Former Subway on Southgate

I think I can see remnants of BOTH logos! (Picture by author, 8/20)

Yesterday, I discovered that the Subway on George Bush Drive (Southgate, at Montclair) closed for good, so this is hot off the presses as far as this blog is concerned. I don't know the backstory of 330 George Bush (originally 330 Jersey), but I try my best here. From what I can find, in 1956, it was the home of Pruitt's Fabrics (moved down a few spaces fairly early on, although dropped "Fabrics" in recent years). By the early 1960s it was Fugate-Davidson Printers.

This is from the 1963 A&M Consol vs. Del Valle Football Program on Project HOLD. I just cleaned it up a bit.
An oral history transcript mentions that Fugate shut down that location and moved "back to the house" in 1970 before selling out in 1973, this house presumably being at or near where Fish Richard's was located.

In 1988, it became Beef 'N Brew (which did not seem to have been related to "Beef & Brew", where The Tap is today, nearly a decade earlier). By late 1991, it was Subway, and Subway it would be for a number of years afterward. The (many) Subway stores around town are operated by Centex Subway, and from working at the stores at one time, most of them do marginal business. The COVID-19 problems (especially related to students on campus and around town) wiped out a lot of business, with the Southgate store being hit particularly hard, and after a temporary closure, was made permanent.

I can't find most of the tenant history, with only the notes where Beef N Brew's application suggesting it was part of Rother's (next door) at one time (and indeed, the property lines for the business include the former Rother's next door and what is now Good Bull BBQ).

For the purposes of blog organization, I'm going to assume the building dates back to the 1940s but I don't have any hard proof of that.

UPDATE 05-24-2021: Subway opened in fall 1991, shortly after Beef 'N Brew (which was not related to the former business at The Tap) officially closed earlier that year. This has been appended in the main article.
UPDATE 02-10-2024: In 2022 it became "FNL Nutrition" (sold juices, smoothies, etc.) which also occupied the Good Bull BBQ space next door. It ended up closing by fall 2023.

Former Black-eyed Pea

The old restaurant has since been demolished and replaced with a hotel. (Picture by author, June 2020).
From what I can tell from newspapers, the Black-eyed Pea restaurant opened in early 1991 at 201 University Drive East (though based on "last six months" from an April 1991 paper, it could have been late 1990). I'm pretty sure I've eaten there at least once, evidenced by some of the kid's menu cups that kicked around my parents' house for many years following (before the designs faded out), but despite being a moderately-priced chain, it was never on the regular rotation.

It closed in January 2006, before the rest of the chain melted down in late 2016 (not counting the independently-owned Colorado restaurants). After closure, the restaurant sat vacant for about three years before a series of Chinese buffets took it over. E-star Chinese Buffet opened in early 2009, then Great Wall Deluxe Chinese Buffet less than a year later, followed by "88 Sichuan Bistro" by 2013, then another name (Ocean Buffet), then Asia Star by late 2014. Most of these were probably just of the "clean up after Health Department shut down and reopen", because the place was constantly getting shut down due to terrible health reviews (roaches, moldy food, etc.)

Eventually Asia Star folded and it and other houses (rentals) on the block were all torn down (likely early 2016) for an Embassy Suites hotel (seven stories) and a parking garage, which opened October 2017. The hotel (like the restaurant) has no access from University Drive East proper but has access from Jane Street (like the restaurant) and Eisenhower Street.

The Embassy Suites by College Station has seven stories, five meeting rooms, and 162 guest rooms. One thing that has carried over to its new use as a hotel is including a restaurant (Saber Bar & Grill), though it isn't advertised (as hotels used to do locally) to the greater community. 

UPDATE 03-28-2021: Despite the April 1991 newspaper article referring to Black-eyed Pea opening in the "last six months", new additional evidence has suggested that Black-eyed Pea did in fact open in 1991, likely January 1991.

Former Academy Sports + Outdoors

From March 2019, by author. Yes, I know I covered this over a year ago.

In February 2002, Academy Sports + Outdoors opened a new location at Horse Haven Lane and Earl Rudder Freeway, either just prior to or after the closure of College Station Golf Center, a driving range off of the highway (for more information, see "At Home" on the Boriskie Ranch).

Academy was where I purchased much of my clothes and shoes over the years (never was a sharp dresser) but there was nothing particularly nostalgic about this location, especially given how much the new Academy resembles the old store on the inside.

