MAIN STREET AND HOTEL CLOVIS---C.H.S. "KIDS" REMEMBER!

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from ALBIN COVINGTON, CHS CLASS OF '51
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During  part of WWII, we lived in the 100 block on Sheldon Street. Tom, Marie, and I would get to go the Mesa Theater for 10 cents apiece. We would walk down 1st Street, watch the movie, and on the way home we would go to the hotel and ride the elevator. That was a great thrill for us at that time!

Then before we left to go back home on First Street, we sometimes went over to the Coney Island Cafe, and you can guess what we ate there! If we didn't have the money to eat, we often stopped in and just asked for a glass of water. For some reason that was the best tasting water we ever had. They were always willing to give us a drink. Wow! What a Saturday that was!

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from ART SNIPES, CHS CLASS OF '51
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We all remember the old hotel and Main Street, which it guarded so faithfully. Dragging Main was something I often thought I didn't get my share of because I was employed by Safeway and all employees worked well into the night on Saturdays. Here I was, swinging a mop up and down those long aisles while everyone else was dragging Main.

It wasn't all bad because the best thing that happened in my life was when I was dragging Main one Friday night. I spotted a beautiful girl by the name of Wanda King standing in front of Standridge Drug. I circled the block and asked her to get into my old car. She did and that was the beginning of a long and beautiful relationship that lasted over 61 years.

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from WYLIE DOUGHERTY, CHS CLASS OF '53
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My dad was a charter member of the Clovis Rotary Club which met at the Clovis Hotel at noon on Thursdays. I used to go there with him, and hung out in the fancy lobby. It made me feel like a big deal, while waiting for Daddy to come out of the Rotary meeting. I even rode the elevator to the ninth floor once! Imagine nine stories tall in downtown Clovis!

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from ROBERT STEBBINS, CHS CLASS OF '51
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My memories relating to the Hotel Clovis are limited. I remember the curio shop, and I believe there were a beauty shop and possibly a barber shop located there. And the elevators were classy and sturdily built; they were quite possibly at that time the first and certainly the best in Clovis.

However, I never spent much time there as most of it was beyond my allowance/pocket money as a teenager. I more frequently was seen across Second Street at the Greyhound Bus Station restaurant, run by Mr.Asimos, or across Main Street at the Coney Island, if on my own resources, or at the Busy Bee, if accompanied by my parents. My parents usually took me to the Busy Bee on Saturdays to enjoy the "Halibut Steak Special," which I believe was about $1.35 in the late forties or early fifties.

I can still remember the pool hall across the alley from the hotel.  A lot of Santa Fe railroaders and some high school students used to enjoy the clicking of billiard balls there.

Hopefully, the long empty and ill-treated Hotel Clovis will once again become alive and reflect positively on Clovis, as it did in years past!

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from MIL, CHS CLASS OF '51
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All of the comments that have been made about the HOTEL, have come in with a broader view of our "milieu," than just the building. They include the seven blocks of Main Street, right down to the red brick paving!

The HOTEL, after all, was never a home to us kids (most of us were never in there more than a time or two). As I have stated, it was a protagonist in our story of growing up in the forties and fifties---it was a "character" in a drama---our drama...and a "FRIEND"....if you will.

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MIL'S PLACE
1/07/13
Sent from my iPad