Woodall Rodgers Freeway Under Construction — 1966
by Paula Bosse
Land cleared, May 1966 (click for gigantic image) (UTA Libraries)
by Paula Bosse
The photo above shows land partially cleared for the construction of Woodall Rodgers Freeway. The view is to the east, with Central Expressway at the top left and Stemmons Freeway at the bottom left. The land cleared was once part of what used to be called “North Dallas,” and before it was bulldozed away, it was a predominantly black residential neighborhood served by several African-American- and Hispanic-owned businesses. The photo above was taken on May 24, 1966. The photo below was taken on December 8, 1966. The freeway was already years behind schedule when these photos were taken, but nobody would ever have believed it would take until 1983 (!!) for Woodall Rodgers Freeway — a “cute” little highway, less than two miles long — to be completed. Oh, but it did.
Dec. 8, 1966 (photo by Squire Haskins; UTA Libraries)
In a Dallas Morning News article published on the May 27, 1983 opening of the freeway, Henry Tatum wrote the following:
Dwight Eisenhower was starting his second term as president of the United States. Elvis Presley had passed his physical examination and was headed for a stint in the Army. And Doris Day was singing up a storm on the screen in “Pajama Game.” The year was 1957 and Dallas city fathers decided it was time to build a downtown connection between Central Expressway and Stemmons Freeway. (“Freeway From the Past” by Henry Tatum, DMN, May 27, 1983)
1957!
When it was completed 26 years later — in 1983 — Ronald Reagan was president, Sally Ride was about to become the first woman to go into space, and Madonna was singing up a storm as her first album was being readied for release. That’s a looong time.
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Sources & Notes
Both aerial photos by Squire Haskins, from the Squire Haskins Photography, Inc. Collection, UTA Libraries, University of Texas at Arlington. The photo from May can be accessed here, the one from December, here.
“Woodall Rodgers”? James Woodall Rodgers was mayor of Dallas from 1939 to 1947. It was announced that what would become a never-ending headache-of-a-highway-project bedeviled by funding squabbles and right-of-way issues would be named in his honor in 1960.
Those two photos are really, really big when you click them. …REALLY big.
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Copyright © 2016 Paula Bosse. All Rights Reserved.
Flashback : Dallas 
I recognize the church on McKinney that would become the Hard Rock Café but what is the larger church closer to downtown around maybe Olive Street?
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I think that was the Trinity Methodist/Trinity Methodist Episcopal Church — it burned down in the early ’80s (suspected arson) after being vacant for many years). Here’s a photo: https://www.aiadallas.org/media/uploads/news-images/trinity_before_fire_crop.jpg. Background is here: https://www.aiadallas.org/v/columns-detail/Lost-Dallas-Trinity-Methodist-Church/b9/
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The Hard Rock Cafe was at the corner of McKinney Avenue and Routh Street. It was the McKinney Avenue Baptist Church which can be seen near the left edge of the photos on McKinney. As Paula mentioned the church you see on McKinney at Pearl in these photos is the Trinity Methodist Church. The church closer to downtown and above the not yet completed Fairmont Hotel is on Pearl at Ross and is the Cathedral Guadalupe Church.
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But if they had finished the freeway in a reasonable amount of time we might not have had “The Christian Woodstock”: http://imgur.com/a/3jjF5/layout/vertical
An excellent source of more information about Woodall Rodgers is available in this section: http://www.dfwfreeways.com/book/ExWoodallRodgers?startOdd=False from a free ebook on DFW highways available here: http://www.dfwfreeways.com/
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I remember Trinity. There was a movie scene shot there starring Burt Reynolds . (Semi Tough). I also see North Dallas High School further North and towards the left.
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What is the interesting building ( razed no doubt) at the east end of Woodall?
As always Paula – thank you !
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That is B. F. Darrell Elementary which was originally Colored School No. 2: https://tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/fdaas It was closed in 1969 and demolished in the 1970s: http://goo.gl/bhhZ4B
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Pretty clearly shows Ross Avenue as the street of car dealerships.
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Today’s Ross Avenue would be barely recognizable to someone from 1966. “What? No Goss on Ross?!!”
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During the years when the freeway was in limbo, El Fenix rented the space where it would eventually be built and used it for a parking lot. I remember parking on the future freeway right of way while eating at El Fenix. That was probably in the early 1970s, maybe late 1960s. I was a graduate student at The University of North Texas.
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