For years, the store "competed" against the Gander Mountain next door, but eventually would close just as the Redmond Terrace location before it, with the store closing in June 2017 (a new store, about three-quarters of a mile south, replaced it). The store remains vacant, except for the occasional Halloween store that occupies it.

Editor's Note: A reason this post is spinning off from the At Home post is to separate the posts and partially so MasFajitas can have its own page someday.

Ponderosa Motor Inn

The motel hugs the freeway tightly. (Picture by author, 7/20)
Ponderosa Motor Inn first opened in 1971 at the intersection of Ponderosa Road and State Highway 6 (3702 Highway 6 South and formerly 3702 Texas Avenue), citing the highway's presence and the continued growth of the city in that direction, both of which were true. While the motel had a restaurant, private club, and meeting rooms, all of which were standard in motels modeled after the standards that the growing Holiday Inn chain pioneered in the 1950s and 1960s, it was very isolated from just about anything, about two miles from the nearest commercial establishments on Texas Avenue (near modern-day Holleman). It was also a few years before even the Southwood Valley area began to take off, which within a few years would see new development, such as Kmart and Doux Chene Apartments within a few years.

As a testament to the old age of the property, some mercury-vapor lights still hang, though not NEARLY as green as my camera it thought it was.
Ponderosa Motor Inn soon built an addition to the main two-story building and another building out back with additional rooms facing east and west, and for the next three decades it would be the furthest south motel/hotel in the city until Navasota. It wasn't until 2001, when Courtyard by Marriott built a hotel at Woodcreek Road and the Highway 6 frontage road, ending the motel's dominance as the furthest south hotel, and unlike the motel, was a true hotel with interior corridors. By that time, the area that Ponderosa had once been alone in was starting to get rather built-up, and it wasn't slowing down.

Ponderosa changed hands a few times (though it remained as Ponderosa Motor Inn until around the early 1990s). In this article, it talks about some interior updates made in 1982 as well as a mention of the club ("My Sister's Place"). You can also see that it has expanded with an additional building behind the motel. Around 1988 it became Varsity Inn and around 2005 it became Howard Johnson Express with Mi Familia Coco Loco as the restaurant (independently owned). It may have even briefly closed for a while.

When the motel became Americas Best Value Inn, the hotel used its new logo on the outside, but still had the older style of room numbers.
In 2016, the "second building" was torn down, and, after about two years or so of construction, a four-story Microtel Inn (or rather, "Microtel by Wyndham") was built in its place at 1820 Ponderosa Drive. The final product was outlined in blue neon, giving it a unique appearance but also unfortunately similar to the sleazier hotels along Houston freeways. Sometime around the time Microtel was completed, the original motel was rebranded as Americas Best Value Inn (a different owner than what Microtel and Howard Johnson's belonged to).

View of Microtel from the parking lot, c. 2020
After a few years as ABV, the motel changed hands again to a boutique hotel group. In July 2023, the motel completed a renovation and rebranded as Hotel McCoy (see archive link). I also discovered something interesting. The original logo of Ponderosa Motor Inn, which you can see below in a 1980 phone book listing...is completely identical to the Ponderosa Motor Inn in Shamrock, Texas. I don't know the fate of the Shamrock location, but it's very likely the two motels were once related.

It should be noted that today, the motel's location is not that well located off of the freeway. Prior to the mid-2000s, you could access Ponderosa through the two-way frontage road it was on by exiting Rock Prairie from either end, and today is probably best worked through the back but in the early days (before the freeway lanes were extended down by 1991), Ponderosa turned into the northbound frontage road (two way) and turning left directly into Ponderosa was an option!

Note the southbound frontage roads were not complete at this point.

UPDATE 01-03-2025: Rewrite integrating October 2023 update. This also added additional information and an article link. The [2010s] tag is for Microtel.

One-o-One Grove

The Amtrak platforms STILL stand on the other side of the railroad, but 101 Grove is totally gone.

Even fairly late into the planning process of this page, I had considered this making this a multi-subject post to cover the other buildings demolished at the same time, including 100 George Bush apartments, Equity Real Estate (which was built around 1997-ish), the Unitarian Universalist church, and 101 Grove. Of these, I only had real interest in covering 101 Grove and Equity Real Estate, except I lack any pictures of the latter and my experiences with renting an apartment with Equity were less than stellar.

