The Captain's Half Shell Oyster Bar / The Boat / Shipwreck Grill

I don't have a contemporary picture on file, but that shouldn't be too hard to find. Ad from The Eagle, October 1985.
Starting as The Captain's Half Shell Oyster Bar in 1985, which appears to have had other locations and likely as well a spin off of the extant Captain Benny's of Houston, today this 206 East Villa Maria Road is the home of Shipwreck Grill since fall 2009, owned by Wade and Mary Beckman.

The Captain's Half Shell Oyster Bar operated here from 1985 to 2002, and following that was another seafood restaurant, "The Boat", from 2002 to 2006. (Despite the name of Sam's Seafood on the tax record, it was not related to Houston-based Sam's Boat). After that, it sat abandoned for a few years, though according to tax records, just prior to Shipwreck changed hands to become "Melting Pot African-Caribbean Cuisine" (though this may have operated as a home-based catering service briefly). From 2013 to 2024, a second restaurant operated across the street, Amico Nave Ristorante. In March 2024, while the corpse of Amico Nave was still warm, the owners of Shipwreck Grill announced they would renovate the former Amico Nave into the new location of Shipwreck Grill, causing them to "abandon ship".

UPDATE 03-06-2024: Rewrite of existing post for Amico Nave addition.
UPDATE 09-04-2024: Shipwreck Grill has sailed away from this spot, having moved to the former Amico Nave at 203 East Villa Maria Road. ([defunct] added)

Mr. Gatti's on Northgate

One of the new restaurants of University Square was Mr. Gatti's (opening 1974), which had the tagline of "The best pizza in town (Honest)", and by all accounts, it was a decent pizza place. It had two levels, cold beer, and, as the ad above indicates, did have live entertainment (like a pre-fame Lyle Lovett). For nearly two decades, Mr. Gatti's thrived at 107 College Avenue.

The "pizzamat" (817 University Drive), as indicated above, was a take-out pizza and beer building and had the address of 817 University Drive. It was later the home of the little drive-through ATM (First National Bank?) which was Mt. Aggie Snow Cones in the late 1980s and early 1990s. The pizzamat replaced, and had the same address as the "Rao Drive Inn", an extremely cool looking drive-in straight out of the 1950s, was closed and torn down in the early part of the 1970s. (The ATM building, later rendered inaccessible due to parking lot removal, still stands today).

"54" is scribbled on the side. Did it open in 1954? (from Historic Brazos County: An Illustrated Journey)


In addition to the Pizzamat, there were a few other locations that came and went, most notably the location at Villa Maria and Texas Avenue (gone by the mid-1980s) and even a short-lived location at 2551 Texas Avenue South (more on that another time).

In 1996, Mr. Gatti's opened a second location in Bryan (again), featuring a huge arcade area. This would be Gattiland, but the story of that restaurant from there on out would only get worse...

Both stores continued to operate for a brief time but this location closed in 1997 and was torn down for a Schlotzsky's Deli soon after. That store continues to operate, later dropping the "Deli" portion and gaining a repaint in the late 2010s for the "Austin Eatery" theme re-do the chain went through.

Prior to dropping the "Deli" and adding Cinnabon. The patio has been expanded since then (2012). From Stalworth's website.



Edit 1/16/14: Added opening date, will make another update when Gattiland article is added.
2/14/14: link added
May 2019: Updates made.
UPDATE 01-19-2025: Both stores did operate simultaneously. This article has been amended with that and talk of other locations. Also, there is news that a new Mr. Gatti's (sans arcade) might make an appearance in the area again...but nothing yet.

Wickes Lumber

A full-service hardware store!
This has always been a building I've seen since my youth, operating as a business I can't remember anymore (it had six letters and appeared to be there for a while, given how faded it was) but originally, it was Wickes Lumber, operating since at least 1975 (likely built soon after the completion of the "West Loop"). Given the ad below, it seemed to be a full hardware store, even going with its own functioning railroad spur to bring in lumber directly.


I don't know when Wickes Lumber went out of business...FundingUniverse seems to indicate late 1980s or early 1990s, which makes sense and then somehow later down the line, Wickes was bought and operates in the UK exclusively, but such a thing is out of the scope out of this article.

You aren't missing much in terms of building variety.

After the closure of Wickes in the late 1980s or early 1990s (as mentioned before), about two or three other businesses tried their hand at the building. There was that faded sign with six characters in the early to mid-1990s (as far as I know that was the first tenant after Wickes) and something else as well later (or two), until finally coming to Moore Supply Co. and their "Bath & Kitchen Showplace" (initially with a tiny sign) sometime in the early to mid 2000s. Sometime since this post was last updated (2017?) Bath & Kitchen Showplace renamed to "Facets".

