Former JJ's Liquor, Texas Avenue

In the pre-JJ's days, though all but the ball-looking thing at the top of the sign survived to the end.
Originally located at the now-defunct Texas Avenue page and later at this page, this former liquor store (1600 Texas Avenue South) has been near the corner of Harvey Road since the 1970s (original build date unknown, it was listed in the early 1970s phone books but did not exist in 1971 as per aerials), originally as Discount Liquor Store. J.J. Ruffino bought it in 1983 to complement a Bryan store, and it remained as such for decades. In late 2010, Ruffino exited the liquor store and sold the three stores to Spec's. Spec's converted the store on Rock Prairie and Longmire to their brand but kept the two stores as JJ's, eventually converting them to wholesale only. I went into the store only once in 2016, when I applied for a job in the chain, though for unknown reasons it fell through. (I can tell you that the inside of the store was dark and dingy). The location at Redmond and Texas Avenue closed in 2017 when Spec's built a new store at University and Highway 6 at the former Linens-N-Things that incorporated their wholesale operation.
Southbound on Texas Avenue, March 2014, from car.
Southbound on Texas Avenue, March 2014. Another view.

Jack in the Box, Texas Avenue, College Station

This store has since been gutted down to just a few columns and walls and totally rebuilt (with a small expansion).
Jack in the Box store number 683 (1504 Texas Avenue South) opened in 1976. The picture isn't high resolution because I was going to publish it as part of the Texas Avenue City Directory on the next update on Carbon-izer. It's all part of a big site overhaul. The picture is from me, but I don't have the date recorded down of when I took it (likely a few years ago). This is the only Jack in the Box in College Station proper as the one on Rock Prairie closed down a couple of years ago.

UPDATE 11-07-2020: Updated opening date based on new evidence and added a bit on the rebuild.
UPDATE 08-06-2021: Changed date to 1976 and also added [1970s] (instead of [1980s]) to the tag.

Southgate Village Apartments

Here's an Eagle ad from December 1971, subsidized even back then.
Originally part of the Luther Street and Wellborn Road article to undergo major changes as of this writing (accounting for the huge new apartment building replacing the entire block), the Southgate Village Apartments were built in 1970 and is a HUD subsidized apartment (even going into foreclosure in early 2012).

Street View image, 134 Luther Street

Shiraz Shish Kabob

Picture taken January 2017, I had been holding onto this for over two years!
When I added this post in February 2019 (which itself got transplanted to a new post following a reorganization of the website at that time), I didn't have the resources I do now. This restaurant started out as a rather typical (for the time) Kentucky Fried Chicken restaurant as what those restaurants looked like at the time. (It also had the address of 100 Dominik Drive before changing to 110 Dominik Drive a few years later, which it still is today. In late 1986 it closed and moved to Park Place Plaza where it still business as KFC (after a few remodels) and is currently engaged in an ongoing war with the Popeyes catty-corner to it.

In 1987, Quick as a Flash, a photo studio, moved here from Post Oak Mall. Ritz Camera eventually bought it to become "Ritz Portrait Studio" or "Ritz One Hour Photo" (not to be confused with the main Ritz Camera store, which later moved in across the street) and it eventually closed in the mid-2000s. For a very brief time in 2007, this was "The Pump". One of the old comments erroneously referred to it as "The Filling Station" but described it as such:

It specialized in fried everything. They were quite good if you could exist on fried everything. Chicken, chicken fried steak, fried livers and gizzards. They also baked beautifully decorated Christmas cookies. Interesting place.

By fall of 2008, the restaurant was being renovated into its current tenant, Shiraz Shish Kabob, which opened in December of that year. While the heavy lifting was done by The Pump in restoring the building back to restaurant use (I'm guessing that when it became a portrait studio, connections required for food service were simply covered up rather than removed entirely), Shiraz added a fountain to the main dining area for ambience (though it made the restaurant a bit humid). I'm guessing that when it became a portrait studio, connections required for food service were simply covered up rather than removed entirely.

UPDATE 02-27-2023: Complete rewrite done.

Dominik Drive Whataburger

The sun sets behind this Whataburger, but don't worry, it's open late!

This Whataburger at 105 Dominik Drive is another restaurant that has been here for decades (though been rebuilt a few times). This is the closest Whataburger to campus and I've heard (and felt) like quality is a bit sub-par compared to the Rock Prairie Whataburger. In 1969, it changed hands from an unknown seller to Grace Dobson (wife of Whataburger founder Harmon Dobson), with the earliest reference in newspaper archives to this location in 1971. In 1987, Grace Dobson to Whataburger. It changed hands again in 1987 to Whataburger officially, which was about the time a rebuild of the store commenced, as a permit had been filed in 1986. Regardless, it was rebuilt again in 1996. This is what Brazos CAD says about the store, and that is correct--I had heard when I was a bit younger of a large fire at the store in the 1990s, and later I found a newspaper that said that it did in fact burn down in January 1996, with a "mobile Whataburger" serviced the area until the Whataburger reopened that spring. The store was No. 78 even in the Dobson days and it still is.

While it is the closest Whataburger to campus, for a brief time it was not as you could get Whataburger in the Sbisa basement, and with the revelation that they had a "mobile Whataburger" even back in the mid-1990s, it makes me wonder how much money a Whataburger food truck could still make on campus today. It was at this location that I realized Whataburger had subtly changed its logo.

