Venus with angular cuts on the letter endings. Being a corporate commission, Vonnes is not available to the public."
What I don't understand is that these lovely typefaces, Venus Bold & Extrabold Extended, that were very used and popular in the 50's and the 60's are not digitized in the right way for public purchase.
I tried to find them one year ago for a job and no way, finally I got Annonce Grotesque (very similar to the Extrabold weight) and you know what, now it looks nor even this one is available any longer... !?
Yeah, Venus is an old favorite of mine. I used to get it in Format (cut out lettering sheets) and Letraset sheets. I did one my early business cards with it, although I didn't really know how to use it correctly at the time (way too tight). It used to be you could only get the extended weights and condensed weights, now you can only get the others.
Venus Light Extended and Venus Extrabold Extended in action in this 1955 lobby card. I found out reading a book that Hitchcock was a Typophile too.
If someone is interested in the extrabold extended weight, there is a free-but-not-perfect and no lowercase version by Grampa's Lap.
Mark, do you have that card around? 
Captured from web.archive.org on 26 Aug 2005. view this capture