Frequent CC Cohort contributor Ralf K (Don Kincl) recently added a series of images from Tacoma taken in 1980. A brief glance at the city’s downtown, specifically, Pacific Ave. between 14th and 13th streets, showing the traffic of the period, and the storefronts of the time.
Today, I’ll leave car ID’ing to the readers, which is mostly pre-SUV, CUV, with a nice mix of 1960s, 1970s and 1980s models.
Beautiful light poles, evocative of Los Angeles in that respect.
Interesting photos of a gritty part of town.
Quite a seedy block in 1980, looks to have been demolished for parking. The large building with the banking sign is still there. If I was there in 1980 I would have got into the departing little green Datsun pickup.
I guess Neko Case was right:
That song came to mind immediately upon seeing these photos. I commented about that song with Aaron’s Neko Case article a few months ago, and listened to it a bunch since then.
My late friend Miro was the country folk blues and bluegrass buyer for Tower Records for decades. He was friends with Neko Case and most of the other artists in the genre..
We both grew up in Aberdeen and Tacoma was the big city. The cool kids all bought their school clothes etc at the Tacoma Mall or the B&I.
Thrice National Champions..
I grew up in Aberdeen in the 70s and Tacoma was the big city. Tacoma Mall was where the cool kids bought their school clothes etc
But downtown Tacoma was just sketchy. Porno peep shows and dive bars and derelicts..
Gee, I wonder what attracted Ralk K to that street? Looks like Tacoma’s version of 1980’s Times Square, NYC or the Tenderloin, SF.
Lots of 60s cars here. Even a ’58 Chevrolet in the third photo. Surely the result of no salt on the roads in the Pacific Northwest.
In the second picture, there’s what looks at first sight like the back of a white Kei van on the right between the gold and red cars, under the ‘Greyhound’ sign. Is it some sort of trailer?
It’s a Cushman parking cop, you can see the police symbol on the back.
Thanks, every day’s a school day on CC!
Tacoma is of course different today, but it’s still a real working port city and not very photogenic. Except for CC. And the traffic on I5 for miles in either direction … like from Canada to Oregon … is always very heavy. No offense to any Tacomans out there, but I always wonder why Toyota chose that name for their pickup truck 30 years ago. Although my negative perceptions of the city didn’t stop me from buying one of the trucks.