In the drought-ridden spring of 1934, Bena Jonnsen, her husband Ted, and their newborn baby relocate from their home in Minnesota to Pueblo, a Western plains town plagued by suffocating dust storms and equally suffocating social structures. 1946 International Harvester.In a bold debut novel of the Great Depression, a young doctor's wife uncovers the sordid secrets of a withering Colorado mining town, even as she struggles with the ravaging truths about her marriage and her child.Now that's a keel.'Lark', ready to go in, Brookl.The Mineral Palace, Heidi Julavits, & Pueblo.1949 Chevrolet 3/4 ton, just east of Medicine Hat.1964 Nissan Patrol and whisky blanc on Prince Edwa.Bruce McCall: Bulgemobile Airdreme 1934.1946 Heavy Duty Chevrolet: J-E-T Service, Victor CO.Textile Town: Biddeford Part 2 (Houses) And a Davi.Hawkes Plaza, Westbrook Maine: Country & Eastern.1948 Chevrolet Fleetmaster, West Cumberland Maine.1975 Ford F 1 Cadillac Coupe de Ville.1946 International Harvester, Saskatchewan.1960 Pontiac Ventura hardtop, North Windham Maine.'61 Austin Healey 1955 Pontiac (?), and San Franc.There are some glorious buildings in Pueblo: the Thatcher Building (1914) is one: The urban sequence in once-urban midsize America seems to be a)downtown decay, b)collapse of manufacturing, c)growth of enormous mega-medical center, d) a casino to sweep up any surplus nickels from the embattled population. Diabetes, and all the other horrors that are outcomes of our way of life, are a growth industry in the heartland, or kidney-land, or dialysis-land, or whatever you want to call it. Lots of snazzy doctor Audis-and-up in the parking lots. Lots of large people in pastels on those sidewalks. In Pueblo the med center is the only zone that feels like it belongs to the economy of the 21st century.

It's hard to feel any dignity attached to the human condition in a shopping mall, isn't it? Whereas downtowns used to be lively & unpredictable spaces-anything can happen.Īpart from malls and big-box cantonments, the only other hives of activity in ex-industrial towns like Pueblo (or Bangor ME, or hundreds of others) are, typically, hospital medical centers which have evolved/swollen to engross significant acreage. We've let the real estate industry decide where we live and work and how we organize space in America and this is the result, all over the country. What life there is, commercially, happens out in the sprawl-malls. Downtown Pueblo has some great buildings but like so many once-urban centers it is essentially a dead zone. Pedestrians are an odd enough sight that people in passing cars slow and stare-they seem.stunned. Walking around downtown early one weekday morning, I was the only flaneur in town.

The Mineral Palace by Heidi Julavits