Today, it has an all orange logo (formerly, the name was in black and there was often blue trim). Compare this picture (not mine!) to the store today. There's another blank lot nearby used for overflow parking. This used to be a Shell station (it was a Texaco prior to 2003) just about three years later when Texas Avenue started to widen, and demolished a few years later. Since then, nothing has taken its spot, but it provides excess Whataburger parking. It was one of the "Max Food Mart" stores that were in a lot of the Texaco stores at the time. The gas station at 1405 Texas Avenue I believe did not co-exist with the old Zip'N at George Bush and Texas, as the stores I remember converting around January 2003 (Eagle archives show the conversion of the store at Southwest Parkway and Welsh converting, and I think that was one of the first to convert), and by February 2003, the old Zip'N had been completely leveled.

Update May 2019: This Whataburger is scheduled to be rebuilt soon, and the Gumby's has moved out.

Pooh's Park, Tinsley's, and Others Replaced by a Shopping Center

View of the center today

Once again, we come back to one of our blog, this time to roll a few smaller posts into a bigger one. As the picture above shows, the area at Holleman and Texas Avenue is now a large (kind of low end) shopping center. In addition to covering all the changes that went on there (which I have yet to do), I can combine a few older posts into this one. So, first, we have Pooh's Park at 1907 Texas Avenue South.

There's far more to Pooh's Park (no, not related to the "Winnie" one) I can get into today, because it's a popular topic on local nostalgia threads: if you want to learn more, you can head over to Facebook to talk or browse through old photos (and they include newspaper articles!)

I never got to experience Pooh's Park myself, but from what I've seen and read, it was like Chuck E. Cheese, Putt-Putt, and a skating rink (roller, not ice) all wrapped into one. It opened in 1972 and was where the shopping center where Hobby Lobby, Big Lots, and Ross are now. I would like to say that Pooh's Park remained open until it became too valuable to remain (and was getting run-down anyway) and closed in the early 2000s, but no, that's not the case. It closed around 1988 (for reasons unclear, probably economic) and only the sign remained up (with the logo of the yellow dog they had, and not the one pictured above, and the name gone) until around the time they built the shopping center in the early 2000s, and then remained up until a little while afterward.

A 1984 phone book has a different ad that does mention things like a water slide (408 feet) and a different address (at some point, they changed to 105 Holleman Drive East, though based on what you can see from Google Earth, and backed up by a picture of Texas Avenue from a local history book I don't have a copy of with me) is that Pooh's Park was accessed through Texas Avenue, not Holleman.

Google Earth 1995, with modern streets overlaid

Some older maps (circa 2001-ish, long after Pooh's Park bit the dust) put a "Pooh's Lane" roughly where the Bahama Buck's is now, but unless that first part of Holleman Drive East was actually called that (after all, there's a few things that do support that, including the odd alignment of Holleman Drive and Holleman Drive East suggests that the East part was first, and then Holleman Drive extended that way later by way of a particularly awkward curve, or the fact that the subdivision nearby (behind the strip center and the other businesses on the east side) is named Pooh's Park Subdivision.

Sharing the address with Pooh's Park (at least the original address) was one "Furniture Liquidation Mart" which closed in October 1985 (The Eagle), and I would guess that this is what Bahama Buck's replaced (it used to be the foundations of another building). It should be noted, though, my 1984 phone book doesn't list it.

Near Pooh's Park was Tinsley's Chicken 'n Rolls.

Chicken done well, chicken well done!
Opening in late 1979, Tinsley's was located on 1905 Texas Avenue South as the chain's only College Station location (there were locations from Waco to Houston, and two in Bryan--one of which has an article on the blog). In 1985, the Tinsley family sold out to Church's Fried Chicken.Church's closed sometime around 1989 (it would resurface years later). In the mid-1990s it was Santa Fe Pizza (aka Santa Fe Market Cafe). In 1997, it was Kokopelli's (Southwestern food, I have a menu but never scanned it) and Clay Oven from 1998 to 2000 (Indian food).

It should be noted the plane was a real thing, though, as David Tinsley used an actual 1930s plane to promote his restaurants, not unlike how Flying Tomato used hot air balloons.

Despite a brief re-appearance in Huntsville with much fanfare (in a former KFC and now Hartz Chicken Buffet), Tinsley's is current a dead chain once more.

Anyway, by the early 2000s, the space was almost entirely vacant (I believe Clay Oven had been demolished) with little else on the property except the old Pooh's Park sign, which had remained up. While the new shopping center (opened in 2002) had rather downscale tenants, most of them were new. There was Hobby Lobby, which moved from Post Oak Square, locating at 1903 Texas Avenue South. Others included a branch of Loupot's (1907 Texas Ave. S.), Shoe Carnival (1909 Texas Ave. S.), Ross Dress for Less (1911 Texas Ave. S.), and Goody's Family Clothing (1913 Texas Avenue South). Petco and a few smaller stores shared the 1901 address, and in 2006, CiCi's Pizza moved in from Culpepper Plaza, taking the 1905 Texas Avenue address. Goody's would close in early 2009 as the chain went under, but it was replaced with a few new stores, Big Lots (returning back to the market, as by that time, their old location at the former Kmart had been closed for several years) and a Twin Liquors (which, despite slightly nicer décor, seemed like a smaller, inferior competitor to Spec's). Loupot's also closed in spring 2012 and reopened as a Salata in less than two years.

Another shopping strip was built around the same time as the rest (but named The Shops at Wolf Pen Plaza) with Starbucks Coffee, a Sprint store (which initially had the older logo, then eventually was rebranded to T-Mobile following the merger), and Champion Firearms (moved from the Kroger shopping center). The Starbucks can be seen in its early days here from Starbucks Everywhere. It shows the ratty little building next door, the trees along Texas Avenue that got wrecked when it was widened, Goody's, and the patio of Starbucks before it was expanded.