The surrounding buildings that Wickes had were all sold off (they were owned by Wickes--during the right time of day, you can see a Wickes Lumber "labelscar" on the Boral Bricks building). Brazos Valley Turf occupies the building to the right of it (has been there for years), and Boral Bricks was in the back (probably originally something else after Wickes). The addresses are all different...Wickes Lumber had been 101 West Loop, but the current addresses include Moore Supply Co. as 1530 Harvey Mitchell, Brazos Valley Turf as 101 N. Dowling Road (which is strange since the same address is shared with Living Water Pottery), and Boral Bricks ("Boral Bricks Studio"?) is at 95 N. Dowling Road. Brazos CAD was no help in trying to get any information on the confusing addresses of these things, nor any old phone books. The only things that I gleaned from my resources was that Brazos Valley Turf opened in the late 1990s (which makes sense with what I remember), but even before BV Turf opened, the address of Country Grocery was 101 A N. Dowling Road, which suggests that even back in '96, there was a second address for that.

Finally, we have those pictures of railroad spur I mentioned before. It shut down around or before the untimely closure of Wickes Lumber, and a cell phone tower has been built on the site, but some of it remains today. These pictures were taken in June 2010 with my then-new cell phone camera, and I'm excited to show these, even if they are low quality. It had been around since at least 1975, so it was likely built soon after the completion of the "West Loop".

One more story—in the late 1990s or early 2000s, someone had the bright idea of parking their car in the wide right of way area between Harvey Mitchell Parkway and the parking lot, and putting a "For Sale" sign on it. This, in turn, was a success. The car was sold, and other people started to put up their cars in the space to be sold. At one time there was up to five cars, and no less than 3, until TxDOT got fed up with people parking their cars there, and put up a row of "No Parking" signs in the area that remained until construction of the overpass began.

UPDATE 03-20-2021: Added back section that was previously from "Photos of the West Loop". There's some sort of collision center coming to the former Boral Bricks area, but I need to get more information.

UPDATE 01-04-2024: A few corrections and updates.

I did want to make a few corrections. The warehouses behind the store were indeed part of Wickes Lumber, before the construction of Joe Hudson's Collision Center (today at 95 N. Dowling Road and opened around August 2022), you COULD see the faded Wickes Lumber scar on one of the buildings on Wellborn Road, given the right light conditions. Wickes Lumber also opened in 1974.

Some additional information I uncovered that there was a "JST CONCRETE CO INC" (operating from 1995 to 1996) at the address; however I can't confirm or deny it was the first tenant I remember seeing there, as well as Les Investments Inc. from 1990 to 1994 (probably not the actual name on the building) and "SHR ROOFING SUPPLY INC." from 1994 to 1997. Showman Electrical Supply Co. Inc. was here from 2001 to 2002 and used the 1530 Harvey Mitchell address (the first to do so, looks like).

Also, I believe 2017 was when B&K Showplace became Facets, with a repaint coming around that time.

UPDATE 08-10-2024:: Sometime in the first half of 2024, Facets moved to 3164 Holleman Drive South Suite 600, presumably the space here has been absorbed into more warehouse space.

McDonald's & Blockbuster

This picture was taken by author, around 2011 or 2012.
Opening in December 2001 as the first of its kind and receiving its first renovation around 2008, College Station was once the home of an extremely rare (only three were ever built) McDonald's/Blockbuster combo store. While the two had separate addresses (1748 Rock Prairie Road for the Blockbuster and 1750 Rock Prairie Road for the McDonald's), you could access the stores from each other on the inside and in many ways as a prototype for the Redbox kiosks, which McDonald's first developed as a wholly owned subsidiary before it was sold to Coinstar.¹ The 2008 remodel cut down on the huge cavernous feel of the original store for a separation into three separate dining areas that the company was pushing at the time, an area for kids near the Playplace indoor playground (which it always had), the "Grab n Go" zone, and the "couches" area. I didn't really like the post-remodel version, but I remember being impressed with the original layout when I went for a "McTeacher" night when teachers made burgers for charity in middle school.

However, the 2008 remodel still maintained the original layout and connection to Blockbuster, and I was unable to take a picture of Blockbuster's interior (the store had a no pictures policy, got caught by the clerk...wasn't subtle enough) before it closed in spring 2013 during one of the waves of closures when then-owner² Dish Network was purging the company of its remaining company-owned stores. By July 2013, some McDonald's signage and decor appeared on the outside of the Blockbuster side, which was cleared of all décor, which didn't exactly look aesthetically pleasing.

In late 2015, Sola Salon opened their College Station location in the former Blockbuster. However, McDonald's space had already been walled off. In 2020, the McDonald's renovated again inside and out (no more red mansard roof).

1. Coinstar purchased 47% in 2005 and increased its share to 51% in 2008 before buying the rest from McDonald's in 2009. Through various parent companies, Redbox remained a partner with McDonald's until the failure of its parent company at the time, Chicken Soup for the Soul Entertainment, in 2024, when it finally disappeared.
2. I say "then owner" because at the time Dish Network still had an active role in Blockbuster's operations. Despite little role in the operations of the "Last Blockbuster", EchoStar (a former Dish spin-off which purchased the company in 2023) still owns the Blockbuster trademarks.

UPDATE 07-31-2026: Did a rewrite of the article, having barely been touched since it was added close to fifteen years ago. During the process, some links were fixed.
UPDATE 08-29-2026: Here is a picture of mine from January 2020 (from my car) of the last section of mansard roof during the remodel.