Townshire Shopping Center

Bad sign when there's a "Now Open" sign nearly a year after actually opening. (May 2014)

Opening in 1958 (it advertised to even Hearne) with Safeway, Lester's, Hotard Cafeteria, Kelly's Toylane, Stacy's Furniture, Texas State Optical, Woolworth's, the "Laundromart", and Sears, Townshire was one of the first big shopping destinations that started to draw attention away from Downtown Bryan, arguably the first shopping center in Bryan.

The Sears was at a slightly different grade than the rest of Townshire. At only 21,800 square feet, which was rather small (a "B" class store) for Sears, especially since a "full size" Sears was 10 times that size at the time. After Sears moved out, it would become Central Texas Hardware for a while, and eventually facilities for Blinn (which happily vacated it after their new campus in Bryan was built, as by the time that happened, the building was in horrible condition).

Here's the 1964 tenant list from a document about Montgomery Ward's consideration of moving out of downtown:



Lester's pulled out before the downtown Bryan location did, in 1973 when it moved to a stand-alone location.

Safeway probably moved out in 1977 to its later home catty-corner to where Village Foods is now, and eventually to its current home, where it lasted less than 2 years (at best) before becoming AppleTree (and you know the rest), but by that time, Townshire was already beginning its decline, with Manor East Mall and newer strip centers, like Culpepper Plaza and Redmond Terrace. Finally, Post Oak Mall opened, putting all of the Bryan shopping centers in deep decline. By the early 1980s, Townshire was getting cleared out.

Townshire reopened in great fanfare in 2002 by the same developers that built the Rock Prairie Kroger center with a new facade and a completely rebuilt north anchor, when the ratty old Sears/Central Texas Hardware/Blinn building was torn down and replaced with the area's third Albertsons supermarket, joining the two in College Station (that would be the one next to Wal-Mart and the one on University Drive East, both of which I covered) and attempted to give the nearby Kroger and H-E-B Pantry Foods a run for the money. Despite seemingly solidifying the grocery race (at the time it was built, H-E-B, Kroger, and Albertsons all had three stores in the area each), it was an odd choice since at that time. Albertsons was retreating from Houston area (after a short run of less than a decade) and San Antonio, with Waco and Austin (and the breakup of Albertsons Inc.) not more than a few years away (the three stragglers, including the one in College Station, would all close by 2011). For all its fanfare, the new Albertsons at Townshire didn't even last five years, and closed in 2006, becoming one of the shortest-lived grocery stores in town, though not even close to unseating poor Weingarten near Post Oak Mall.

But the new Townshire didn't whither up, despite the loss of its largest tenant. CiCi's and a dollar store (now King Dollar, but not originally) kept trucking, and several service-oriented tenants came in.

Around 2012 or so, the Albertsons gas station reopened as a generic "Tigerland Express" (which also never took down its "now open" banner and remained as such after it closed a few years later), and in the summer of 2013, the new Walmart grocery store finally opened.

Of course, Walmart Neighborhood Market was much more downscale than the Albertsons it replaced, but it was much cheaper and closer to what the neighborhood needed. It didn't hurt H-E-B very much, and Village Foods was having its own problems thanks to some extensive road construction. However, it too had problems. While Village Foods was going through out of business sales, it abruptly shut down as part of a major purge Walmart did with underperforming/high shrink stores.

Even when Walmart injected some new life into the shopping center, the rest of the strip never really picked up traffic and largely remains vacant. A partial tenant list is below, with the address in parentheses.

Albertsons - Albertsons #2796 never lasted long at Townshire (only from 2002 to 2006), but it made a profound impact at it. The store featured the "Grocery Palace" ("Theme Park") decor of Albertsons (though missing the high-end features), an upscale décor package that featured specialty flooring for departments. Details of the store when it was at Townshire can be seen here. Check out my other site's section on Albertsons, though it's still under construction as of this writing. The Walmart kept much of the exterior features of the Albertsons but repainted it. (1901)

AlphaGraphics - Bought out Tops Printing, a local professional printing company that relocated here after the redevelopment (2023). May 2014 picture here. (2023)

Buddy's Home Furnishings - Opened sometime in 2014 or soon before. Can be seen in this picture. (2009)

Burdett & Son Outdoor Adventure Shop - Here in the early 1990s before eventually moving to Redmond Terrace Shopping Center. (2017)

CiCi's Pizza - This replaced the old shopping center's open-air arcade with smaller stores. Can be seen in this picture(2003)

Dollar Tree - A tenant after the re-do, here in 2005 but gone by 2014. (1915)

Domino's Pizza - Here as of 1993. (2015)

Goodwill - Was indeed here in the late 1990s. (1913)

Kelly's Toylane - Moved out in the early 1980s to 404 University Drive East, disappeared by 1989. At one time the only dedicated toy store in town. (2007)

King Dollar - This wasn't here in the big re-do, but the prices have crept upwards since 2014 since the header picture was taken, now up to $1.25 as of this writing. A similar thing was noticed at Houston's 290 store. (1903)

Safeway - You can see the original Safeway building here, though it's been heavily modified (it's on the right) and moved out in the 1970s to a comparatively larger store. The former H-E-B Pantry is behind it, but that's for another post!

Walmart Neighborhood Market - See the main post.

Woolworth - Closed at Townshire prior to 1980 (downtown Bryan one remained open).

World of Books - Here in 1980, the address is unknown (it also had a store at Culpepper Plaza at this time).

I realize that I left out a lot (I'll add others over time) but I wanted to mostly update Townshire as a consistent narrative in this March 2020 update.