UPDATE 07-08-2022: QoL updates including the life of the center, better closing date of Pooh's, new tags

Dead Lazlo's Coffee Pub

Courtesy Project HOLD. Sadly, those funky oversized door handles don't exist anymore.
Dusting off something from a longer post all in favor of integrating into that new "directory" project discussed previously, the space that is "Foundation Lounge" today (which was "Foundation Room" until maybe 2012 or 2013) was a long series of shops and restaurants that I have yet to fully document.

The earliest record I could find for this building was a store called White Auto Store at this spot in 1972.

In the early 1980s, this was a store called The Drafting Board, an engineer's supply shop (reminder: there were less computers than today), which lasted from 1980 to at least 1984 (formerly "News Office Supply", according to a 1980 phone book).

Later on it was called A&M Steak House by c. 1989 (hamburgers, apparently). After that was shortly another store, Condom Station (at the zenith of Northgate's decline). Condom Station may have actually lasted a few years before closing.

"We've Got You Covered" is what the small text says.
This was Dead Lazlo's Coffee Pub in 1995, which lasted a few years too. A newspaper article I read (I don't have it with me but if it turns up, I'll cite it) mentioned that Dead Lazlo's was owned by Sweet Eugene's House of Java which is still alive today. Given how crowded Sweet Eugene's gets, if they still owned a coffeeshop here on Northgate under any name, it would do spectacularly well.

Copacetic (or Copasetic, I've seen it both ways) Café in 1998, and Foundation Room later (which has even more recently changed to "Foundation Lounge"), but not before briefly becoming a bar called The Groove in the mid to late 2000s, which had live music. The Groove was around as early as 2004 (citing The Eagle archives) and as late as 2007 (Google Street view and a restaurant report card). The Foundation's current ƒ logo used to be a Comic Sans-esque "G". Not counting the name changes of Drafting Board or Foundation Room, that's been 8 tenants over the years, but there's probably more...

UPDATE: Here's a comment posted from 2016 regarding Dead Lazlo's from Mikes Teks: Just wanted to confirm that Dead Lazlos was owned by the same people that owned Sweet Eugene's (back when coffee came in ceramic mugs/cups and not paper cups with lids). College Main was closed due to a major reconstruction project during its first year of being open which hurt business. After its biggest supporter among the owners of Sweet Eugene's left (he used to part his Motorcycle inside Eugene's when he worked there, cool guy) they turned it into the Copacetic Cafe (or so pathetic Cafe as we called it) Same owners and coffee, but no longer had a Gothic feel to it and it soon after I 'm told. Best 2 years of my life in BCS was spent at Dead Lazlo's. Non-smoking section was in the back and the Coffin by the bar. Good times.

Zachry Engineering Center: End of an Era

We'll be exploring this one soon enough.

In late 2014, I was planning to hurry up on the last posts before closing the blog indefinitely to focus on new endeavors, and Zachry was supposed to be one of the "big posts" the blog had gotten some fans from. It opened in 1972 originally and I have a full suite of photos (though many of the videos are still in storage) on my website, Carbon-izer. The building closed in February 2015 for a massive remodel that pretty much gutted the building (I haven't yet gone inside, but based on my experiences from The Commons, which was so offputting that I refused to rewrite the post, it's probably for the best). It doesn't cover the Zachry Snackery, as it had been closed for several years prior to my exploration, and doesn't cover the Einstein Bros. Bagels that was briefly in Zachry from fall 2012 to its closure. The modern "Zachry Engineering Education Complex" (ZEEC), as opposed to the "H.B. Zachry Engineering Center" (ZEC, though I have also heard it as the "H.B. Zachry Engineering Building") reopened in 2018 and has a Starbucks inside (like many other A&M buildings these days).

Updated June 2019

The Nightlife at Doux Chene Apartments

See those stairs leading up to the second level in the main office building? That's the focus today here. (Google Maps Picture)

I originally wrote this in August 2014 and the text below reflects that, as well as an email/addition I got from the owners at the time. In April 2015, however, all this would change when it was sold and was rebranded as "Flats on 12", which so far over a year and a half later (August 2016) looks like the typical game apartments have run in town, change the name, give a repaint, cheap remodel, jack up the rent. This also added a lighted sign on the front of the building and also changed the entrance to the former restaurant/nightclub area (I think it's supposed to be a clubhouse now). This is a bit disappointing because Doux Chene was famously the holdout in these sorts of shenanigans. And now back to our original post...

First off, this is not an apartments review site. Nor is the title supposed to be some sort of snarky joke. Most of the content here is long out of date. If you came via Google looking for information regarding the actual apartments as they stand today, move on. Or not. I could always use visitors here. So, Doux Chene Apartments (I think it's pronounced "doe shane", though I'm not entirely sure, and the translation is "sweet oak") is one of your typical run-down apartment complexes from the 1970s, except it's more than that.

First off, Doux Chene was designed to be trendy, trendy enough that they would actually advertise themselves as "country club apartment living", and trendy enough to be the first true mixed-use building in the City of College Station.

From circa 1974 to late 1970s, it was "Mansard House". Mansard House, despite being the upper level of an apartment complex on the edge of town (sure, why not?) was one of the really nice places in town. Live entertainment, seafood, lobster, lamb, and more were all on the menu.

This was the kind of apartment complex Doux Chene used to be, and apparently wasn't one of a kind...the Chateaux Dijon apartments, known for when George W. Bush lived there in the early 1970s, was also the same theme and layout, but unlike Doux Chene, managed to upkeep itself quite nicely.

By 1980, while Doux Chene was still successful, Mansard House had closed and was replaced with Studio 2818, an actual discotheque.

Source: personal collection

Later night clubs included Dallas: The Night Club...

...and finally, Scandals.

Most of these are sadly relatively undocumented, only whispers across forums and other sources, including stories of ladies' nights with male strippers, with men being let in after the women had several drinks. Perhaps it's better that some of the craziness that went on is better left unsaid (I'm sure there were many regrettable nights).