One of the reasons I'm bringing up this is so I could also bring up LoTrak, which is one of the "hidden sub-pages" of the blog. Had it been constructed, 101 Grove might have died that much sooner.

101 Grove first opened as Jazzercise Exercise Studio in 1984, a warehouse-like building (I seem to remember it having gray metal siding), and I believe they held this into around 1999 until the Northgate McDonald's was reconstructed, without a basement. At this point, a huge Golden Arches sign was erected on the building, facing Wellborn, and the McDonald's Training Center was born, which also seemed to have been the main headquarters for the local stores. Unfortunately, in 2002, the local McDonald's franchise retired, and so went the McDonald's sign. A few years later, the building was completely renovated inside and out, with stucco, windows, awnings, and a mural on the north side. Initially named "One-o-One Grove", by 2007, it was the home of Ellis Custom Homes, but a few other tenants were there as well, including Larsen Insurance, and (as of summer 2007), P. Dallas Construction Co., though it was largely a one-man landscaping operation.

By 2019, the property had been bought by TxDOT and leveled, with the parking lot stub cut off and everything neatly removed. I returned in August 2020 to take these pictures, but as you can see, there's nothing left!

"Nothing remains...but memories!"

Military Depot

You can barely make out the EAS (from Eastgate) here, but I think the shadow next to it was from Military Depot, not its predecessor tenants (May 2014).

Military Depot was on the short list in 2017 (internally, "Season 3") and probably would have come after "At Home" on the Boriskie Ranch but as that post describes, things happened and it got shelved (it got close enough to have a post mostly written up). This post is intended to replace the the big Eastgate post.

105 Walton started out as a UtoteM in 1961 with a 1967 article mentioning it was going to 24 hour service (which must have been rare at the time, even 7-Eleven had only experimented with 24 hour stores in Dallas-Fort Worth and Las Vegas) and continuing to do so until the chain was bought and rebranded as Circle K in 1984. However, soon after rebranding it, Circle K was ready to pull the plug on this store (and the store at 1405 University Drive) and sold it in fall 1985, becoming Eastgate Food Store. It seems that it permanently closed in 1991 and possibly served as Talon's Collegiate Wear around 1992-1993.

You can see Eastgate Food Store listed as part of this 1992 streetscape study:


Sometime around the mid-1990s (definitely by June 1996) Military Depot moved in (it used to be at the mall) and it has been here since. There's also a green roofed building next to it that held a few tenants years ago, including Robinson Pet Clinic in 1989, but it's been vacant for a number of years now. The picture was taken in May 2014 with no activity since.

Here's another view of the sign, from May 2014.

UPDATE 06-22-2025: Removed old Editor's Note and got some better dates about comings and goings

Sarge's

Goodbye to a Northgate icon (Picture taken April 2020).

First mentioned in the long-outdated 104-115 College Main page (still up but being dismantled), I had personally never stepped foot in Sarge's, rather appreciating it as a Northgate staple that was part of Northgate itself. At this rate, Sarge's will probably be replaced with yet another nightclub that will just be an eyesore during the daytime.

Sarge's with its neighbors, 2013.

Operating from May 1984 to the end of May 2020, Sarge's was an army surplus store (at least originally) that operated as a Corps of Cadets supply store, including sabers and Corps boots (before TAMU also started selling them). From 1975 to until the early 1980s, University Frame Shop operated at 109 College Main. This store, same ownership as Theo's Gallery at Culpepper Plaza, featured, according to a 1980 ad, not only "custom and ready made frames" but also "New York graphic reproductions" and "limited edition prints & original art".

The building's earlier history (which dated back to the 1930s) is harder to determine. It seems that in the early days (late 1930s), Houston Street and College Main was named Bell (Bell Street?), with the Houston Street portion on campus taking the 1xx addresses and Northgate taking the 2xx addresses; however, other renumbering has taken place and placing the College Main businesses is difficult. Based on that information, it can be inferred that "Jones Barber" and "Wilson Beauty" operated here but more information needs to be acquired before an accurate chronology can be created.

UPDATE 04-24-2024: In fall 2022 a candy (and snow cones, it looked like) store called "Sugar Babies" opened. It seemed to be open as of December 2023 but as of April 2024 it seemed to be closed up shop even during a busy weekday with lots of foot traffic, even though there was merchandise inside. They have a website but all pages were marked with an ominous "Our store is not currently accepting orders."

Jack in the Box, Texas Avenue, Bryan

The Box is back after an extensive rebuild.