Redmond Terrace Shopping Center / Texas Avenue Crossing

Author's picture from August 2019. The overcast makes the buildings appear shadowed.
Among the retail establishments off of Texas Avenue is Texas Avenue Crossing (a name not seen on signage, by the way) is also the only strip center for miles around with rooftop parking. Texas Avenue Crossing is the redone version of a previous shopping center called Redmond Terrace Shopping Center, built in 1964 at Jersey and Texas Avenue on the site of a dairy farm. Major stores were Gibson's discount store, Ben Franklin five and ten, Brookshire Brothers, and a post office. All of these were housed under a continuous "squiggly roof" (not unlike the defunct discount store The Treasury). As most of the Gibson's were franchised operations (a few Dallas stores even had supermarket departments), it ultimately was their undoing as franchisees like Howard Brothers and Pamida pulled out. The Gibson's here was quite small (clocking in at around 30,000 square feet INCLUDING the garden center) but did include a pharmacy despite its size. It liquidated in December 1982 and in 1983 was replaced with Academy. The Brookshire Brothers space was sold to Piggly Wiggly in 1973 (the store was small even by Brookshire Brothers' standards, much smaller than Navasota's or Hearne's Brookshire Brothers), though Brookshire Brothers did get another chance in College Station when it opened a new store on George Bush Drive West many years later. The post office was replaced with Joe's Used Books.

Compared to the top picture, this is how it's supposed to look color-wise. (Picture by author, 8/19)
Jason's Deli (a Stacy's Furniture for a time, by address) would be on the far right of the center. Other stores included Burdett & Son's and Loupot's, as well as a mattress/furniture liquidator. Here's a picture of Burdett & Son's, in which you can see the original figuration as well.

Burdett & Son was here from 1997 to 2002, as says their website. Copy Corner is off to the right.


Here's the directory listings for what the center was like as Redmond Terrace circa 1998.

1400 - Stand-alone Zip'N gas station (Shell) at the corner of George Bush (Jersey) and Texas Avenue. The earliest reference I can find May have replaced an older gas station, only 1,000 square feet. This went first around 2002 with little more than some remains in a raised section of concrete to show that something was here. It looks like it was originally an Amoco and became a Shell Zip'N in the late 1980s (#101, chosen as the first store to be rebranded).
1710 George Bush Drive - Not part of the 1400 block, but Joe's Books in the late 1990s was the closest to the George Bush side.
1402 - Brown's Shoe Fit from sometime in the 1980s to the early 2000s
1404 - Copy Corner
1404A - Jason's Deli. I remember how Jason's Deli was one of the last buildings to be torn down, and the first to be rebuilt.
1406 - Piggly Wiggly closed in 1980. It was K&M Sebring School of Hair Design by 1981 which had evolved into Sebring Career School in 1989 (same focus), the last mention of it at this address was Career Technical Institute in 1991. It became Discount Office Furniture by 1992 and very briefly "CC Reprographics" in 1996. It later became Burdett & Sons by 1997 (to 2002)
1408 - The directory for 1998 lists "Vincent AC" or something like that, but I only remember a mattress liquidator being here.
1410 - AR Photography
1418 - Gibson's Discount Center in 1976 and Academy by the mid-1980s. By the 1990s it was rebadged as 1420, possibly due to an expansion in the late 1980s.
1422 - Loupot's Book Store. This moved to the center at Holleman and Texas Avenue and is a Salata today. This appears to be originally part of Gibson's, and originally had a south entrance for a garden center.

In 2001, Redmond Terrace would lose its largest anchor when Academy announced it would move out to the bypass (the new store opened February 2002, a store now closed and replaced by an even larger one), and shortly thereafter it was announced that the entire shopping center would be wrecked for a new center: Texas Avenue Crossing. While one portion was saved and rehabbed (today home of Boot Barn—see tenant list—and I think this was where Jason's Deli originally was), the rest was demolished and built anew, and for the next fifteen years the center was extremely stable tenant-wise.

On top of Total Wine going to Jason's Deli is that rooftop parking area, but it's never been very full. An elevator takes you back near Burlington.

Over at the Shell spot, a new plaza was built with Panda Express (new to the market), Complete Nutrition (formerly "Bath Junkie"), James Avery Craftsman (originally something else?), and Cold Stone Creamery (new to the market).

TAC remains rather popular, having brought new retailers to the market and a popular lunch spot with inexpensive restaurants (Jason's Deli, particularly, remains a popular after-church spot).

Here's the current directory.

1400 - Panda Express in the strip center that replaced the Shell. It opened in 2004.
1404 - Formerly Bath Junkie from 2005 to 2009, later Complete Nutrition. It later converted to Supplement Warehouse (by 2022, though the name on the store didn't change) and closed by spring 2025. (1402 not used)
1406 - James Avery jewelry store.
1408 - Cold Stone Creamery.
1410 - Crust Pizza Company opened here in October 2024 on the north side of the building, replacing longtime tenant DoubleDave's Pizzaworks at the north end of the center (2005 to close May 1, 2023).
1414 - European Wax Center (1412 not used), originally Urban Salon.
1416 - The original tenant here, Charming Charlie, opened in 2006 as one of the first stores in the chain (the chain launched in 2004, and this was only store #5 out of nearly 400). It was vacant before CC. In August 2019, the store and the 260 other stores in the chain (at the time) announced it would go out of business. Rally House opened in 2022 to replace it.
1424 - Pier 1 Imports moved from Post Oak Square and closed in early 2020 before the entire chain filed for bankruptcy protection and liquidated. A few years later, Boot Barn moved to the center from Tejas Center and absorbed 1418, which was originally Mattress Giant and later transformed into another MattressFirm location (it happened not long after they had built a store at the former Blockbuster at Holleman). It would close around 2020. 1420 and 1422 were never used.
1430 - Bed Bath & Beyond until it closed in 2023 and became Burlington by year-end (see update 02-10-2024). 1424-1428 not used.
1440 - This was Pine Boutique in most of the 2010s (I think it closed in 2020). For years Ritz Camera & Image (moved from across the street), closed in 2012, one of the last ones to close. In late 2022, Optimum opened a storefront here.
1432-1438 not used.
1446 - Palm Beach Tan (originally Darque Tan for years)
1450 - Total Wine & More opened in 2022. Formerly World Market before it closed around the late 2010s/early 2020s (before parent company Bed Bath & Beyond sold it). 1448 not used.
1460 - Jason's Deli. 1452-1458 not used.