Doux Chene of course is also a rather unlucky apartment complex, such as a tornado in 2006 striking a building, necessitating its demolition, or the fact that the building caught fire some months later due to improper wiring (it's also worth noting that anytime I read about an apartment complex fire, it used to be that there was a good chance it was Doux Chene).

If there are any restaurants/clubs I missed, or you have any memories of them, please write in the comments.

Since writing this post, we (I) was contacted by a management representative of Doux Chene Apartments, whose name has been redacted for identity purposes.

"While your account of the history of the complex is mostly accurate, I take issue with the assertion that Doux Chene has not 'managed to upkeep itself.' While the property did fall into a state of disrepair in the late 80's to the early 90's, the current management has put a lot of effort (and money) into repairs and renovations and enhancements. While there is no hiding the fact that the property is 40 years old, it is in very good condition for a property of its age.

Doux Chene has indeed encountered more than its share of challenges.

A lightning strike destroyed 4 apartment units, severely damaged a dozen others. No injuries, a quarter of a million dollars in damages.

Severe hail required the replacement of nearly a dozen roofs, another quarter of a million dollars.

The tornado in 2006 actually destroyed two buildings, damaged several roofs, caused water damage in nearly 80 apartments, required replacement of over 160 central air conditioning systems. Total casualty loss, just over $4 million.

And then the small fire that happened shortly thereafter... The fire marshal initially indicated it was electrical, but upon further investigation it was found to be caused by a resident's cigarette butt rolling into a gap at the edge of his balcony.

Through all of this, we have been blessed in multiple ways. Firstly, there have been no injuries as a result of any of these incidences. Also, our insurance company has consistently paid in a timely fashion, and we have been fully made whole. We have also been given the reassurance, that no matter what we face, we will be able to come through it. I won't get all preachy here, but our faith in God has been strengthened through these difficulties.

Some ads were also sent as part of this, including Doux Chene hosting some wild parties (it's hard to imagine even the student-oriented apartments specifically hosting a keg party today)

As wild partying obviously upset the neighbors, a nearby apartment complex offered a shotgun as among the freebies you could get for signing a lease.

- 9/3/14

Former Luby's Cafeteria

For a number of years prior to closure, the sign had read "Luby's Drive-Thru"

Opening in February 1977, Luby's Cafeteria (4401 South Texas Avenue) opened at a time when cafeterias were more plentiful, but much like the clientele they tend to service, they've been dying off. No more Piccadilly Cafeteria stores exist in Texas, and even Luby's has been continually closing restaurants left and right, even the one closest to its headquarters. All this before COVID-19 hit in earnest!

Unfortunately, I have no photos of this Luby's when they were opening and operating, because it was only a Luby's, and the Luby's closing took many by surprise. It closed in April 2014 a few years shy of its 40th anniversary, as it was sold to a mystery owner, soon revealed to be the Eccell Group.

This would be the new home of Café Eccell, after the drama surrounding it at Church and Wellborn Road. After renovating the inside and repainting the outside (it was originally white, which Eccell repainted to tan), it opened in August 2014 after renovating it.

While Café Eccell has updated a bit (mostly by repainting the drive-through end of the restaurant and opening it as the sub-restaurant La Bodega Express, as well as making it share the roadside sign), it wasn't the one with the history behind it. Even the Eccell name would go away from the sign, as after being forced to close in spring 2020 during the coronavirus pandemic, the owners revealed their intention to rename it. Originally planned to be "The Local", it reopened July 1, 2020 as "Public & Main" with a new menu (no word on the La Bodega Express restaurant-within-a-restaurant).

Of course, Luby's was the one with the history behind it. A full page ad had been taken out for its opening, describing the restaurant that didn't have waiters or waitresses.

You'll feel good about Luby's... selection... Everyone likes what they get, because everyone chooses their favorites. Snappy fresh fruits and crisp garden salads. Hot and hearty entrees. Piping hot vegetables. Home baked rolls and breads. And the taste-temptingest selection of homemade desserts you've ever seen.

This was the only Luby's Cafeteria in the area. There was also one in the mall that opened in 1996 but it closed after a while (lasting about five years, or less).

Enjoy the pictures I took in and around the restaurant shortly after closing (and after Eccell repainted it), taken May 2014.

UPDATE 04-11-2022: While some other updates have been made in the past (2019 to account for a few new things, including La Bodega Express, the Post Oak Mall location, and others. A second update in 2020 rearranged the article and updated what happened to Café Eccell), KBTX has reported that Public & Main has closed for good. No other changes have been made to the article, but [COVID-19] has been replaced with [defunct].
UPDATE 08-03-2023: The next restaurant here will be Sushi Masa, though as of June 2023 the signage still reads Public & Main.
UPDATE 09-08-2023: Sushi Masa is now open, [defunct] removed.

Heep Center

Historic picture looking west. Until 2011, this is very similar to what it was. Then they made Olsen go through there. (Mapping Historic Aggieland)
More photos, mine, in glorious color. Taken 2/2014.
Facing east. This is my best picture
Approaching east.
The skywalks within.
Looking west from inside.
Hi there!

Besides its impressive five-story atrium, this building is also one of my favorites because it's incredibly solidly built. The walls are a foot or so of reinforced concrete, and the whole thing (sans skylights of course) would likely survive a nuclear strike. Heep Center was built in 1977 according to Historic Aggieland.

EDIT 2019: The two halves are named for Herman Heep and Minnie Belle Heep, but they were built at the same time (although it would've been interesting if they were built as two separate buildings and then adjoined later). Here's another link for it...

Marion Pugh Drive

Officially, this post has been removed from the site, but remains up for posterity purposes. Please visit the Index for current features.

