The town of Willcox grew up because of the railroad, and it’s primary business street (for 2 blocks) is Railroad Avenue. The old passenger depot is now city hall.
There are a couple of pieces of memorabilia outside the building, as well as a small exhibit inside.
A vacant train car sits across the street with a ramada over it.
The town dates from the late 1800s.
Most of the buildings date from the early 1900s.
The town’s most famous son is Rex Allen, the ‘Arizona Cowboy’. Rex was a singer and actor along the lines of Roy Rogers. If you do a search for him you can find him doing a great version of Tumblin’ Tumbleweeds, complete with a green rhinestone suit.
The Willcox area has 15 wineries surrounding it, as well as huge pecan and pistachio farms, but in the end Willcox was, is, and will always be a railroad town.
The town of Douglas, Arizona was founded in 1905 as a copper smelting center. It sits directly on the border, across from Agua Prieta Sonora Mexico. For decades the two towns functioned as one.
As with most towns and cities in Southern Arizona it has a history of Native American, Mexican and European cultures.
The town very early on had an airport that attracted cross country flights, including Amelia Earhart who stopped by during a 1929 Women’s Air Derby.
It was known as the world’s first international airport since the runway crossed the border – not anymore.
The town has many historic buildings, including the former El Paso and Southwestern Railroad depot at the north end of town. It now serves as the police headquarters.
Completed in 1913 it is said to have an impressive interior, but sadly we were unable to see inside.
The Avenue Hotel consists of two buildings. The left one is made of adobe and dates from 1901. The one on the right is a 1915 brick building.
It is now a B & B.
The 1919 Grand Theater was the center of cultural events for Douglas. While it closed as a theater decades ago, it is in the process of being restored, albeit slowly. This is understandable given the significant cost for such a small town.
The Brophy Building was completed during the boom years in 1907. It was designed by famed El Paso architect Henry Trost.
It too is waiting for someone with the love, and money, to restore to it’s former glory.
This small building has had a varied history. Another Henry Trost building, it was completed in 1913 as the Airdome Theater.
It closed as a theater and became a Chevrolet dealership in the 1920s. The depression took out the dealership and it became a supermarket.
In the 1940s it became a USO canteen serving the thousands of soldiers from a nearby Army Air Corp training center. Later it became a real estate and insurance office. Today is still serves as a financial advisor’s office, and a copy center. They should call it the cat building as it seems to have had 9 lives.
Our final stop in Douglas is the Gadsden Hotel, which is featured in the next posting by itself.
Douglas is a pleasant little city with some interesting history.
The current Salt Lake City Main Library was designed by architect Moshe Safdie, and was completed in 2003.
The numerous curves are striking from the exterior.
The building is even more impressive on the inside, with the 4 story atrium intended to invoke the classic arcades of the past (such as the Cleveland Arcade)
The dramatic stairway takes patrons between the levels.
The building was designed to provide as much natural light as possible, along with quieter spaces on the upper levels.
The massive hanging sculpture is entitled ‘Pysche’. It consists of 1500 small sculptures of books and butterflies that form a large human head. Some of the butterfly wings will flutter.
A model of the building is proudly displayed on the main level. When in Salt Lake City a visit to the library is well worth the time.
Some random views of an evening in downtown Salt Lake City.
Trolley Square was once a trolley barn for the original streetcars of the city. For 50 years it has been a trendy shopping district (and somewhere with a patio restaurant open for lunch!). The water tower is a highlight of the skyline.
Another in a long line of stupid arena names in the pursuit of a few more dollars – the Vivint Arena. The streetcars however, are a great (re)addition to the city.
While we are going on strange names – the Utah Jazz. The franchise was founded in New Orleans in 1974, playing just 5 seasons there before relocating to Salt Lake City, but keeping the Jazz name, apparently because they switched cities so close to the start of the season they never had time to get new uniforms and advertising completed.
A few murals…
Our hotel for the night had a nice view of downtown for both sunset…
Our route through New Mexico took us through the picturesque town of Silver City. The small downtown and nearby neighborhoods had a number of historic buildings.
Founded in the late 1800s it was known to be home to a number of characters and outlaws, including Billy The Kid and Butch Cassidy/Sundance Kid.
After a week of travelling about in the mountains, with a few small cities mixed in, Spokane seemed like the big city. And it has been that way for well over 100 years.
As a result downtown has a nice collection of older architecture.
The island in the middle of the river at the top of the falls was the home of the 1974 World’s Fair. This clocktower was part of the Great Northern Depot train station that was unfortunately demolished for the fair.
The falls itself is quite impressive.
Also of note is Manito Park and Duncan Gardens. As for that 278 miles – it is that far to Seattle.
Our trip’s northernmost stops were in Montana, Idaho and Washington. In Montana we spent the night in Helena.
When we first arrived we saw the state capitol on a hill as we entered town. To our amazement we just drove right up, parked on the street just outside and walked in!
As we wandered around we looked down a hall to a room that had a sign above that said ‘Office of the Governor’. A lady was standing in the doorway, and she encouraged us to come on in.
She told us the capitol is the ‘People’s Building’, and during business hours is always open to just come on in, no security checks whatsoever. She showed us around the office a bit, including the room that is used for the governor to greet people. It contained a set of flags for the state of Montana, as well as the 8 tribes that reside in the state.
She also told us the best way to see the rest of the building and encouraged us to ‘explore’.
The next day found us in Missoula. There we checked out the riverfront and some of downtown’s historic buildings.
The next larger city on the way west was Kansas City. The highlight was Union Station (next posting), but the couple of hours in town provided some nice shots beyond the station.
RDZ Photography 