As a closing shot, I've added a picture taken by my dad from 2002 showing the empty Academy.

UPDATE 10-07-2025: Previous updates archived with some rewritten parts and a new photograph.

FedMart

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


Before Wal-Mart...before Kmart...there was FedMart. Founded in 1954 in San Diego by Sol Price and later had concepts "borrowed" by the late Sam Walton, including the "Mart" suffix¹, FedMart arrived in College Station in November 1973, just a few months before Kmart did.

By the time FedMart opened in College Station, the name was a bit of a misnomer (originally a membership-only store for government employees), but it was a large, modern store open to all. The store featured "one-stop shopping" including not only apparel, sporting goods, appliances (even heavy appliances), and other dry goods, but groceries as well. (It also appears to have lacked a bakery and deli). The November 7th, 1973 edition of The Eagle ran a huge 12-page multi-page guide/ad for the store for the store's big opening on November 8th, mostly talking about FedMart's features (but did not include a map). An auto center/gas station was to open in early 1974. FedMart had a bit of unusual merchandise mix, having both discount store items and food, but not a large selection of either. The grocery component was heavily advertised but only offered a few brands or sizes of a given item that a full supermarket would carry more of, even by 1973 supermarket standards, and lacked a lot of the features that a full supermarket would have (no bakery or deli). The College Station store was part of a small handful of stores opened by the company in the Houston area, as in this era, FedMart had picked up numerous sites from Globe, a discount store operated by Walgreens.

A spread in November 1973 showed some of FedMart's many specials. In previous versions of this page, this was just a thumbnail but now you can view it at full size!
The development also straightened out Tarrow with a new road that connected to University called Fed Mart Drive and cutting off the "old Tarrow" portion that curved around toward the back.

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.

FedMart's time in College Station would only be for less than a decade, perhaps owing to upper management's merchandising decisions (based out of Germany starting in the late 1970s) 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). Maybe it was just the fact that at the time, the warehouse foods + discount store concept was not as effective as just having a more full-featured discount store like Wal-Mart and Kmart did. In any case, the College Station store, along with all the other stores in the Texas area (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.

Aerial photo of FedMart around the time it closed, c. 1981

While the building would never be used by a single retail tenant, it was purchased by local investors and converted into Chimney Hill Shopping Center. The first tenants of these would be Kettle and Hillside Lanes, a bowling alley. Kettle #145 would ultimately close just a few years later but with its opening, for a brief time the area had FIVE Kettle restaurants, all open 24 hours—next to Rodeway Inn, a former Denny's restaurant, the College Station location, and the one near campus.

Unlike the other four restaurants, which stood alone, both Hillside Lanes and Kettle would open into each other. (While Kettle was a bit of a nostalgic experience in the 2010s, a smoky diner connected to a bowling alley sounds like a VERY different experience). Western Beverages moved into the old FedMart Service Center building at the corner of Fed Mart Drive (renamed Tarrow Street East within a few years) and University Drive East. The transformation into Chimney Hill Shopping Center (aka Chimney Hill Retail Plaza) started in late 1983 a 70-foot tall landmark sign was erected to serve as the signage for a brand-new shopping center. That same month it was announced that the Western Beverages would be evicted and remodeled for the new Bryan-College Station Chamber of Commerce building (later known as 715 University Drive East).

The name of the center was named after a nearby development of mixed-use development built off Tarrow with townhomes and small office suites (the alley off Arguello Drive serves both). By December 1983 David Gardner's Jewelers was operating in the building (it was here at least into the early 1990s). Soon after, Chimney Hill Bowling Center opened. There was also a new addition to the FedMart building that housed the relocated Western Beverages.

Hillside Lanes closed in December 1983 but quickly reopened as Chimney Hill Bowling Center (within a few days).² In 1990 the bowling alley closed³ and most of the building continued to be a rotating selection of smaller tenants, with the exception of Western Beverages, the second restaurant space, and a second outlot built in the parking lot. This second outlot (besides the Chamber of Commerce) was built as Fletcher's Original State Fair Corny Dogs, which had several small locations in Texas but by the late 1980s they had closed.⁴ This was briefly (for a few months) Burger Express, then Dogs & Such until 2000.⁵ From 2002 to September 2010, a location of Shake's Frozen Custard operated in the spot, but after its closure the building was demolished.

The restaurant space (with the address of 707 University Drive East)⁶ started out as Bill Edge's "Confederate House" restaurant in early 1984 (back when a name like was socially acceptable as Southern hospitality and heritage, and not demonized like it is today), based after a Houston restaurant. Part of the problem was that the area was in recession when it opened, and a "top of the line" steakhouse as it was put was a tough sell in the economy. A name update to "Confederate House '85" and new management (likely other changes as well) didn't help turn things around, nor did another retool (changing it to "Tradition Restaurant & Bar") saved the restaurant. It closed around late 1986 or early 1987. By August 1987, there was another restaurant, Cafe d'Amerique, operating in the space.

One last retool for Confederate House.

Rembrandt's opened in 1992 after a period of vacancy (doesn't seem like there was anything after Cafe d'Amerique, which closed in spring 1988) and closed in 1994...and then The Tavern on Chimney Hill opened in 1997 in suite 406 and operated until 2000. Finally, in 2007, The Republic Steakhouse opened in the spot. Shortly afterward, however, in 2008, the City of College Station purchased the strip center as part of a failed bid to build a large hotel/conference center in the spot.⁷ The early 2010s saw the center start clearing out (Western Beverages went away around as late as early 2014, I seem to recall) and in 2016 demolition began not long after the City gave up on the space and sold it to developers. The idea was The Republic could stay as the lot was redeveloped and be a part of the new development, but plans shifted again and it would move to a new building on the site. (There was also talk of a Black Walnut Cafe being a major tenant). By this point in time, the Chamber of Commerce building had moved out to a new location on Highway 6 (the move happened around 2013-2014) with 2016 seeing the demolition of the structure minus The Republic building, which itself had been new construction. The original FedMart building was gone.

