Remember when Joe DiMaggio was hawking Mister Coffee on TV? The year those ads began, Carmen Alvarado went to work in the laundry department of the St. Anthony Hotel downtown, News Radio 1200 WOAI reports.
'Tie a Yellow Ribbon Round the Old Oak Tree' was number one on the charts back when Carmen loaded her first bag of linens.
Now, after 45 years on the job, she is being honored by having the laundry room renamed 'Carmen's Laundry' in her honor.
Housekeeping Manager Rebecca Leal says San Antonio has changed a lot back then, the city had a population of about 650,000, less than half of what it is today, there was essentially no development outside Loop 410, apart from the Medical Center which was in its infancy, and that was the very first year the San Antonio Spurs, recently changed its name from the Chaparrals, played in the old ABA, at the long gone Convention Center Arena.
Leal says the hotel has changed immensely since then as well.
"Its dramatically changed, and with the remodel that they did, not too many years back, she was part of everything that went along with that."
She says the laundry room was far different in 1973 as well, with two ladies putting the sheets and towels in the washer and two taking them out.
She says air conditioning came to the laundry room in 1983, but before that it was 'very hot.'
She says from the early seventies to today, the St. Anthony has welcomed presidents, diplomats, generations of King Antonios, and, just recently a real king and queen.
"We had the King and Queen of Spain a couple of months back," Leal said. "So they were here, and she helped with all the stuff that went with the room, as far and getting it ironed and getting it situated."