What was once the social hub of a small city will soon be reduced to rubble, a casualty of the city's need to catch up with recent growth.
The Spanish Fork City Council, in order to make room to build its new fire station, voted to demolish the historic National Guard armory that has sat vacant on Main street for about a year. Demolition will begin March 6."I'm going down to get a brick," said Milo Andrus, a 73-year-old Spanish Fork resident who spent many days within the armory's walls. "I've spent too much time there not to."
Andrus said he still remembers when the armory was built in 1937, two years before he joined the National Guard.
"It was a nice-looking building - it was No. 1," he said. "I can remember there used to be a lot of dances and other kinds of activities. It was a good old building."
The armory was first established more than 100 years ago at the request of then-Territorial Gov. Caleb M. West. West's letter, postmarked March 24, 1894, asked the mayor of Spanish Fork to "provide rooms for drilling and an armory for a unit of the National Guard." After using a rented room at 237 N. Main for several years, the armory finally took up residence at its current site at 400 North Main.
"At one point it was the focal point of the entire community," said Sgt. Wendell Day, who works out of the new National Guard Armory in North Spanish Fork. "It was just a part of everyday life and a very vital part of the community."
Dances, bazaars, basketball games and picnics sponsored by the armory symbolized the good times the city and the nation enjoyed throughout its history. Tearful goodbyes to soldiers of the Battery "C" 1st Battalion and 140th Field Artillery leaving to fight battles in World Wars I and II, Korea and Vietnam awakened the community to the reality of life outside Spanish Fork.
As the building's walls started to crumble and its roof got leaky, plans were made to construct a new National Guard armory in Spanish Fork. In 1994, the doors were closed for good.
Today, some are concerned that as the bulldozers prepare to take down the structure's walls, those that have been involved with the armory in years past may not know of the building's imminent fate.
"I'm sure there are some people out there with a lot of fond memories of that place," said Day. "I really don't think they know it is being torn down."
Richard Whittington of Nephi, who started working out in the old building in the 1960s, said he wasn't aware of the building's pending destruction.
"There is so much history in that building," Whittington said. "I'd hate to see it torn down. It might have served its purpose, but it's still too bad."