By 2019 new businesses had taken its place. The Republic moved into a new spot at the southwest side of the property (with a bar-within-a-restaurant, Primrose Path). A new Starbucks opened in March 2020 (moving from down the street) with a strip center beginning business soon after, soon filled out with the likes of Five Guys, FedEx Office (opened in early 2022 and moving from its longtime Northgate home), Charles Schwab, and Snooze: An AM Eatery. Drury Plaza Hotel (705 University Dr. East) opened for business around early 2025. In November 2025, Sakura, a Japanese restaurant opened a new building (713 University Drive East) right about where The Republic used to be, sharing its strip mall building with hair salon Drybar.

1. The rest of the concept was lifted liberally from New England chain Ann & Hope, which Wal-Mart forced out of business in 2001. 2. I'm not sure how the Kettle space was reused.
3. I feel like I read somewhere that the lanes were moved to the MSC but I may be remembering how Wolf Pen's skating rink was moved from Bryan.
4. There was another location on Gessner Road in Houston. While no longer a Fletcher's, the building is still the same, and looked identical to the College Station location.
5. A second location opened on Texas Avenue at the short-lived Red Line location.
6. Officially this was 701 University Drive East Suite 406.
7. There were of course, other tenants over the years but I've already covered the major ones. Some of the lesser tenants that were mentioned in the older version of this post included the 1993 tenants like A&M Travel Service, Beneficial Texas Inc. (insurance), Chimney Hill Florist & Gifts, and Qualice Network Services.

UPDATE 01-28-2026: A long-awaited redo of the post has been created, from a new picture to current events to more chronological ordering and so on.
UPDATE 01-30-2026: As the most recent rewrite was sitting in the backlog for a few years before I decided to finish it, there were some things that didn't quite make the cut. Some things from an old "new" draft included an article about the 2013 plan and confirms that Western Beverages was still there as of 2013. The new Republic restaurant opened in December 2018 allowing for the demolition of the old building, and a few more tenants that I didn't previously mentioned. There was "Whoops Bar & Grill" (which I got from a tax listing, and did not seem to open under that name if it all), Tonix/Metro/The Lounge (operated in the last half of the 2000s, a nightclub with three concepts operating simultaneously), A&M Travel Service, Total Tan, Reflections Hair Design, Qualice Network Services, Points Plus, EPI Center, JE & R Finance Inc., Custom Operating Systems Inc., 11th Frame, and Pacific Garden (1986-1990, this may have been in the Kettle's space...though wouldn't have opened into the bowling alley). I had also taken the time to mention that I went into the Chamber of Commerce building a few times to get the latest city map, which I remember being fascinated with as a kid as it included "new" streets, some of which were later built (Highway 40) and some of which weren't (Jones-Butler Road extending south from Holleman but looping and connecting with Southwest Parkway)...which I'm not sure was ever on the books.

PLAY Gaming Café

Taken June 2014.

Once a Planned Parenthood location a long time ago (likely something else, built in 1964), this is now a bar (Cedar Lane, another bar is in the back), but the focus is on PLAY Gaming Café, which was open around 2005 and advertised at Hastings (another now-defunct establishment). The College Main location was tucked out of sight from the main Northgate establishments, and related parking problems didn't help. From the comments, I have this quote from "downhillcrasher", "I remember Play pretty well, they had everything from the latest games to old school nintendo. Almost everything that is. What didn't they have? Cheap beer. And what do you need to make it in Northgate? Cheap beer." The archived website website sort of works, but almost nothing remains of it on the Wayback Machine save for a Flash intro video and a page of the forums (appropriately, from 2005).

UPDATE 01-27-2026: The first address I can find for 303 College Main (this building's address) is Aggieland Agency (Fidelity Union Life Insurance Company). It had vacated by 1977. In 1978, there was Financial Achievements Inc. with Planned Parenthood at 303B¹ though by the late 1980s it had expanded to the rest of the building. In 2001 it served as a leasing office for Tradition at Northgate, and after PLAY, it briefly served as the new reincarnation of Varsity Shop (see this article) before becoming Cedar Lane in 2008.
1. Planned Parenthood did not offer abortions at this facility and explicitly denied being abortionists, it operated (at least stated to operate, depending on your point of view) as a clinic that screened for cancer and information in regards to unwanted pregnancies, including alternate solutions than abortion.

H-E-B Pantry / Gattitown / DSW

The store today (picture mine). The facade just keeps getting bigger and bigger...

H-E-B built its first store in College Station in 1991 (according to InSite Magazine) at 2026 Texas Avenue South, a time when they were starting to expand H-E-B from outside of its confines in Central Texas toward East Texas, Houston, and even Louisiana. College Station-Bryan got three of them in 1991 before the first Houston stores in 1992.

Unlike the full line H-E-B stores, the Pantry stores were small even by early 1990s standards (averaging 20k to 30k square feet) and lacked departments that other stores had, only with a meat counter, produce, and a very small collection (maybe one aisle) of non-food items like HBA (health & beauty aids) and pet items. At the same time, two more stores were built in Bryan, one near the intersection of Twin Boulevard and South Texas Avenue, and one near the intersection of Old Hearne Road and North Texas Avenue.

I'm still mad that I lost both of my store directories for this store, which in addition to showing the layout also listed all of the H-E-B Pantry stores, though you can see the list here on Houston Historic Retail.

Instead of parking spaces in front of it like the other stores in the center, it had a large ramp in front of it for shoppers. Inside, it had mid-rising drop ceilings with a few random "Texas" graphics, such as a picture of a bunch of haybales scattered through a field. The produce was in the right side, there were ten check-out stands (with one being an express lane, 10 items or less), a photo developing kiosk, a "bakery" that didn't seem to make anything that fresh (fare was mostly limited to some tasteless bagels, the stuff that would be sold in the bread aisle today).

