What A Trip!

(Greetings from Roswell New Mexico, Here at Mick's !)

While most everyone else was heading 'over the river and through the woods'  we headed over the Plains and into New Mexico for a vacation with friends! One of my mothers friends had a son who goes to school out in Roswell and she did not want to travel alone so my mom, dad, sister, me and Patricia went with her!

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I was SO EXCITED to go to Roswell, (and no not to see "Aliens") I had this image in my mind, When we got there- It would be just like it was in 1945, the architecture would be fascinating, My family would be having Thanksgiving dinner in a little silver boxcar diner, and there would be MORE to this town than "The Saucer Incident" in 1947...

(Nope.)

Upon arrival Wednesday afternoon, I found it was very much 2011,  nearly everything is made of cinder blocks, AND you cannot turn a corner without seeing some sort of Alien shrine. Now, before you start yelling at your computer screens "You want history?! GO TO BOSTON, THIS IS ROSWELL"  the Alien thing is sort of cool... but way over played, by no means am I bashing Roswell or its fine people! (it just wasn't what I had expected.) But with a couple of Antiques stores on its 10 mile long Main Street, we were sure there was fun to be had!

That first evening in town we ate at a restaurant called "Farley's"-

(Home of the Tasty Farley Dough Burger!)

After that it was off to bed for a good nights rest. The Next day was Thanksgiving and because most things were closed the "Alien town" resembled more of a "Ghost town" and that made it PERFECT for Me and Pat to take a nice long walk...

Beneath all the cinder block and Alien awareness posters we found some of that classic Architecture we were looking for.

 (One of the only pluses of Cinder Blocks! Lots and lots of patterned ones!)

(Old gas station turned auto sales office)

(Now is the Neighborhood Watch Center)

 By far one of my favorite buildings down town was the "Minton Building"  I'm usually not a fan of stucco but this was neat! 

It had great detail! its now some sort of office supply building but the original building itself was constructed in 1947.

 (Neat old restored signage!)

(The Courthouse)

It made me really happy to see a monument of the Ten Commandments on the Courthouse lawn. I don't understand why people find it so offensive, but then again I don't understand most things...

Topping the list of places in Roswell that make me smile, nothing was showing but its nice to know there is a live Theatre there! Last but not least on our walk around tour kind of bugged me but what can ya do?!

(The U.F.O. Museum)

What is now the U.F.O. Museum, was once the biggest and finest Movie house in Roswell, The "Plains" Movie theater was one of five of the town's "picture shows" during its heyday.

Built in 1947 it was the place to go in town to see the stars flicker across the screen. It ran movies right up until the late 1980's and for a while showed Spanish films in the 1990's  I couldn't find any good pictures from its heyday, but if you look at the one below you can just imagine how majestic it was.

It even had the same terrazzo tile that we have out front of the Wichita Theatre, in fact it had the same color scheme too!

It even though a total gut was done when the U.F.O's moved in you can still see  few of the original deco features.

This is the underside of the marquee awning, im fairly sure the ticket booth was once where this statue now is.

Oh well, Que Sura-Sura!

 Tune in Wednesday to see all the out of this world things we brought back!

-Mick-

P.S. Today is also my second Blog-a-versary  for two years of "Everyone Goes to Mick's", thanks to all you great friends and readers who keep it going!