Memories of "old" Downtown El Paso (Beaumont, Santa Fe: apartment complex, rental)

[joqua]

Originally Posted by katzpaw

Looking North-Northwest:

Good eye!

Only comment I have is that the Camino Real hotel would have been named Hotel Paso Del Norte in 1923.

I've added a couple of names to the photo. Just to the left of the Public Library was at least a block square park known in 1923 simply as City Park. I think the name was later changed before the park was obliterated by construction of City Hall, which was recently demolished to make way for the new baseball stadium.

[75grad]

Thanks, guys.

[75grad]

A former El Paso resident recently sent me these. Most of them are Downtown-related, but I'm posting a few that aren't because I'm too lazy to chase down the thread they should be posted under.

[joqua]

Originally Posted by 75grad

A former El Paso resident recently sent me these.

Wow...Thank You! I especially like the views of N. Oregon and San Antonio Streets. I'd not seen those before in all of my historical searches on old El Paso.

Also, I well remember when that "flying boat" had to make an emergency landing on Ascarate Lake, and then required "JATO" (Jet Assisted Take Off) to get back in the air in the short length of water the lake provided - but it worked! And the old refinery structures in the background were my daily work place at that time, owned by Chevron. The tallest structure (on the left side of photo) was known as a Houdry Catalytic Cracker, long since demolished. The refinery is now known as Western Refining.

Another memory. That Houdry unit used to spew a continuous stream of yellow vapor, and every so often when there was a plant upset (something went wrong) it would spew more than vapor. On one occasion the wind was just right to carry the liquid droplets to the new car dealership on Montana, coating the cars in the outdoor lots with a film of nasty petroleum goop. Chevron was prompt in reimbursing for damages, but that didn't appease the nascent environmentalists at the time.

[md9680]

Originally Posted by joqua

I rode the MESITA bus to and from the plaza and lived on MESITA street, which was the last street in the El Paso city limits at the time."

I lived at 910 Mesita in 1962 and rode my bike to and from Mesita school. Was terrified by but still loved the huge and fast playground merry-go-round on the playground. Would catch the 8 Mesita bus after school to go downtown to my mother's office in the El Paso Natural Gas building. She would send me over to Newberry's to bring back guacamole tostadas. We didn't have a car and had to take the bus everywhere, even to do our laundry at a laundromat in the shopping center at North Stanton and Cincinnatti. Would ride my bike everywhere, too. Rode over Scenic Drive to Dyer street and back one summer day to get model rocket engines from Hal's Hobby Shop. Dedicated "rocketeer". Looking back, we kids had tremendous freedom and were quite physically fit compared to today's versions who seem absorbed with their "electronic devices". We also couldn't get away with much "bad" behavior because the neighborhoods "had eyes" -- everyone's parents looking out for all the kids. You soon learned that someone would report your behavior to your parents.

I was an only child of divorced parents, something relatively uncommon in those days. Might have been one of the first "latch key kids". My mother remarried and in 1966 sent me off to a Tennessee military school. I absolutely loved it and thrived with the discipline and routine. Went to UT Austin, UTEP and NM State with a break for the Army during which I met my wife. My first real job after college was as a programmer with Bancology (State National Bank's data processing group) in their new building before they were swallowed up by the MBank holding company in Dallas. Have lived in Illinois, California and now New Mexico. Still married to my first wife (38 years).

I still love El Paso, even with the changes I see from afar. Would move back in a minute if there were the right job. Glad there's a forum like this to share memories.

[atrabilius]

Originally Posted by md9680

Rode over Scenic Drive to Dyer street and back one summer day to get model rocket engines from Hal's Hobby Shop.

I remember that as being in Sunrise Center. Did you ride all the way there and back on your bike from near Mesita Elementary or was Hal's Hobby Shop further south on Dyer once?

BTW: When I was 15 and 16, I used to get porn books from this cluttered hole-in-the-wall bookstore on Franklin (I'm pretty sure it was east of Oregon, but I don't know how far east).