The sister store to the College Station Jack in the Box further down Texas Avenue, 2906 South Texas Avenue's Jack in the Box was built in 1977 (#675), before the chain's dramatic makeover that dropped the "clown head" speakers and started to push a more "adult", upscale menu.

While the picture at the aforementioned post looks like this one before rebuilding around early 2019 (picture taken in March 2020), the picture here is the one that the College Station one also looks like now. As of this writing, the most recent Google Street View shows the old Jack in the Box building.

The construction also ditched the entrance off of Villa Maria for a new one to Maloney, but it's a moot point since medians installed since 2016 on Villa Maria make access difficult anyway.

UPDATE 01-27-2022: As part of putting this on Facebook in 2022 about a year and a half after the post was made and put in the queue, Google Street View has been updated here.

Jimmy Jackson's Enco, 3000 South Texas Avenue

Nothing remains of the first Jimmy Jackson's Exxon but a rather standard Eckerd-turned-CVS. (Photo by author, 3/20)
Built in the 1960s at 3000 South Texas Avenue, "Jackson's Enco" eventually became Jimmy Jackson's Exxon (in the early 1970s, Standard Oil of New Jersey renamed to Exxon to unify the Esso and Enco brands), and by the early 1980s, gained a second entrance when Restwood Drive was rebuilt as an extension of Villa Maria Road. The gas station was eventually sold to focus on the College Station location and in 1998, an Eckerd was built at the site and eventually converted (around late 2004) to CVS/pharmacy when parent company J.C. Penney decided to liquidate the chain.

Aggieland Credit Union, 501 University Drive (Sulphur Springs Road)

One of my pictures from 2013.
From various sources, this building (501 University, formerly 501 Sulphur Springs Road) was opened in 1950 as a bank, the College Station State Bank, which moved down (what is now) University Drive in 1962 to a new location. This new location eventually was torn down for a skyscraper with the bank (by this point, BB&T) eventually moving in on the ground level. The original location of the bank survived, however, and is still a bank of sorts today.

After College Station State Bank moved out, the Presbyterian Student Center opened in the spot. By 1972, it was serving as The Answer (The Answer is Jesus Christ Inc.), a Christian counseling center. In the early 1980s, The Answer folded and Pizza Hut moved in. Apparently, PepsiCo (or the local Pizza Hut franchise) believed that the Pizza Hut just on the other side of Texas Avenue was doing well enough that a second location closer to Northgate would be a good business decision, and, from the early 1980s to early 1990s, a Pizza Hut occupied the space.

One of the few 501 University-as-Pizza Hut photos that exist (Project HOLD)

In 1994, the building reopened as Aggieland Credit Union, and has been so ever since.

Editor's Note: I'm currently experimenting with a new title format, let me know what you think!

University Flowers

Taken way back in May 2014 by author

University Flowers has been here at 1049 Texas Avenue South since at least 1980 and all indications show that the building was built in the 1970s and opened as the flower shop. In the late 2000s, a "store-within-a-store", BCS Gold & Jewelry, opened at the site. It has common ownership and the same address (even the vehicles UF drives around has both names on it), but a different phone number.

Editor's Note: With a new schedule carved out of the wreckage of the three "series" posts, I now have a plan going forward. That does include, of course, filler posts, like this one I've had since 2014, taken with other Eastgate photos.

Olive Garden's Original Location

In real life Italy, unlimited breadsticks are not a thing.
Besides marketing its food products in all the area grocery stores, General Mills brought two restaurants to the Bryan-College Station through its General Mills Restaurant Group subsidiary, Red Lobster in 1983 and Olive Garden a decade later. (The other two significant concepts at the time, Good Earth, and China Coast, never made it to the area, though the latter briefly saw Waco and Houston).

Neither my articles on Hastings or H-E-B Pantry mention Olive Garden, which sat at the corner of Texas Avenue and Holleman Drive from 1993 to 2004. The old Olive Garden met its fate when it burned down in a fire, and what was left of the building was declared a total loss.

In January or February 2005, a new Olive Garden opened at University Drive East and Earl Rudder Freeway, and by October 2005, two new buildings rose at the former Olive Garden site, a Chase bank (replacing the 2000 Texas Avenue South address), and a second building (2002 Texas Avenue South) holding Jimmy John's and Men's Wearhouse (Google Street View link). The Jimmy John's closed in late summer 2019 for reasons unknown but by that time, a Jimmy John's was operating at Rock Prairie Crossing and near Texas and University Drive East. Of course, Jimmy John's at the latter location has a somewhat interesting backstory, and that will be covered soon enough...

