Coal mining was one of Gallup's biggest industries from the 1880s through the 1950s, drawing workers from across the nation and around the world with good wages and often-provided housing. Over time, fifty-seven mines in the Gallup area supplied coal to the railroad and to industry. The first coal miners' strike came in 1917, after coal mining had peaked, and demand declined over the next twelve years until by the Great Depression half of Gallup's coal miners were out of work. During the 1933 strike, martial law was declared. In 1935, the Gallup Riot took place along this alley after an unemployed union miner who had been evicted from his home in the Chihuahuita neighborhood and another miner were arraigned; as one prisoner was being returned to jail, a gun went off and caused a riot. Three persons were killed, and ten suspects, scapegoated as radicals, endured a lengthy trial; all were acquitted or pardoned, but many were deported.