Allan Herschell carousel in 1920s, Trail Dust Town, Tucson, Arizona

Trail Dust Town is a historical outdoor shopping center located in

Tucson, Arizona , "(at the) base of the black ill , nicknames = "The Old Pueblo", "Optics Valley", "America's biggest small town" , image_map = , mapsize = 260px , map_caption = Interactive map ...

. Although Trail Dust Town operates as a for-profit shopping mall, on its grounds exists a great number of historical artifacts, including an

Allan Herschell The Allan Herschell Company specialized in the creation of amusement rides, particularly carousels and roller coasters. The company manufactured portable machines that could be used by traveling carnival operators. It was started in 1915 in th ...

merry-go-round which was manufactured in 1954 that still contains its original horses and benches.

History

The shopping mall was built originally in 1961 and featured retail shopping. Pinnacle Peak Steakhouse was built in 1962 and quickly became a popular destination. The are has often been rumored to have been a former movie set, but that has never been confirmed.

Playbox Theatre

From 1961 to 1982, Trail Dust Town was the site of one of Tucson's earliest community theater companies, Playbox Theatre. Playbox started several years earlier in a vacant church near the University of Arizona (later home to the Loft Theater, an early art film theater in Tucson) but it moved to Trail Dust Town in order to grow. The building (including the stage which still stands) is now called The Savoy Opera House and it is rented out for banquets and other events.

Museum of the Horse Soldier

Trail Dust Town was also home to a non-profit history museum; Museum of the Horse Soldier. The museum chronicled the history of U.S. mounted military service. It was notable for having one of the nation's largest public displays artifacts from the era of the military horse, including original period saddles, uniforms, weapons, firearms, and ephemera. The museum incorporated in Jan. 2013 and received recognition from around the world, including the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC), History Channel, Discovery Channel, Arizona Highways, and multiple publications. Some of the museum's highlights included the only Civil War collection available to the public in the state of AZ and rare U.S. military saddles from the 1830s-present day. The Museum officially moved out of Trail Dust Town in June of 2019 and has yet to find a new home.

Constituent attractions

Trail Dust Town Railroad

The Trail Dust Town Railroad is a

narrow-gauge A narrow-gauge railway (narrow-gauge railroad in the US) is a railway with a track gauge narrower than standard . Most narrow-gauge railways are between and . Since narrow-gauge railways are usually built with tighter curves, smaller structu ...

, motorized

train In rail transport, a train (from Old French , from Latin , "to pull, to draw") is a series of connected vehicles that run along a railway track and transport people or freight. Trains are typically pulled or pushed by locomotives (often ...

that runs on a looped 24" track. The railroad loads patrons at Trail Dust Town's

train depot A train station, railway station, railroad station or depot is a railway facility where trains stop to load or unload passengers, freight or both. It generally consists of at least one platform, one track and a station building providing su ...

, which is modeled after the

Delaware, Lackawanna & Western The Delaware, Lackawanna and Western Railroad (also known as the DL&W or Lackawanna Railroad) was a U.S. Class 1 railroad that connected Buffalo, New York, and Hoboken, New Jersey (and by ferry with New York City), a distance of . Incorporated in ...

station located in Wallace, New York. The engine, named " C. P. Huntington", and numbered 287, pulls two passenger cars around the town and passes through several theme areas, two tunnels, and across several working, but miniature crossings.

Pistoleros Wild West Show

Performed twice per evening, Friday through Sunday, Trail Dust Town's stunt show is a slapstick

comedy Comedy is a genre of fiction that consists of discourses or works intended to be humorous or amusing by inducing laughter, especially in theatre, film, stand-up comedy, television, radio, books, or any other entertainment medium. The term o ...

homage to the

wild west The American frontier, also known as the Old West or the Wild West, encompasses the geography, history, folklore, and culture associated with the forward wave of American expansion in mainland North America that began with European colonial ...

. The shows, which vary from twenty to thirty minutes in length, are performed are on Dragoon St. towards the northern end of Trail Dust Town. The outdoor theater seats roughly 175 patrons on metal bench seating. Most shows feature falls from the top of two story buildings, dynamite explosion effects and many "rough and tumble" choreographed fights.

References

External links

Official homepage
{{coord, 32, 14, 50, N, 110, 51, 11, W, display=title Shopping malls in Arizona Buildings and structures in Tucson, Arizona Shopping malls in Pima County, Arizona Tourist attractions in Tucson, Arizona Museums in Tucson, Arizona Military and war museums in Arizona Equestrian museums in the United States American West museums in Arizona