This bronze plaque on the old Sears Building on the corner of 5th Street and Central Ave (Old Route 66) in Downtown Albuquerque gives a brief history of Albuquerque from 1946 when the photo on the plaque was taken to 1950. Notice there is a small sign on the Kimo Theater that reads "KGGM CBS". I assume KGGM's radio studios were in the offices on the west side of the Kimo Theater in 1946. At that time KGGM was a CBS radio affiliate at 1260 on the AM dial. In the early 1950's, KGGM became a Channel 13 CBS affiliate television station, KGGM-TV. Today it is still Channel 13, but the call letters have changed to KRQE-TV.

Closeup of the photo taken in 1946.

I took this photo from the same corner this afternoon at 2:47 PM. Most of the same buildings still line Central Ave in 2017 — some have had minor changes to their exteriors, others major changes, and a few buildings have been replaced since 1946. The "KRESS" sign at the top of the the KRESS building (mostly covered by the traffic light in today's view) looks to have endured the years, and the "KIMO" sign was redone to be close to the original. Otherwise, all the signs have changed and the buildings have been modernized. Yet there is still a sense of the old Route 66 from the days when KGGM was 1260 on the AM dial and Central would be a traffic jam of cars and trucks at three o'clock on a Monday afternoon.