The ad is from the mid-1990s, before it introduced its newer logo (dropping "The" and adding what appeared to be a bunch of grapes to the logo) around 1999 (replaced in 2014 but still seen on many restaurants).

Former Taco Villa

Let's taco 'bout this vacant building.
The former RadioShack at 614 East Villa Maria Road goes back over 40 years. In June 1977, the building first opened as a Taco Villa restaurant (notice the picture) and remained as such for nearly a decade following.

One directory edition from the mid-1980s lists it as a Del Taco, which was odd as while the Texas franchisee of Del Taco did buy Taco Villa but indications were that the owner at the time (a subsidiary of W.R. Grace) wanted to convert the Del Taco restaurants it owned to Taco Villa (to avoid licensing fees), not the other way around.

In 1988, W.R. Grace liquidated Del Taco and Taco Villa, with the restaurant closing with the Houston stores, including this one (indications that Taco Villa did live on, and today operates stores in West Texas and New Mexico, though I'm not 100% sure they are the same chain).

By the early 1990s, it became a Quick as a Flash (likely a facade re-do/repaint happened around this time) and in 1999, it was still a Quick as a Flash location (the directory for that year lists "Back in a Flash", which was a similarly-named operation focused on film processing located inside the AppleTree stores and the College Station Kroger). The directory error also lends credence to the fact that the restaurant was never branded as Del Taco.

At some point, like the sister store in College Station it went under the Ritz Camera name, though it was probably a Ritz Portrait Studio like the other store. I'm not sure when it closed, probably early 2000s.

The back of the store still has some original stucco, giving clues to what the original Taco Villa looked like.
RadioShack, the last known tenant, moved in after the redevelopment of Sul-Mar Center at Villa Maria and Briarcrest around 2006-2007, where it had been previously been homed there since 1971 (originally opened as "Allied Radio Shack", a short-lived branding of the chain when parent company Tandy Corporation owned Allied Electronics). In 2015, Tandy Corporation (renamed RadioShack Corp. in 2000 to focus on its core business) went bankrupt and most of the corporate-owned stores closed. The corporate stores that weren't closed were converted to Sprint/RadioShack co-branded stores under new company General Wireless. Unfortunately, the partnership with Sprint dissolved with the bankruptcy of General Wireless two years later, closing the Sprint/RadioShack stores (including this one). The closure of this meant that RadioShack officially exited the Bryan-College Station market, and today, the closest brick-and-mortar RadioShack store is in Brenham (which is a franchised store).

All pictures here are by the author, March 2020.

UPDATE 02-04-21: A revisit to the area shows that this has now reopened as Fred Loya Insurance. Two tags ([Series: Closed & Closing] and [defunct]) have been removed.

Dixie Chicken

Wish I could get the picture from BEFORE the barrier was put in, but it is what it is. (Picture taken 4/20 by author).

Other than the big "Northgate post" written several years back (and then eventually removed as part of website upgrades), I never saw fit to really cover Dixie Chicken on Northgate all that much. It was never a place with nostalgic value, never went to it as a kid (for obvious reasons!), and it never changed either, which would give it the allure of documenting it for future generations.

The Dixie Chicken started in 1974 when Don Ganter bought a pool hall that had only been around for a few years (estimated to be built in the late 1960s) called the Aggie Den (at 307 University). From some forum threads, you could buy or sell old issues of Playboy, view vintage pornography on (based on how it was described) microfiche, smoke (a no-brainer, everyone smoked inside back in the day), and play pool. The walls were covered with half-naked pictures of movie stars. Don Ganter converted the pool hall to a bar and changed the appearance to, as ESPN writer Scott Eden once wrote, "a honky-tonk as dreamed up by the Disney people who designed Frontierland".

The bar expanded in the early 1980s by adding a kitchen to serve food, and eventually, combining a building next door. This building was even older (from the mid-1950s), with the last tenant being Miranda's, a fern bar. This too was converted to the Dixie Chicken's décor, the exterior entrance covered up and the only major remnant of being it was a painting not covered up by wood (near the snake cage).