In 2002, this store closed and was replaced with the massive and modern store across Holleman. That wasn't the end for the space, though in summer 2003, Gattiland closed its Bryan location and moved into the old Pantry Foods store within the month. Although I was getting too old to be part of the Gattitown demographic by the time it opened, I visited anyway, because it was new, and it was to be the latest in the technology. Gattitown totally rebuilt the facade (the Texas part remained visible from the back, but unless you lived in one of the apartments behind the complex, you could not see it) and removed the ramp in the parking lot, making it smooth. You also had to enter through the sides.

“When we built [the Bryan location] it was the second GattiLand we built,” Moffett said. “This is the latest generation, and it’s going to be more comfortable and fun for every age. From here on out, they’re all going to be GattiTowns.”

This is the sixth restaurant to open under the GattiTown name and “eatertainment” theme, and each is decorated to reflect its community, Moffett said. At the College Station restaurant, an Aggieland Dining Room will be lined with reproductions of Benjamin Knox paintings. The drink station is positioned beneath a mock water tower, and other rooms include a city hall and a mock movie theater.

The game room will occupy the entire back section of the restaurant, but Moffett said adults can find quiet dining areas in a corner cafe and the Library, which will have high-speed Internet connections and five iMac computers for customer use.

Moffett said he plans to hire a full-time marketing employee to promote the restaurant’s meeting space, which is free to use once customers buy a meal. There also are two meeting rooms set apart from the customer traffic flow, and some of the dining rooms have sliding walls that can divide them into smaller spaces.

The "mock water tower" was modeled after by-then defunct old water tower at the corner of Park Place and Texas Avenue, and as for the "Library", I never did find (employees didn't seem to know where it was, a sign of bad things to come), but it apparently did exist and was soon converted into another theater room. The midway area wasn't all that better than Gattiland, if anything, it seemed smaller. There wasn't even room for a playground. The old style tokens that Gattiland used was replaced by a card system.

Well, initially Gattitown was a huge success and the parking lot stayed packed every Friday and Saturday night. But as the years wore on, Gattitown started to get competition in the form of Chuck E. Cheese which opened at Post Oak Mall in 2005, and at Grand Central Station, which happened soon after. Chuck E. Cheese did the most damage to Gattitown, with Gattitown's knockoff formula competing with the original, and just like that, Gattitown slid downhill just like its predecessor. It was pretty much exclusively for kids (no classic arcades, or even alcohol) for that matter, and even then stayed pretty empty except for the "Kids Eat Free" nights. In July 2012, Gattitown closed. The pizza was now abysmal (not even fully cooked) and Mr. Gatti's left the area for good after nearly 40 years of jumping around town.

It wasn't the end of the space, though: in fall of 2013, it reopened as DSW (Designer Shoe Warehouse). Despite the fact that the facade of the old Gattitown/Pantry was completely covered up, the design restored the appearance of a retail store, so if you go inside and close your eyes you can almost remember how the Pantry used to be laid out.

In the same shopping center (developed by H-E-B originally), there's also Hastings, built after H-E-B, and later became Havertys.

2006 - Star Nails
2008 - Originally Sir Knight Tuxedoes (1996-2005) and later The Pita Pit (operated from 2006 to around 2021)
2010 - Marble Slab Creamery
2048 - Scoots (scooter rental), moved out 2024 to a stand-alone and Gong Cha as of 2025
2050 - Freebirds World Burrito
2050E - Old Navy (took up unused space but added a new facade, opened 1998).

UPDATE 02-24-2022: Updated for Pita Pit's closure, adding the tuxedo store previously mentioned, did some rearranging to list Old Navy with the others (along with a fixed date), and updated an old sentence to account for Hastings' closure.
UPDATE 04-04-2023: Our sister site Carbon-izer did manage to have the H-E-B Pantry College Station picture submitted to them through an anonymous contributor. Check it out here! Some of the first paragraphs have been changed, including linking to a Bryan store.
UPDATE 06-30-2023: In fall 2022, a new restaurant, Champion Pizza, opened in the former Pita Pit, but it probably won't last the year—a photo from TexAgs shows the odd, short hours the pizza restaurant actually has (even if it IS from NYC).
UDPATE 10-05-2025: Accounted for Scoots closure and replacement restaurant.

Marooned on Northgate

Courtesy Project HOLD
Editor's Note: Originally, I had created this page as "104-115 College Main". It was created to follow the breakup of an even larger page on Northgate (now offline). This page was later slowly broken up to make new pages like Kyoto Sushi, Antonio's Pizza by the Slice, Sarge's, Dead Lazlo's Coffee Pub, and Former Aggie Cleaners on College Main.

Pictured here is what is now known as Social Lounge but was Marooned in the 1990s (1990-1998), a record store that many still remember today. After a brief stint as a Quizno's, in 2005, it transitioned permanently into bar space, originally named V-Bar. In 2007, V-Bar had a bit of bad publicity when a Rice basketball player was killed during a stabbing, but ultimately, the story came out that the man (and his brother, who was also injured) were killed because they were beating another man to death and the man's friend came to his aid. That's the short version of it anyway, but because of the bad publicity from the attack, in the late 2000s, V-Bar became "Social Lounge" (same ownership).

From what information can be found on the building, here is a rough chronology: Aggie Tailors (1952?-1955?)
The Slaxatorium (circa 1955, love the name)
Nita's Alterations (circa 1964, see here)
Stereo Shack (fall 1972)
The Hanging Tree (1973-1974)
Cycles Etc. (c. 1987, before they moved within the block)
The Aggie Grill (1988)
Taipei Express (1989)
Marooned (1990-1998)
Quizno's (2002-2004)
V-Bar (2005-~2007)
Social Lounge (~2008-present)
Due to the fact that there are large gaps in between, this probably isn't the complete chronology of the space (see below). Making this complex is it's technically a part of the same building that holds Foundation Room (colloquially "Foundies") today. As mentioned before, that building was previously covered on the blog; however, the gaps don't seem to indicate that a larger tenant occupied both at the same time.