I am well aware of Marion Pugh being a real person, but the story of how Marion Pugh Drive started to become a real road started not so much with the first tenant on the stretch (Marion Pugh Lumber Co. at 101 Jersey Street West, which dated to the 1940s) but rather Tree House Apartments at 205 Jersey Street West. This would turn part of an abandoned railroad right of way (International & Great Northern, from the 1960s) into a paved alleyway with parking for the apartments. These apartments were one of the first apartments (and remain so) catering to off-campus "non-regs", which started in the 1960s.

Treehouse is the ONLY thing that hasn't changed much since this time (Courtesy Henry Mayo)
Marion Pugh Lumber Co. would eventually give way to J. Arnold Construction Co., as Marion Pugh (a former football player and class of '41) would pass away in 1976 at the age of 57. J. Arnold actually had a small railroad crossing just to the south of Jersey, which you can still see today (venture a bit south of the McDonald's and around that area)

Just to the south of that was 102 Luther, Brazos Valley Concrete, and although the concrete plant and the construction company were right next to each other, neither of them had rail access of any sort nor was Marion Pugh even connected between them: only the unpaved right of way (undoubtedly driven on) connected Luther to Marion Pugh.

At 101 Luther Street West was Schaffhauser Distributing Co. (dealing primarily in liquor). Apparently, 102 Luther was once home to the National Guard building, as Fugate's comment is replicated here (seen here).

1 comment:
Grover Fugate said...
Yes Luther extended over the railroad. That road led to the dump. Right across the railroad was a beer distributor on the left. On the right was a National Guard building.
Right past the NG bldg was a place that made charcoal for a while. Maybe two hundred yards back was a pond that we played around as kids. You can get in touch with me via Anne Boykin. I would rather answer your questions via phone or a personal meeting. Ed Hrdlicka was my Grandfater. I lived in his house with my Mom and Dad. The house was right in front of the railroad crossing.
June 19, 2011 3:46 PM

In the early 1980s, the area was officially named Marion Pugh Drive but only extended to about Luther Street West, with Treehouse adopting the new address of 200 Marion Pugh. Treehouse II (400 Marion Pugh, but originally also 205 Jersey Street West into the 1980s) would build soon after next to it, with Treehouse Village (800 Marion Pugh) soon behind, building in 1985. This put a lot of cars crossing at Luther Street West's railroad crossing, which was steep and unsignaled and was even worse after Wellborn Road (until very recently at this time, "Old College Road") was widened in the early 1980s.

At first, this doesn't seem like a big deal--after all, the 1985 map shows how Holleman can be used instead of Luther Street West, until you remember that most of those connections didn't exist in 1985. Marion Pugh didn't extend to Holleman for nearly another two decades, and never did extend to FM 2818 (unless, of course, they used the old ROW as a dirt road like they did for what is now I&GN Road, but I don't have any proof of that).

So the crossing remained with signals but no road for several months until it was finally built in early 1986, and Luther would keep their crossing open until it too was closed off (at which time, I presume, traffic was finally restored between Luther and Marion Pugh).

Sometime during the 1980s, J. Arnold would shut down, but something else would take its place: Amtrak! Amtrak came into town with the Texas Eagle in 1988 and a new station. This train connected Dallas to Houston with only two stations between: College Station (restoring a train stop) and Corsicana. Unfortunately, the train only ran until 1995, when the line was cut. The mural in the train station was moved to A&M Consolidated High School, which unfortunately, I don't have a picture of.


Amtrak didn't last too long. (from an old calendar)

After the demise of Amtrak, the concrete plant (now abandoned) had a few buildings leftover: "Traditions Night Club" wanted to open in 1997, but the city reacted to the word "nightclub" even though by the prospective owners' words it was to be less "bar" and more "normal restaurant that serves beer and wine". It didn't even have a dance hall. Probably for the better as the location was still bad (only way in was George Bush Drive or way out from 2818 via Luther). The restaurant was doomed anyway by harsh criticism from area residents, including the Marion Pugh's widow Helen Pugh. Among the arguments was that "noise, trash, and traffic would be too close to College Station's historical district", never mind that places like the dumpy Piknik Pantry and Varsity II apartments were far closer, and furthermore, around that same time, a McDonald's would build at George Bush Drive (Jersey Drive's new name) and Marion Pugh.

I initially thought this McDonald's near Marion Pugh was a rather strange and ugly specimen. In a misguided effort to fit in with campus, the McDonald's (which was built in the mid-1990s, I'd say) featured a maroon-on-white mansard roof instead of a stock yellow-on-red mansard roof. It would've looked great if the colors were flipped, but they weren't, so McDonald's truly looked like the Aggies on an away team game. Around 2003 it renovated to what it is today. In summer 2011 it suffered a bout of bad publicity when a man ate a meal there and stabbed a little girl on the way out (her father was an employee). The restaurant was also robbed that same day, and said employee later sued because these weren't the only major incidents that happened during that time frame. Yikes. It seems to be doing better now, though. I wish I had a picture of that original McDonald's, though.

At around the same time all this was happening, a "five-story women's dorm" was proposed, this would turn out to be the co-ed upscale "Callaway House", which featured its own parking garage and was the first "upscale" student apartment complex. A few years later, Callaway Villas would build and destroy Luther Street West (or what remained of it) in the process and also extending Marion Pugh to Holleman. The road now featured Treehouse Apartments (in the late 1990s briefly named College Park - Treehouse), Stadium View Apartments (formerly Tree House II), Meadows Point (formerly Treehouse Village and the pre-2005 limits of Marion Pugh), Callaway House, and others. Finally, in 2011, U-Club Townhomes were built, which opened by 2012.