Miranda's is visible; source unknown

309 University had its own history. The earliest I can find (1963) shows it as being a location of Loupot's Trading Post, long before it moved into its iconic location at the corner of College Main and University. It was vacant in 1972 (shortly before Dixie Chicken's opening) and as of 1978, it was Farkelberry's Domino and Pool Parlor. There may be a few others I may be missing.

Editor's Note: Future posts in the [Series: University Drive] will skip around somewhat, so next cycle's post will not be about Duddley's Draw, and instead go further down University. Also, as per the last article, a number of entries were upgraded with new photos, tenants, and advertisements. These details will be revealed in future installments.

Former Mechanics Unlimited

There hasn't been much activity here in years.
Mechanics Unlimited was the last known business at 102 Lincoln, which was briefly covered on what was originally called "Mobil & Mechanics", a post published back in 2014. As of this writing, this post has been removed from the Index to be rewritten and updated.

102 Lincoln was likely built in the 1940s (according to what I can find, the city estimates it was built in the 1940s, and it was definitely in the 1960 aerial) and sits on a tiny lot. Known as "Murphy's Garage" in old listings, the building hasn't changed much in at least six years. When I photographed the building in 2014, you could see the the maroon-painted plywood that boarded up the garage doors, as well as some of the maroon paint that was once on the bricks. If I recall, these had been painted maroon after Mechanics Unlimited (which was painted on the outside of the facade) closed (which I recall closing in the early 2000s, though can find little proof of it except in this 1990s-era listing).

Looking inside, there's remnants from Stratta Auto Repair next door.

The pictures seen that aren't linked are the ones taken in June 2020.

Former Red Lobster

It wasn't a red, it was a Red Lobster! (Picture by author, 6/20)

The current COVID-19 pandemic has done a number on local restaurants, and one of the victims appears to be the local Red Lobster at 1200 University Drive East. Opened in spring 2008 at the corner of Lincoln and University Drive East and replacing their 1983 location at Lincoln and Texas Avenue, the Red Lobster updated their logo in the early 2010s (2013) to their 2009 logo instead of the one they've had since the mid-1990s.

The restaurant was reported in late June 2020 to be locked out for non-payment of rent, and while some barriers have been put up to prevent vandalism/theft, I don't see the restaurant reopening. Also I apologize for the quality of the photos, it was taken when the sun was at a low angle, and I had to do some weird things to the photos to make them viewable.

All of the handicapped spaces were converted to to-go spots. I'm not sure this was actually legal.

GMRI Inc. is the corporate name of the original Red Lobster/Olive Garden group, descended from the original Red Lobster Inns of America, Inc. and named after the General Mills Restaurant group...though Red Lobster was spun off several years ago.

UPDATE 05-04-2022: According to KBTX, Austin-based Trudy's Authentic Tex-Mex is coming to the spot, confirming after two years that Red Lobster is gone for good. Parts of the original post have been touched up.
UPDATE 10-06-2023: Rumor is that Trudy's has unfortunately fallen through.
UPDATE 04-23-2024: Reports that Tyler-based Javi's will be opening in the spot.

Dry Bean Saloon

This is the first post to feature the new [Series: University Drive] tag, a new feature I'm trying out that as an official thing, that will allow you to see only the posts in the near future down Northgate (and beyond?!) which I've been doing recently. This won't appear on older posts, but it provides a way to chronologically see (in reverse order, unfortunately) the parts of the site you're interested in. Two other "series" will also be shown in the near future.

In order so far, there has been Handy Burger / The Onion Ring / The Deluxe / Chimy's Cerveceria (203 University), 4.0 & Gone (205-207 University), Aggieland Flowers & Gifts (209 University), and Former Zapatos Cantina (211 University).

Additionally, going further down, there was Northgate Juice Joint (215 University), Shiner Park (217 University), the Chevron on the other side of Boyett (formerly Citgo for years, 301 University), and The Backyard (formerly Fitzwilly's, 303 University). All of these have been updated recently as well.

We now get to Dry Bean Saloon (305 University), which only says Dry Bean on the facade now for reasons unknown.

Unfortunately, until I can get to the archives again, I can't give a whole lot of information on the building itself other than the fact that estimates say it was built in the mid-1950s. The 1000 sq. ft. building is thin and narrow, with the building only 13 feet wide, and only open to a 21+ crowd. (I was never a patron of Dry Bean Saloon, for that, there's Yelp).

