I was asked the other day who Joe Battle was. Here is an article from 1991 that describes his service to El Paso:
October 9. 1991
City names Loop 375 after Battle
By Maria Cortes
El Paso Times
Joe Battle oversaw the construction of virtually every major road in the Sun City – including Interstate 10 and Woodrow Bean Trans Mountain drive – before stepping down last week as director of the Texas Department of Highways and Public Transportation’s El Paso district office.
City Council honored his 28 years of service by naming part of Loop 375 now under construction after him.
The council voted Sept. 24 on the name Joe Battle Boulevard for the 11-mile link between Montana on the East Side and Trans Mountain in the Northeast.
Battle reacted with modesty.
“If that’s what the City Council wants to do, it’s fine,” he said. “I think it’s a real nice tribute to the work I have done in El Paso.”
Battle served 45 years in various jobs with the state highway department. He began working in El Paso as a member of a surveying crew in 1937 while a student at the University of Texas at Austin. He returned to the department after graduating in 1940.
Although he hopes to travel, Battle said he plans to keep his permanent home in El Paso
“And when the loop is completed, I’ll be driving through there,” he said.
Joe Battle died March 19, 2004, fifteen days before his 89th birthday.
Like your idea of looking back...please reconsider what you have named the blog..
Posted by: Douglas Naudin | April 24, 2008 at 07:43 AM
The name is very accurate, since a newspapers storage/library is called a morgue.
Posted by: Dot | April 24, 2008 at 01:37 PM
I like the name and the blogger is cute too.
Posted by: hey there | April 24, 2008 at 09:07 PM
He must have worked with my grandfather. He was a surveyor during those years,he went to UTEP, of course it was Texas Western then.
Posted by: Teri Phares | June 07, 2010 at 05:30 PM