UPDATE 04-02-2022: Cut down post to just 110 College Main and updated that section. UPDATE 10-07-2025: Removed Editor's Note, added new tenants (Aggie Tailors, The Slaxatorium, Nita's Alterations, Cycles Etc., The Aggie Grill). Added [The Slaxatorium] as a label as a joke. It really shouldn't get a label like that (it's not for one-offs) but I love it.

Ardan Catalog Showroom / Rolling Thunder / Gattiland / Thunder Elite / Planet Fitness

The former Ardan/Gattiland/Thunder Elite (and current Planet Fitness) at 1673 Briarcrest as it stood in June 2015. (Picture by author.)
This place in Bryan-College Station is best remembered (at least to me) as Gattiland, but the history of the building goes farther beyond that, and we'll start there instead.

There were plenty of discount stores and similar operation in the 1960s and 1970s, most of which were bankrupt by the mid-1980s (if not earlier) and part of the problem was that they were scattered across the country with no real distribution system in place. Naturally, Bryan would be the home to a few of these doomed ventures including Cook's and Ardan Catalog Showroom. Despite being the fourth-largest in the country in 1979, there isn't much information on it. Even Google brings up this very page as the first result. Based out of Des Moines, there were about ten stores in Texas though none in big markets. No stores in Houston, just Bryan, Beaumont, and Galveston. The whole chain went under in 1986, and by that time Service Merchandise had taken over Wilson's and was firmly in a bunch of markets.

One of the ads Ardan ran locally, from November 1983. This, coincidentally, is a great example near the apex of when the video game industry crashed and retailers were forced to sell cartridges at low prices.

While Ardan was designed to have additional smaller stores, mostly on the Kent Street side of the center, the closure allowed the main space to be subdivided, and this is when longtime tenants like Brazos CAD (which was there until the late 2010s) to move in, and Ardan's old space was whittled down to around 18k square feet. Rolling Thunder, a skating rink (roller, not ice) moved in by August 1989, with the name of the shopping center changed to Travis Landing around this time (you can see a picture of the plaza here from c. 1989, though the tenant listing is newer). In 1994, however, Rolling Thunder was sold. Rather than new ownership reopening the rink (it closed in May 1994), everything was dismantled and moved to Wolf Pen Bowl & Skate where it would remain for at least another decade.

Ardan Catalog Showroom ad from 1985 after many of its stores closed; these were the ones to close in 1986. Note the newer logo.

On May 1st, 1996, Gattiland opened (see the Mr. Gatti's on Northgate post. While at one point Mr. Gatti's operated a location not too far away from the Briarcrest location, this gave Bryan a new Mr. Gatti's location (I'm not sure how it was signed, if it was "Mr. Gatti's Gattiland" or whatever, but it was definitely colloquially known as Gattiland), and was the place to have fun/birthday parties/etc. (as Pooh's Park was dead and gone by this time, leaving little but the sign...and Putt-Putt was a bit of a joke even in its prime) for anyone growing up in College Station between the late 1990s and early 2000s. Oh yes, it was definitely something: there was a large buffet and a regular eating area, the party rooms, a large room that showed Cartoon Network on a projection TV (remember, this was Cartoon Network of the late 1990s, which is still spoken of very highly), and the "Midway", which had the prize booth right as you went in. To the back was the bumper cars and a huge McDonald's Playplace-type playground, only larger (with one of those things you could grab and push off and it would slide down the metal rail: I don't know what it's called). There was also air hockey and tons of games, both redemption type games and arcade games (including several linked Daytona USA arcades). Unfortunately, I don't have any photos of the inside but I can remember most of it on the inside and could probably describe parts of it to you if asked nicely (it was the purple bumper car that was put in storage in the later years, for example).

Well, it got really run down pretty quickly, accelerated by an incident where some "unruly teenagers" released early from school damaged machines and culminated in someone going through one of the huge 10-foot windows in front of the restaurant (read the article, second page too). Some of the damaged machines never worked quite right after that and by the time it moved, the playground was dismantled as well; it was quite sad because just a few years earlier it was a premier place to be. In 2003 it moved to College Station and renamed to Gattitown (which will continue here). The building sat vacant and eventually became "Thunder Elite", a kids gymnastics/cheerleading place for a while, too, though it eventually packed up and left as well (new location).

Google Street View
In mid-2014, the former Gattiland/Thunder Elite space became Planet Fitness. It also gave part of the facade a purple paint job which didn't match the rest of the plaza.

So that's it for Gattiland, Ardan Catalog Showroom, and the like. Pictures are welcome, you know...

UPDATE 01-13-2023: Fixed dead links, got rid of the antiquated light blue text and other rewrites.
UPDATE 01-19-2025: Significant rewrite including the article where Gattiland lost its soul, better integration with other articles, and a lot more on when Ardan and Rolling Thunder came and went.

Reed McDonald Building

It's game over for Dulie Bell, but another generally unloved building has been getting some facade work recently. Reed-McDonald Building, the long-time home to the Battalion (it was there 15 years ago and years before that) and a current place to store grad students. Built in 1967, as of winter 2013, this has been getting a repaint, getting some blonde tan, covering up the battered and faded red paint (which is apparently was used/is being used as a primer) and slightly less battered dark tan color. As of this writing, it's mostly done.

Older Aggies that went here prior to 2006 may notice that something's missing: the Bus Stop Snack Bar, which sold things like sandwiches and chips. Regrettably, I don't have any pictures of the missing building, but you can discuss it here.

ALSO! We went added and added a newspaper article for the opening of Weingarten (College Station) location. You know, the one that lasted two months and never even became a Safeway?