In the late 1980s and very early 1990s (1990), it was Sticky Chin's Ice Cream Parlor, but in the very early 1990s the owner (Don Ganter of the Dixie Chicken) closed and converted it into the Dry Bean Saloon (which ultimately, by the late 2010s, got a sign that read "Dry Bean").

In 1969, it was Hobby World (before that time is unknown), also known as Hobby World of Texas ("Planes, trains, boats, & rockets"). By 1973, it was Andre's Bicycle Shop. Confusingly, some ads refer to it being at 303 University Drive East (different address). Newspaper ads do confirm it was previously at Northgate Juice Joint's building.

UPDATE 01-04-2021: Removed [Series: University Drive] (aborted) and filled in more details on the building's earlier years.

Former Zapatos Cantina

Before Zapatos Cantina, this was DoubleDave's PizzaWorks. (Photo from Project HOLD)
Once again, we continue the walk down University Drive, and next to the former Aggieland Flowers & Gifts was, for years, Zapatos Cantina at 211 University. Like Bill's next to it, this was once "Don's Barber Shop" in the early 1970s (Building as marked as "1960s", assumed build date). After it served as DoubleDave's PizzaWorks by the 1990s (not the original location--the original-original is now Good Bull BBQ on George Bush Drive), it became Zapatos Cantina, which was a Northgate hangout known for years known for "trash can lid nachos". There's a few other reviews of the old establishment, and even that review predates 2009 (when smoking was banned in bars).

At some point after Bill's at 215 University closed (no 213 University, just an open-air area between the two buildings), Zapatos expanded to that location, until spring 2013, when Zapatos closed. This was almost certainly because of Chimy's Cerveceria opening and providing more space and likely better overall for a similar menu and theme.

Most of the building's recently history has been empty, with only serving briefly (around the middle of the 2010s) as a leasing office for Aspen Heights off of Holleman Drive South, and in fall 2018 opened as The Draconian Lounge.

UPDATE 01-03-21: As part of integrations with the University Drive "City Directory" page (still in its original form as this writing), this building was "Pyramid Audio" in 1980.

The Failure of the Micro District

New Republic Brewing Co.'s original location, and later Rio Brazos. (Author's picture, June 2020)

Unlike the other big roads covered on this site, North Dowling Road (or Dowling Road if modern city signs are anything to go by) doesn't have a lot going for it. The two other items on North Dowling Road worth talking about, Former Country Grocery and Wickes Lumber were both covered years ago, and despite some newer development (an RV park, a mini-storage, and a few apartment buildings), North Dowling is relatively empty.

The exception, was, of course, the Aggieland Micro District, an informal name for 11405 North Dowling Road, a collection of warehouses dating back to 1994. The oldest building there is what is now home to Go Dog Customs, but in the early 2010s (and possibly original, as it was there in the late 1990s) was Quality Enterprises. This had the address of 11378 Hickory Road, and was accessed from Hickory Road.

The 11405 North Dowling Road buildings came in-line a few years later, with Unit A and Unit B in one building. Unit B (until fairly recently) was a warehouse for Texas Trading Post, which actually hung out in the links section as part of this website for years because they linked back here (they eventually took out the link, and when I discovered that, I removed theirs). This incarnation of 11405 North Dowling Road did add a connection to North Dowling Road but still had dirt/gravel roads. By 2006, all but the two northern buildings were built, and by 2010, when New Republic Brewing Co. first moved into Unit H, the driveways were paved (with asphalt, and a few years later it became concrete).

New Republic would move to C (and its adjacent space) a few years later, and by late 2015 it had been built up to a small but thriving brewery.

While the Aggieland Micro District was only a modest success, with food trucks and a band playing at NRBC on the liveliest of days, NRBC's attempts to further coordinate with Rio Brazos and Perrine Winery would fail.

The downfall of NRBC would begin would shortly after with the departure of brewmaster and co-founder Dean Brundage leaving for a new venture. An ugly combination of events including the COVID-19 disruption, issues with the landlord, and the departure of co-founder John Januskey would force NRBC to cease production.

When I visited in June 2020 for what I had planned to be my final visit, the brewery was in poor shape. Half of the space had been sealed off (the other half included a makeshift office and lab, and storage space for empty cans and other products). The other half was cleared of tanks, boilers, and canning equipment. Even the loft, where hops and yeast were stored, was being dismantled.

