City names Wyoming Mall street after long-gone department store
ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. (KRQE) – If you’ve driven on Wyoming Boulevard near Menaul Boulevard lately, you probably noticed the construction taking place. Recent changes within the construction area include two street signs that reference a large discount department store that is now long gone.
The entrance to the Wyoming Mall plaza is now named “Woolco.” The American-based retail chain opened a 115,000-square-foot store at the mall in 1969, according to Albuquerque Tribune Newspaper Archives.
The store was a one-stop shop for goods, including adult and children’s clothes, jewelry, makeup, sporting equipment, furniture, auto services, tools, and more. Woolco’s owner, the F.W. Woolworth Company, announced the closure of its 336 discount stores in the United States in 1982, per the New York Times’ archive.
The Wyoming Mall has undergone many changes since Woolco’s time there, but now a similar and even larger retail chain stands in the department store’s place: Walmart. Dan Mayfield, the spokesperson for the City of Albuquerque Department of Municipal Development, said the city decided to name the intersection “Woolco” because the police department and 311 would refer to the area as such.
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Mayfield said the city typically does not name streets after businesses, but in this case, the city made an exception since the Woolco store is no longer in operation.
