Original architectural features included a façade with pink stucco walls decorated with shell designs and a stepped parapet, on-site office and manager's residence, and garages located between the sleeping units for travelers to park their motorcars.

[4][5] As the Blue Swallow Motel, the property was updated with neon signage proclaiming "TV" and "100% Refrigerated Air".

It would continue in operation through both the heyday of post-war tourism on the old US Highway system (when roadside billboards advertised "Tucumcari Tonight!"

But some of us stuck it out and are still here on Route 66.A resident of Tucumcari since 1923 (having arrived in New Mexico with her family in a covered wagon in 1915), Lillian Redman would operate the Blue Swallow for four decades, continuing independently after Floyd's death in 1973 and ultimately selling the motel in 1998.

[9] After Lillian Redman sold the motel in 1998, owners Dale and Hilda Bakke made substantial restoration efforts, repairing the 1960 neon lighting, adding a vintage rotary phone system,[10] replacing hardwood flooring with carpeting and monochrome television sets with color TVs.