Untold ABQ

NOTE: This is the second part of a two-part post. I'm opening with a quick recap of Act 1, but if you haven't read it yet you really should because it has fire, roller skates, and Dolly Dimples, the educated horse. So, just to refresh everyone's memory: the Orpheum Theater was built in 1911 by William Futrelle to replace a furniture store he owned on the same site that burned down. The theater showed a combination of movies and live Vaudeville entertainment, as was popular at the time, but went out of business after less than four years. After that it was turned into a roller rink, and then a dance hall, but that only lasted a few years too. After the Orpheum dance hall went out of business, the building was empty for a couple of years and then reopened around 1921 as the Viaduct Garage. With its wide open floorplan and oversized doors, it was probably well suited for this purpose. A guy from Chicago named R. L. Harrison started working there as a mechanic, 51 but by 1...

My last post found us at the east end of the Coal viaduct. This time, we're at the west end. The building there, if you've ever noticed it, looks like just another nondescript corner, and it would be hard to imagine much of anything interesting going on inside. But this could not be further from the truth. If you could travel through time and visit the building at different points in history, here are some of the things you might see: Hundreds of children being traumatized by one of the earliest horror films. A crowd celebrating Washington's birthday on roller skates. A future millionaire changing spark plugs. Albuquerque's first jiu-jitsu match. Fires (so many fires). And whatever the hell "Poofy's Den of Lust" is. That's barely scratching the surface. This is the story of the Orpheum Theater. The Orpheum Theater and Coal Viaduct in 2018. Orpheum Community Hub via Facebook . The theater was built in 1911 by William V. Futrelle (c....