[katzpaw]

Where were the two Getaway photos above taken?

[joqua]

Originally Posted by md9680

I lived at 910 Mesita in 1962 and rode my bike to and from Mesita school.

My parents built the house (had it built) at 924 Mesita in 1939. It sits on the inside of the curve where Mesita makes a 90 degree turn to the south before bending back again to the east. I was in the last class to graduate from Dudley elementary and my sister was one of the first pupils at the newly built Mesita elementary, where all three of my sisters attended. I married in 1952, and moved out, but my parents didn't sell the house and move until 1977/78.

Dudley faced onto Boston Ave and the school property took up the entire block bounded by Boston, N. Campbell, N. Kansas and E. Robinson. The building had settled so badly that it was condemned, which is the reason that Mesita was built to replace it. And of course it wasn't air conditioned in those days.

Mesita, in all the time I lived there, was the last street in the El Paso city limit. By 1962, that had moved north as development of the Coronado area was well under way.

One of the many jobs I held while growing up in Kern Place was working one summer as a delivery boy for the pharmacist at Kern Drug. I delivered all over Kern Place/Rim Road area on my single speed balloon tired bike. My paper routes - both El Paso Times in the mornings and El Paso Herald Post in the evenings, had me delivering all of the area to the north, east and south of Madeline Park. I bought my first motorcycle with my paper earnings, which I rode to El Paso High School when I went there.

I just learned that 910 is but three doors west of my boyhood home at 924, and I met the love of my life who was at that time living with her mom, who was renting the house at 910 Mesita. Small world.

[atrabilius]

Originally Posted by joqua

My parents built the house (had it built) at 924 Mesita in 1939. It sits on the inside of the curve where Mesita makes a 90 degree turn to the south before bending back again to the east. I was in the last class to graduate from Dudley elementary and my sister was one of the first pupils at the newly built Mesita elementary, where all three of my sisters attended. I married in 1952, and moved out, but my parents didn't sell the house and move until 1977/78.

Dudley faced onto Boston Ave and the school property took up the entire block bounded by Boston, N. Campbell, N. Kansas and E. Robinson. The building had settled so badly that it was condemned, which is the reason that Mesita was built to replace it.

I remember Dudley Elementary's address being given as 2500 N. Campbell, but that would have put Dudley on the other side of Campbell (even numbered address in El Paso: east side of a north-south street), right up against an arroyo that would have been a torrent if it rained hard enough. I always wondered if the El Paso school board would really do that. It looks like there's houses on that block now.

[upswept]

Originally Posted by gallerr

Same here...we used to take the bus from the lower valley to Basset Center, then to Downtown El Paso...shop at The Popular, White House (which was considered trendy $$) , Kress, Woolworth, Newberry's..and Star Disco - the record store...there also used to be a ..well was it a Harmony Shop, where you could buy 45 RPM's. Kress was the coolest store ever. The buliding is still very cool there but needs restoration badly. The old White House Building and the Mills are all very cool looking buildings too.
Things were so much better back then ! WE would also eat at the Coney Island across the street from La Pacita !

I remember Star Disco from downtown. Around 1967, the owner decided to start recording his own 8-track tapes from the records he was selling. It was great! You just went to the store, picked out an album, ANY album, and they would transfer it to an 8-track tape. I had all kinds of tapes that were never available anywhere else. He bought a high tech commercial recording set up and put it on the 3rd floor of that building. He even took me up there and showed it to me. The owner was so proud of the set up and the service. He offered me a job because he had so much business of transferring records to tapes. I already had a job and reluctantly declined his offer. And, NO, he did not pay royalties to any of the artists or companies. I'm sure that they found out. All of a sudden, the 8-track taping stopped. Then a few months later, he was out of business. Very sad. You might still be able to see the Star Of David carved above the door where the record store once stood.