Culpepper North

A brief stay as "Food City" (after a repaint). There is a tiny picture of this store as an AppleTree on Yelp. (Source: Stalworth Online)

In 1986, the downtown Safeway moved to 2001 Highway 21 to anchor a new shopping center, Culpepper North, presumably as a smaller companion to Culpepper Plaza. Unfortunately, it never gained more than a few stores and has been living with Family Dollar (not the original tenant) and another store space that has changed a few times over the years. As for the former Safeway, it was one of the last group of Houston Division Safeway stores to be built, and the very last AppleTree store to close. Read more about it on Safeway & Albertsons in Texas Blog. Today, the space is split between La Michoacana Meat Market and A&M Furniture.

UPDATE 04-08-2025: I came across some information that indicates the Family Dollar was originally Winn's Variety Stores but information is sparse. It did exist in the early 1990s, though. Additionally, the store between the two is Cricket (in 2007 this was a check cashing operation), A&M Furniture has since departed to the former Kroger (in the 99 Cents Only location), and according to the current PDF (see archive here). A&M Furniture has been replaced with a combo Family Dollar/Dollar Tree store. I have no idea if that's true or not as I haven't been in the area for a while and besides, Dollar Tree is offloading its sister chain to private equity. The reason I don't know is it also shows the rest of the space developed with a Murphy USA, which is not built yet (if ever). Also removed the 2019 update note.

UPDATE 01-21-2026: As of November 2025, the Family Dollar/Dollar Tree still operates, and Murphy USA did build next to it (open as of this writing). The old Family Dollar has been reopened as Stevens Furniture & Appliance. As part of this update we'll be launching [Family Dollar] and creating two labels [AppleTree] and [Safeway] (even if most of the posts have both).

Dulie Bell on a Rainy Day

Another historic A&M building bites the dust.

Built in 1942 as the USDA Building, this building survived just over 70 years before meeting the wrecking ball. While it was definitely a landmark at its prime location at University and Wellborn, it wasn't loved but still operated as classrooms and offices into fall 2013.

While I did go in fall 2013, I didn't take any pictures (to my knowledge and eternal regret), but I enjoyed the "treats" I did find: the bathroom featured separate taps for hot and cold water.

I'm not entirely sure of why they demolished Dulie Bell. It was old, to be certain, but it had gotten a fresh coat of paint and relatively new carpets, and given it was just replaced more parking, there was some serious problem with the building itself that was unable to be fixed without major investment, like plumbing, electrical, or foundation (Special Services Building was razed for that reason, and never utilized again until over a decade later when a basketball court was put there).

Since the front of the building directly fronts the ramps to University and is difficult to get a picture of, I'll have to resort to other pictures. The top one was from the official map of TAMU, the bottom one is from Historic Aggieland.

[Small Updates Made February 25 2019]

Torchy's Tacos

Once again, my phone's camera interprets red neon as having a harsh orange effect. (September 2014)
I originally wrote this post about 1037 Texas Avenue South in January 2014. At the time, it was the recently-closed Sully's Sports Bar & Grill, and the restaurant had some difficult times in recent years with a revolving door of restaurants over the years. Sully's (née Fowl Digits) had been one of many, many failures over the years and was somewhat of a "cursed" location. But now that Torchy's has been here for almost a decade and still draws consistent crowds, did it break the curse? Probably. But how old is the building anyway?

Here's a bit from The Eagle from its 1962 groundbreaking as "Coach Norton's Pancake House", the first restaurant in the spot.

Coach Homer Norton, coach of the 1939 Texas Aggie national football champions, and his wife expect to break ground Monday or Tuesday for a $200,000 restaurant on Highway 6 in College Station. Norton, 56, was in the city Wednesday and today, making final arrangements for the groundbreaking of the establishment to be known as "Coach Norton’s Pancake House." The approximately 200-capacity edifice will be constructed on the corner of Highway 6 and Kyle Street in College Station. The former Aggie coach has a similar business in Rosenberg—-gathering place for members of the '39 champs when A&M is playing football in Houston. Norton officially announced the new B-CS restaurant, which is to be completed in about four months, today. R. B. Butler is general contractor for the restaurant. "I've been looking forward to this for a long time," Norton stated. "Actually I feel like I’m coming home. We have many close, dear friends in College Station, Bryan and throughout the state. So many of them travel in and out of College Station it’s going be a great chance to visit. Actually I dreamed of this long before I quit coaching," the white-haired Aggie mentor said. "I always wanted to do two things; own a motel and a real high class eating place." After a 14-year tenure as head coach at A&M, Norton resigned the post in 1947 and opened his motel business in Rosenberg, "This place will be my big prize," he added, "and I imagine it will be the largest and finest of its kind between Dallas and Houston." The 200-seat restaurant will feature 25 varieties of Norton’s nationally famous pancakes as well as steak, shrimp, chicken and other foods. Completely carpeted throughout, the pancake house will provide the finest of kitchen equipment and fixtures, according to Norton, with all-around parking and an eight-foot covered walkway on the sides and front. Norton indicated a manager would be in charge of the establishment, as in Rosenberg, and that he would commute from Rosenberg. Coach Norton stated he would probably spend most of his time in College Station, however. The building was to be lined off today and set on the lot for construction to get under way immediately.

Sadly, Norton would not see his new restaurant for very long, as Homer Norton would pass away in 1965, but his legacy still stood (the motel in Rosenberg existed as the Homer Norton Motel for many years, though around 2016 was renamed as the Lone Star Inn). The Pancake House in College Station had a much shorter life. Without Norton at the helm (and the hopes for a chain restaurant dashed), it ended up closing around late 1969 or early 1970. The building still stood, however.

