Afterwords

The poster on the wall:

Armadillo World Headquarters

One night in 1976, I was in the old Armadillo World Headquarters in Austin, Texas. I don’t remember which bands were playing. But I remember walking around inside the emporium. The arched quonset hut had a stage and rugs for sitting on the floor. There were some bars at one end. There was a maze of walls in the back leading to the bathrooms, offices and break-rooms.

The dimly lit black painted walls were covered with posters. Austin was legendary for its poster artists. There were always lots of bands to keep artists employed. This poster art scene was as revered as the Art Nouveau movement in Paris. A faded and torn poster from the 1890’s caught my eye. It was not for a concert, but for an amusement park in New Mexico named Dillo World: The Giant Armadillo from Outer Space.

I soon forgot about the Dillo World poster until many years later during the research on The Great Airship Fish. Did Eddie Wilson name the Armadillo World Headquarters after a giant crashed airship wreckage?

If true, then The Great Airship Fish had three lives. First as a historic aviation achievement. Then the airship’s demise and somewhat disrespected rebirth as an amusement park. And the naming of the Armadillo World Headquarters.