One of the most romantic roads in U.S. history — Route 66 — runs through the heart of Albuquerque and its Nob Hill area on Central Avenue. The two-mile section of The Mother Road bounded by Girard and San Mateo in Nob Hill is one of the state’s best-preserved segments of the legendary road. Route 66 was realigned in 1937 to run directly west from Tucumcari to Grants, bringing motorists (and development) straight into Albuquerque through the gateway of Nob Hill.

By the beginning of World War II, Nob Hill had grown into Albuquerque’s first suburb. After the war, the population boomed and a building boom followed. In the late 1940s, R.B. Waggoman developed the Nob Hill Business Center, one of the first modern shopping centers west of the Mississippi. The center and the district blossomed into the most fashionable area of town.

It isn't well known, but Mr. Waggoman had an employee named Freddie "Three-Fingers" Westerholt, who often ran illegal Thursday-night poker games out of the back of a non-descript motel located next to the Nob Hill Business Center. The gatherings were affectionately referred to by local wise-guys as "The Nob Hill Club" since the place was fancy enough to have air-conditioning, a TV in the poker room and tubs & showers for the players who stunk up the place.

Will that do until the truth comes along?