Marion Pugh Drive had been expected to extend all the way to Dowling, which is why another old I-GN segment between FM 2818 (Harvey Mitchell Pkwy.) and Dowling Road was named Marion Pugh Drive for a few years, before it was renamed Jones-Butler Road in 2005 to match the new 2004 Jones-Butler Road, and was ultimately closed after the Jones-Butler segment became Holleman.

FedMart

This ad appeared in a publication shortly before coming to College Station. (Google Books)


Before Wal-Mart, there was Kmart, at least locally. But both were founded in 1962, and in 1954 there was already a "Mart" in San Diego, FedMart, founded by Sol Price. In fact, the late Sam Walton "borrowed" a number of concepts from FedMart, including the "Mart" suffix (the rest of the concept was lifted liberally from Ann & Hope, which ironically Wal-Mart forced out of business in 2001).

FedMart was called such because it was only open as a membership-only store to government employees but this was dropped by the 1960s. In November 1973, a few months before Kmart arrived, FedMart came knocking on the county's door and featured "one-stop shopping" including not only apparel, sporting goods, and other dry goods, but a complete supermarket.

Sorry, you won't be able to click for larger size on this one.

The FedMart at 701 University Drive East (like all FedMart stores at the time) was not a "full" supermarket, only offering a few brands and sizes of a given item that a full supermarket would carry more of.

I don't have a picture of FedMart when it was operating, but given an old early '80s map depicts the now-closed store as looking almost exactly like one of the San Antonio stores, it's assumed that the College Station looked like it too.

Aerial photo of FedMart around the time it closed, c. 1981
The auto center appears to have been built into the store itself, but the liquor store (FM Liquors) was at a different address, 707 University Drive East, at the corner of the newly-built Fed-Mart Drive (later East Tarrow Drive) and University Drive East.

FedMart's time in College Station would only be for less than a decade, perhaps owing to upper management's decisions (based out of Germany) to expand to a full "hypermarket", which didn't really work in most of the locations (and the concept was largely untested in the United States). The College Station store, along with all the other stores in the Texas division (San Antonio, Dallas, Houston, Victoria, etc.) closed in November 1981. The chain's Arizona and California stores went out of business less than a year later.

FedMart's death left a large building in a not-all-that-great location abandoned, and it was soon converted to other uses. Kettle (No. 145) opened a location at the site, with the chain reaching an all-time high of five locations in Bryan-College Station alone (as mentioned in the page on the current College Station Kettle).

Eventually, the building was expanded into a full strip center. From what I can tell, tenant numbers weren't really done in the center, so I'll share what I have. While the building was not demolished until around 2016, the center began clearing out in the very early 2010s, after a long drama that briefly had the center under city ownership (since 2008) as part of a failed bid to build a large hotel/conference center.

A&M Travel Service - Listed as a tenant in 1993.

Beneficial Texas Inc. - 1993 tenant, subsidiary of Beneficial Corporation (insurance)

Chimney Hill Bowling Center - One of the center's biggest options, here in the mid to late 1980s but not listed in a 1993 directory. Indications are that when Wolf Pen Bowling opened around 1994, the lanes moved here, and there wasn't a huge gap between Chimney Hill's closing and Wolf Pen's opening. The space ended up being used as storage for other uses.

Chimney Hill Florist & Gifts - Here as of 1993.

Confederate House - The Confederate House restaurant, a spin-off of the Confederate House restaurant in Houston opened in 1983 in a newly-built space. Unfortunately, it opened at the worst time for an upscale restaurant (according to Bill Edge, it wasn't even supposed to be an upscale restaurant). A rename to Tradition Restaurant & Bar (ad below) around 1985 did little to restore the prospects, and by 1986, it was closed.

David Gardner's Jewelers - This upscale local jewelry store was originally at Chimney Hill (as of 1993) before moving east at some point.

Kettle - Previously mentioned above, presumed to take part of the center that was the original FedMart, did not last more than a few years.

Qualice Network Services - Listed as a tenant in 1993.

Rembrandt's - A restaurant that succeeded Confederate House/Tradition. Around in the early 1990s.

The Republic - Also known as The Republic Steakhouse, or The Republic 1836 Steakhouse, opened in 2006, and was the very last to leave the old Chimney Hill/FedMart building, even as the rest of the building was demolished. (See the bottom of the article for the new building information).

Shakes Frozen Custard - This wasn't actually in the center, it was a new-build building at the corner of Tarrow and University. Closing in fall of 2010 and being demolished in 2011, the brick building at the corner of Tarrow and University is no more. The air conditioning gave out and the owner was unwilling to fix it. It did move however under new ownership--to Carrollton, Texas before it closed for good in March 2019.

The Tavern on Chimney Hill - Existed in the late 1990s, succeeded Rembrandt's and preceded The Republic steakhouse restaurant.

Western Beverages - Western Beverages was located in a large wedge-shaped build-out closest to the Albertsons/Randalls side of the building, and was one of the last ones to leave (as late as early 2014).

715 University Drive East (probably the original 707) was the home of the Bryan-College Station Convention & Visitor's Bureau but around the early 2010s or late 2000s they moved out, and the building was demolished ahead of the rest of the building's demo. I know I went in there at least once for the latest copy for the official Bryan-College Station map (which is rife with errors that never get corrected, but that's another story).

The old FedMart met with some success as a shopping center (even including a bowling alley at one time), and later down the road was bought to be redeveloped into a convention center for the city, but that even failed and it dwindled down to little more than the Republic Steakhouse (very upscale, accessed from the east end) and a Western Beverages (in a section that was newly built out from the original).

