AT Shorts: From Neighborhood to Parking Lot
Armando Campos grew up in Barrio El Hoyo, much of which was destroyed to clear space for the Tucson Convention Center. In this edited excerpt, Campos talks about childhood in the Barrio during the 1950s and 1960s and the experience of being displaced by the City of Tucson.
CAMPOS: I grew up right there, where, um... El Hoyo. Barrio El Hoyo. If you go down Cushing Street, right before the fire station, you're going to run over exactly where I used to live, and that's where urban renewal stopped, and they cleared everything north of there.
I was raised by my grandparents. Right on El Paso, between what is now Cushing street and Blenman. Blenman doesn't exist anymore, it's part of the Community Center parking lot.
They built an old house back in '27. The bathroom and the showers were in another building outside. And then my grandfather and some friends, they started building another house, right next to us, really nice block house. Kids around the neighborhood thought we were rich. In the barrio, all they had these old adobe buildings, but my grandparents were in social security. No, they weren't rich at all! How they got the money, they used to go to California and pick fruit. And my nana and my tata also played cards there in the neighborhood, and they used to always win a lot!
I have nothing but happy memories growing up in El Hoyo. There used to be a wash, right behind the fire station. I don't know why, but there's always water coming down there. It was beautiful. You would see sunflowers, you would see cattails--when I tell you sunflowers, not little ones, they were big old sunflowers. When it would rain, we would find something to float on, pretend we were pirates on the ship, and there was frogs and rabbits and things you wouldn't think occurred because it’s all paved. You know how you hear the kids play under the lamppost? Well, we had a little light, corner light, and we would play kick the can, hide the belt. One of us would take a belt, hide it somewhere, and then we'd all go look for it. And whoever found the belt would start hitting the other kids [LAUGHS]. I know it's kind of violent out there, you'd think, but back then, we called it hide the belt. We’d hide the belt--until you hit home base.
And the market that used to be in our neighborhood, you can still see it, it’s right next to Carrillo [School]--Elysian Grove. I worked there in sixth grade. A lot of the old people went and sat down there, and they would just converse.
Everyone knew the neighbors right around at the time. You know, you hear that a lot of people say that people knew their neighbors... well, we did, because they were all called comadres or compadres, or ninos and ninas.
And then later on, the urban renewal thing passed. They offered my grandparents, first it was $8,500 then they raised it up at $13,500. Really wasn't that much, but again, the city considered all that “slum areas” or... they're going to take your property either way--eminent domain. So we had to sell, we had no choice. They got really upset. I didn't realize it: hey, am I poor? I never thought I was poor, or lived in a blighted area. To me, it was home. Now, to be fair, Meyer and Convent, they were kind of, they were in bad shape. But not every section of that area that got destroyed was in bad shape. You remember, these people wereolder Hispanic people that really did not fight City Hall. This what they're doing to you, you gotta move, you gotta move.
My grandfather built that house. Matter of fact, when we moved in March of '68, he only made it to June. He died at 70. During that short time, he would ask his daughter to drive him back through the area to downtown. I think it's even more depressing to me now because, as I drive through those areas, I remember when Carrillo Pool was open, tons of kids would be playing all over the place. We'd always be there... and I don't see anybody. I literally don’t see anybody at all.