A phone book advertisement for Coach Norton's, showing the original sign. Note the triangle-shaped sign base. One of the first restaurants to reoccupy was Fontana's Italian-Mexican Restaurant (we'll come back to this later). The first reference to Fontana's appeared in 1970, not long at all after the demise of the Pancake House. Like the later incarnation, Fontana's would specialize primarily in Italian and newspaper references to Fontana's would continue into the late 1970s.

In 1980, Mama's Pizza moved from 609 Texas where Oakridge Steakhouse had been (the building was eventually demolished in the mid-1990s for the shopping center).

Here's where things get complicated. Mama's Pizza left sometime in the late 1980s for the end cap restaurant space at Culpepper Plaza, 1601 Texas Avenue, and from there, the building would have a revolving door of restaurants. In the following sections, I will try to best address what I can find and how long they lasted.

Rockyano's Pizza, which later was shut down for tax evasion reasons, opened in August 1991 (it seems the building was shut down for a few years), though because it was shut down for tax reasons, it's unknown when exactly it closed. (relevant post on TexAgs).

In mid-1992, the building finally stopped being a pizza restaurant when it became Shanghai Restaurant (later renamed/changed hands to Shen Zhen Restaurant sometime in mid-1995) but closed by the end of the year. This is another point of contention--a 1993 directory (but not a 1993 phone book) lists "Shanghai Chinese Restaurant" as well as a 1996 directory, however, a TexAgs poster claims that it was open for a "week or two", which seems to be a gross exaggeration. Did Shen Zhen serve sushi like the forum thread implies? Probably not. A lot of places and times get transposed when it comes to this.

When it moved in around early 1996, successor restaurant Porky's Hamburger & Onion Ring Company officially was in business for three months but had already moved twice since its founding in 1994 in Fredericksburg, first to Round Rock, then to College Station. Officially, the restaurant only operated for about three months but eyewitnesses report it was only open for "six weeks" (after all, Front Porch Grill didn't last a long time either).

Snuffer's opened in February 1997 per ribbon cutting information from the Chamber of Commerce, a branch of the Snuffer's restaurant chain out of Dallas. Unfortunately, not too long after that, that part of Texas Avenue began widening and within eight months, they got "snuffed out" by the construction.

Nearly a year after the closure of Snuffers, there was El Arroyo (1998-1999). There was Ginseng Garden (open for maybe a month, they definitely advertised in papers for staff) in early 2000, followed by Nari Sushi several months later. In spring 2001, there was La Familia del Mar, a Mexican seafood restaurant operated by the same owners of La Familia Taqueria. This too would be only a few months (this is the one in the TexAgs post, that refers to "maybe something-Del Mar"). Hong Kong Buffet would follow, in November 2001 (folded within a few months)....followed by El Ranchito Mexican Restaurant (which which opened in fall 2002 but disappeared before the end of January 2003.

Cazadores Mexican Restaurant (#4, actually had other locations including Houston) was here from 2003 to 2009 was the next one here, but actually making it a few years was an accomplishment.

From Fontana's Facebook page, which itself was from ShopBrazos.com, which has since taken down this image
Fontana's Authentic Italian Food operated from 2009 to 2011. This was actually the same owner of the "first" Fontana's here that opened some 40 or so years earlier but it was too little, too late, to work off any nostalgia.

In early 2012, a restaurant called Fowl Digits opened in the building, now fifty years old. Fowl Digits looked to be different than the other restaurants. Stucco was added to the building, the "triangular" sign was restored, there was a huge marketing blitz, there was the whole promoting the business as part of "Chicken Strip Row" (with Layne's and Raising Cane's on either side of them), and...it was a huge failure. Part of the problem was they didn't know their own marketing—a drink coozie I still have states that it's a "sports bar disguised as a chicken finger place"...and the prices were more expensive to match (inflation of course makes Fowl Digits seem cheap in retrospect) but it was too expensive, and the only other thing it had was dozens of televisions with different channels (not just sports, one was on Boomerang which even then was showing 1990s programming during daytime hours). That's not even mentioning its failure as a bar as well, beer was only served in plastic cups.

Around October 2012, Fowl Digits closed and was retooled into "Sully's Sports Grill & Bar" with another new coat of paint. That seemed to do better for them (even if the name switch seemed pretty desperate) as the menu expanded to add things like hamburgers. It still wasn't enough to gain a following (and reviews were mixed). In the end, Sully's closed in December 2013, once again, becoming another failed restaurant in the spot. I was able to get a few pictures during this time--you can see the Fowl Digits/Sully's patio shortly after it closed in late 2013 with side view.

Enter Torchy's Tacos. Based out of Austin, Torchy's did extensive work to the property. After the rumor of Torchy's was confirmed in early 2014, in summer, the demolition of Sully's commenced. It wasn't a total demolition (nor was it the "everything but a few walls" demolition that happened to the Deluxe Diner or Egg Roll House) but did strip off nearly every element that the Fowl Digits/Sully's owners added on, including exposing the Fontana metal siding before replacing that too. It also dismantled the 1960s era triangular sign for the purposes of more outdoor seating, instead opting to have a large sign facing Texas Avenue with a huge colorful neon sign with the "baby devil" logo. It officially opened October 16, 2014 to huge crowds and has been here for nine years, more than any restaurant had been there in the twenty years prior.
• Torchy's September 2014. Almost the exact same view of the Sully's side view above. Compare and contrast!
• Looking in
• A closer look at the red and white. These are road reflectors!
• Inside--the soda fountain dispensers.
• For some reason, the menu boards were replaced before opening.

UPDATE 06-24-2023: After previously being updated September 2014 (new title, photos, and substantial information), July 2015 (further integration), and August 2016 (part of site upgrades), this latest update is a major rewrite which adds more information on the Homer Norton Motel in Rosenberg, some more defunct restaurants, and so forth. The post title was renamed to simply "Torchy's Tacos".
UPDATE 02-16-2024: A few tiny updates. Integrated address back into the article.
UPDATE 01-23-2025: One paragraph updated including the identity of Nari and some restaurants that did open, if briefly.