After the city sold it at a loss, there were plans for it to be a multi-story/mixed-use building which would demolish the remaining building except for The Republic, which wasn't part of the original 1973 building. This got far enough along to make it into a New Development listing and even had a promise of Houston-based Black Walnut Cafe opening a location, but ultimately it fell through and was replaced with a rather simple redevelopment that would leave it looking much like the rest of University Drive East, with a new building for The Republic, a new Starbucks, and space for a Drury Inn.

In December 2018, a new The Republic restaurant opened at the corner of University Drive East and Tarrow Street, keeping the 701 University Drive East designation, and the last of Chimney Hill was demolished. The new Republic steakhouse had a bar-within-a-restaurant, the Primrose Path wine bar. Less than a year later, Starbucks opened a coffeeshop at 709 University Drive East (replacing a location at the Gateway less than a mile away) next to it.


UPDATE 06-21-2021: This post was last updated in July 2020. Five Guys opened a store near the corner of East Tarrow and University East in early June. The whole post needs a major re-do soon. Also removed [1980s].

Boyett Street Businesses

One of the countercultural "back to nature" stores inspired by the late Whole Earth Catalog, this ad is from 1985 and is still around in Houston, Austin, and other major cities...just not in BCS.

This post will show some of the businesses of Boyett Road in detail, specifically the block between Patricia and University, not including the Campus Theater. The problem is that because of the way that tenants absorb each other and the spotty nature of the city directory, it's been exceedingly difficult to figure out what actually went where.

The current tenants in the here and now are the following:
103 - O'Bannon's Taphouse (an Irish-themed pub, if the name didn't give it away)
109 - Paddock (formerly "Paddock Lane" but they dropped the "Lane" and changed the logo)
113 - Tipsy Turtle

It's been difficult to find out buildings about this strip simply because they change addresses, so this next section may never be complete.

103 - Hole in the Wall (2000 directory, I seem to remember it had the same ownership of Shadow Canyon and may even have had an entrance)
105 - The Cue (1996 directory). Directories also mention a U.S. Marine Corps recruiter in this space. In 1985, this was Whole Earth Provision Company. Almost a decade before that, it was the home of University Cycling.

Are they talking about the elderly?
This space was probably absorbed into O'Bannon's later.

107 - Boyett Properties (office?)

109 - Paddock's space had "Gizmo's Cafe & Bar" in the 1980s. I received a comment a few years ago about this place: "I worked at Gizmo's in the late 80's as a server and bartender. It was a great little lunch place with good food. At night, it became the place where all of the Northgate bartenders and servers came to drink, as it was (notably at the time) the only place with a full liquor license on the Northgate strip. Fun times."

Doesn't sound like a bad place, but I like eating outside when the weather's nice, which sadly doesn't happen very often.
Gizmo's Cafe & Bar: it's from an old copy of InSite Magazine, this is now the site of Paddock Lane. Gizmo's was not the first tenant here, but it's what I have information for.

113 - This was BJ's Package Store in 1980, and likely that was the first store in this section (the building with apartments over it was built in the late 1970s). Later on, it became U.S. Marine Corps recruiters offices (moved from a different section?) and eventually becoming Pinky's New School Tattoos by the late 2000s.

Above Paddock Lane and Tipsy Turtle is some 1-bedroom apartments, located at 214 Patricia.


By no means is the list complete. I know I missed some ("Ozone", "Vertigo" being among the not-here), but email me if you have more information. (Updated June 2019, mostly reorganization).

Battle for the Promenade - 301 Patricia

From The Eagle, so apologies for the quality.

Rarely in this town do buildings vanish without a trace. Sure, Fish Richard's is gone completely, but those are exceptions, not rules. Did you know there was a tiny strip center where the Northgate parking lot is, which is next to the Promenade?

It was built at some point in the 1960s (it existed in 1971) late 1960s or early 1970s, and it featured four spaces, with the end store being a UtoteM, a convenience store commonly found in the South. The chain was ultimately bought and absorbed by Circle K in the mid-1980s but most of the UtoteM stores ended up closing (more on that later).

A bit blurry, but on the original, you can actually make out the U TOTE M sign!

A view from the early 1990s, looking east toward College Main.

Besides the UtoteM, the tenant history has been a little hard to tell: at one point, the three tenants renumbered. In the early 1980s, there was The Varsity Shop (a), Aggieland Washateria (b), and UtoteM (c), and in 1988, there was The Varsity Shop (a), Burger Boy (b), and "The Deli Shop" (c). At some point, however, the space that was UtoteM ended up becoming B, Burger Boy was in C, and B was Advanced Tutoring Services (in the early 1990s). In the mid-1970s, Planned Parenthood even maintained an office here (before their location at 303 College Main) in the era of UtoteM and Varsity Shop. Advanced Tutoring Services (ATS) was owned by the owners of Burger Boy, who might've sub-divided suite B. Additionally, in the mid-1980s (1983/1984 range), there was also Chanello's Pizza, which may have predated the spot where Burger Boy was.

The Varsity Shop, which survived from the 1970s to the 1990s. This ad is from the 1970s.
The UtoteM didn't survive long enough to be a Circle K (a 1983 phone book lists it as part of the UtoteM stores, but by 1984, it wasn't listed with the newly rebranded Circle K stores). If it did convert to a Circle K, it was brief: Circle K began to cut back the most run-down stores (many of the former UtoteM stores exist: the convenience store at College Main and Old College DID survive into the Circle K era). An InSite Magazine issue from 1997 (regarding the Northgate redevelopment) indicated that there was an Indian food store there at one time, but I haven't found it (it didn't seem to be "The Deli Shop", which offered "Frankie's Fried Chicken"). By 1996, it was the offices for the Northgate redevelopment. By the summer of 1997, it was being gutted.

