Let’s go back to the viaducts from 1983-1993. The viaducts were beautiful, full of magnificent curves and straight lines of strength! The viaducts’ roadways offered expansive views of the city or the mountains. A closer view gazed down the Platte Valley or at a nearby historic structure.

For me, however, my favorite place was on the ground, sharing time with the steel and concrete viaducts. Only the 15th Street Viaduct had road travel directly beneath it at ground level. This road serviced the huge Post Office Terminal, Wazee Supper Club and My Brothers Bar. The old Monarch Mills building at Delgany Street was demolished and replaced with the superb new MCA building and the old Moffatt Train Station, which still stands a couple of blocks to the west.

Walking under the viaducts was generally quiet; some of my neighbors were rabbits and birds. The sight and sound of trains sometimes interrupted my peaceful wandering to remind me of the railroads’ heritage in the valley. The viaducts themselves arose from the dirt with powerful, unswerving lines and beautiful curves and arches. They were surrounded at each end by buildings and asphalt that replaced the dirt. The supporting beams or columns of the viaducts provided natural frames for structures or scenes near them.

From the top of the viaduct, strong shadows cast down to the surface, suggesting a place where grand mysteries lived. I will miss some of those meditative journeys; most people were not able to experience the viaduct world. If in this text and photos you get a small look and a little sense of the past, then I have done my job.

— Kim Allen
Images ©1986-1991, denverphotoarchive.com

Willie Lewis and Mary Lou (from Westword, 1990, photo by Gary Isaacs)

Willie Lewis is a bonafide Denver hero. I am very serious when I say that there should be a statue of this man in a Denver park somewhere, holding a scratchy ’50s-era 45 RPM record in his hand. Willie Lewis is an acclaimed rockabilly singer/songwriter/performer, president of Denver’s Rock-A-Billy Records and a world-class record collector. If you have ever met him, you would say that he has the unaffected personality of a wild west icon, like maybe Buffalo Bill. But most of all Willie Lewis is a hard boiled survivor.

Rock-A-Billy Records R-101!

What keeps this man alive? He is simply: Too Ornery To Die.

Truthfully though, there are two other factors keeping him going, the love of his life Mary Lou and his respectful dedication to the music he loves… rockabilly. And Lewis knows rockabilly. I guarantee you, no one else knows rockabilly better. Willie Lewis could be recognized as the living breathing embodiment of rockabilly personified.

If you are a Denver resident and you are thinking “I have never heard of Willie Lewis”, this has a lot to do with the fact that he has never cared about commercial pop success. He knows his audience and his audience knows him. In Europe, his records from the ’80s and ’90s sell for as much money as collectable original rockabilly records from the ’50s. One rockabilly band even moved to Denver from Portugal to learn from this man.

Way back in the late 1970s, after having collected every rockabilly, doo-wop, country and blues 45 many times over, Lewis thought it was about time to try to record his own 45. He released the famous R-101 45 “The Rockin Blues” on his own Rock-A-Billy Records, distributed by Denver’s Wax Trax store. As a matter of fact, for at least a decade, the only way you could get your hands on a Rock-A-Billy Record was through Wax Trax! Travelers from countries like Japan, Germany and Finland would always stop at Wax Trax and “load up” on rare Rock-A-Billy Records’ releases.

Since that first release, Rock-A-Billy Records has put out over thirty 45 RPM records (on colored vinyl, a Rock-A-Billy Records trademark), a handful of 10″ EPs, a couple of 12″ LPs, 4 or 5 CDs, and even one 10″ 78 RPM record (!) by High Noon.

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Walking the Streets of Denver: Spuddnicks release on Bopland Records

Aside from releases on own Rock-A-Billy Records, Willie Lewis has also released recordings on Lewmann Records, Waterhole Records, Bop-Land Records (out of Germany) and Goofin’ Records (out of Finland). There was even a large book put out in Germany with the lengthy title “The Story of a Hep Cat: Life and Music of Willie Lewis and His Rock-A-Billy Record Company” by Sven Bergmann in 2003. Lewis has recently come out of retirement and started issuing new Rock-A-Billy Records colored-vinyl 45s and has a new LP “Don’t Shoot Me Baby” on France’s Hog Maw Records that sounds ace!

BuckFifty is about Denver history and here we have this amazing Denver artist who has flown under the radar for many years and is a true Denver legend. So help me here, who do I talk to about this statue? I just saw the esteemed Mayor Hickenlooper introduce X at the Bluebird on Tuesday, maybe he would be sympathetic if he knew that Denver is home to one of the truest rockabilly recording artists of all time and would realize that future generations will be hunting down the story of this amazing man.

Recent release on Rock-A-Billy Records

B50 Note: For more on Willie Lewis and Rock-A-Billy Records visit their website or their myspace page. Tom Lundin is an illustrator, photographer, and chronicler of mid-century modern architecture in Denver. Find out more at his website, modmidmod.com.

B50 Note: Hisashi “Taki” Takimoto died on February 9th, 2009, after almost 20 years of serving delicious and healthy food on east Colfax in Denver. Kyle Wagner wrote an excellent appreciation of Taki for the Denver Post. See more of Matt-san Holman’s comics on his website, Square 1 Comics.

Jay DiLorenzo is a photographer at the Colorado Historical Society. He produced this story in conjunction with “The Italians of Denver” exhibit in 2007.

For more stories produced by the Center for Digital Storytelling and the Colorado Historical Society visit milehighstories.com.