Varsity Shop lasted for around 25 years but closed after spring 1996 after "they could not get any of their beauty operators to return because beauty operators depend on following and there were too many rumors going around" (InSite Magazine), which indicates that they were closed in summer.

It was suite C, though, that caused the stir when the building was going to be demolished in 1997. That was Burger Boy at Northgate (the only business left by December 1996), which had been there since the latter part of the 1980s. The owners of Burger Boy at the time felt like the city was overstepping its boundaries in the eviction of the restaurant, and there wasn't any suitable spot to move to Northgate at the time. It had to stay on Northgate, as a full 90% of its business was delivery via bike. It's worth noting that when Burger Boy moved to Northgate, it replaced the restaurant which is now the Bryan Fat Burger. In 1989, they also had their original location at what is La Familia Taqueria at 300 North Texas Avenue but closed it in favor of the Northgate location, which was now (at this point) at the soon-to-be-razed 301 Patricia. I don't know what was there before Burger Boy.

Ultimately Burger Boy was able to find a new location in Northgate (what is now Daily Ruckus, though prior to Burger Boy's move-in, it was a garage), which the Sopasakis continued to run for the next 13 years. After the Sopasakis retired, the location soon moved and closed in December 2012 (January 2 had the announcement that it would not reopen).

As for the rest of the building, it was flattened in late 1997 or early 1998 for the Northgate Promenade.

Here is one last picture, from The Eagle with George Sopasakis standing in front of his business. Again, apologies for the quality.

Information and photos are derived from a few The Eagle articles:
"Local Eatery Seeks New Home" - December 12, 1996
"Business owners express concerns about relocation" - June 11, 1997
"New Northgate look" - June 12, 1997

Updated March 2019 - Removed redundant paragraph, removed last section due to outdated metaposting, removed "Part One" from post title

Skaggs Albertsons / Skaggs Alpha Beta / Jewel-Osco / Albertsons

January 2011. The Albertsons had been closed for about 13 years by this point.
301 South College Avenue

Rhetorical Question: Why am I re-posting this, when I have had it since 2011?

Originally discussed on the University Square article, the old Albertsons that once anchored the center confused and perplexed many Aggies that have been here over the years, so here's the story. While scanning items for Project HOLD a few summers ago, I found that it opened as a Skaggs-Albertsons, with the center being (apparently named) the Skaggs Shopping Center. This was in 1971. I thought that the Skaggs name was dropped later, but what actually happened was a complicated brand name swap: Skaggs was a drug company, and Albertsons was grocery, so Skaggs Albertsons was a chain that had one of the first now-standard food and drug operations. Here's a picture of a Skaggs Albertsons in Florida. The Skaggs Albertsons would remain until late 1979, at which point Skaggs acquired American Stores, thus renaming itself as American Stores, and turned the store into what many people would know it by: "Skaggs Alpha Beta" in fall 1979.

Now, I do have an ad from that era but it's in such unbelievably low quality (for the microfilms, of course) that I'm ashamed to show it to you. Can it be cleaned up with a photo-editing program? Sure. Will I do it? Probably not, especially given at the rate that pictures are ripped off of here on a high basis without "real" visitors. This isn't other people's faults entirely: the new way that Google Image Search works now is rip the image out of context, which is unfortunate.

The new "American Stores" company continued to manage this store until it rebranded it as Jewel-Osco in 1991. Shortly after, Albertsons came back and bought the entire market off of American Stores (they would later come back and buy the rest of the company), and rebranded the store as Albertsons.

And so from about 1992 to 1997, Albertsons managed a store on the corner of College and University. However, Randalls, an upscale supermarket further down University, sold its store to Albertsons, causing the small supermarket to quickly be abandoned (it closed in November 1997, according to Wikimapia), and it continued stand for nearly another 15 years, longer than it had been any name.

Of course, a vacant building won't last forever, and in 2012, it finally began to come down, with demolition halting for months but continuing about a year later. Not much more than the east wall remains as of this writing.



An ad from the brief Jewel-Osco days. Note the "Special Supplement to The Eagle" to the left.

There's even a shot of a Sunny Delight bottle as I remember it, before they changed it to "Sunny D" (and later "SunnyD"). Tangy Original was called "Florida Style" and "Smooth" was "California Style".
Other shots, taken January 2011...






Regrettably, I couldn't get any of the interior on that shot, or any other time: the windows were painted over, and my one shot of the interiors was kind of messed up by the flash, and while it did capture some of the interior in a blurry configuration that revealed rows of fluorescents and columns, it mostly created a reflection of me, which I didn't like.


Whoa, Albertsons was open 24 hours! Must have been super-convenient, relatively rare (I don't think even H-E-B did when it first opened), and must have been fun to see at night when the bars had closed for the night.


What was left of Albertsons after the first major demo.


The first Christmas at the store.


Albertsons interior. (Official Stalworth Picture)


From The Eagle, shortly after the demo began.
The real fun thing that no one really knows about the store is that there were some real plans to actually reopen the store under the Albertsons name!

From the city's archives. Click for full size.

In May 2000, Albertsons filed plans with the city to reopen the store as Albertsons #2797. This time around, the Albertsons would have gained a fancy "Albertsons University Market" branding and come complete with a Starbucks and "J.A.'s Kitchen", a deli concept (JA stood for Joe Albertson) that Albertsons played around with for a short while in some stores (from what I can tell, it was just the regular deli usually placed in smaller stores or drug stores). The main reason this never happened was probably because of the issues the company was having at the time, trying to integrate American Stores into the company (which it bought) and fighting a losing battle in the main Houston grocery market (which the 27xx series were part of).

Too bad that was never the case, and the site is now a fenced-off grassy area, returned to simply potential.

Crossposted with some edits from Safeway and Albertsons in Texas. Post updated May 2019.