NRBC built up a full outdoor area complete with a stage.
With NRBC fading out and Rio Brazos said to have shut down its taproom, the Micro District appears to be dead with no chance of revival. It's disappointing that the Micro District would only be a footnote, if that, for the history of College Station-Bryan, and return to its original form, a collection of unremarkable warehouses. I suppose it's better that it has some physical memory, as even bigger places have faded away entirely, such as East Orange, Louisiana. Even physical places, of course, hide the time when they were really something. Neither the front office at The Flats on 12 nor the closed-down Tobacco & More suggest they were anything fancy at one time.

The other "Micro District" tenants include Rio Brazos Distillery, a small whiskey/bourbon bottler (largely just one employee, located at Unit H, NRBC's old location), Perrine Winery (a few doors down, opened 2016 after being at Post Oak Village for a few years). The only other retail tenant I can think of there includes Brazos Valley Trash Valet and Recycling at J-1 (opened 2009 after that warehouse section was built). (At Unit F, a business called Absolute Wheel Technologies was operating, but it has since moved out to Highway 30).

Aggieland Flowers & Gifts

Original from Project HOLD, c. 1994
Aggieland Flowers & Gifts (at one time, at least according to directories, "Aggieland Flowers & Gift Shoppe") has been in the 1965-built 209 University from before 1980 to around 2007, when it moved to the bypass as Aggieland Flowers & Chocolates. After a few years of being empty, it was replaced with The Ranch, which replaced the roof with an upper level area. What I'm not sure about is as of 2012, was the upper level of The Ranch part of The Ranch or was it Schotzi's SkyBarr/Sky Bar as described in the previous post 4.0 & Gone? Furthermore, there's evidence that The Ranch was filed in New Development files as "Aquarium Bar", but it never opened as such.

The conversion to The Ranch came about the time when on-street parking was removed in favor of a wider sidewalk. Sometime by 2015, The Ranch closed and became The 12 Rooftop Bar & Lounge.

UPDATE 01-03-21: As part of integrations with the University Drive "City Directory" page (still in its original form as this writing), Aggieland Flowers has been at this site since at least 1972.

Abandoned Quality Suites

The direct sun hurt this photo, but I think it gets the point across.

I first stumbled upon this hotel (at 3610 Highway 6 South) in fall 2019 to find it closed despite being a fairly modern-looking hotel (it was built in 2005) and on the highway. All the signage was up and graffiti had not yet hit the building, but the high weeds and tattered entryway said otherwise, nor any sign that the hotel would be opening soon (it was removed from the Choice Hotels website). Apparently, the hotel closed by early 2018 (mentioned on Yelp's "Tips" which seem to have disappeared in a recent redesign) due to a flooding problem and it never reopened. At this rate I can't see it reopening as a Quality Suites any time soon, and even without a virus decimating tourist trades, there's a lot of hotel competition that didn't exist when Quality Suites first went up. Despite being on the freeway as well, its access is a bit difficult, either requiring the southbound exit to Texas and staying on the frontage road, or working around Longmire and going back to Ponderosa. There's a good chance that it was planned before the new Rock Prairie exit was made, not only did the old Rock Prairie exit actually allow access to the hotel very easily (even southbound) in 2005, it did not visually obscure it.

According to one of the old Choice Hotel locators I have (from 2007), the hotel has 81 rooms, a swimming pool, exercise room, meeting room, and a few other modest features (like guest laundry).

Even if the hotel industry was better (overbuilding had gotten to be a problem), Quality Suites shows no signs of reopening anytime soon. The card reader on the south entrance has been ripped out, exterior maintenance is slipping, rooms have been dismantled (mattresses leaning up, etc.), and the lobby is trashed. It would not take much to reopen it under a different name, but it requires some work that the current owners have not put in yet. Personally, I'm surprised the high weeds have not gotten the pressure from city code yet.

In terms of placement, this is the very first address (apart from Veronica's Country Corner, an outlier in every sense of the word) that focuses on a Highway 6 address that isn't on the Earl Rudder portion, and the first hotel covered in a while (not since La Quinta).

UPDATE 10-24-2023: In early 2023 this hotel reopened as Wingate by Wyndham. ([defunct] removed).
UPDATE 12-25-2023: I wanted to mention that the hotel is dual-branded as a Hawthorn Suites as well.

Brake Check

Brake Check, pictured here in 2014 (by author).

It's Thursday, and there's no more posts in the backlog to feature. Time to make a new post, luckily there's source material to whip something up. In this case, it's Brake Check on University Drive East (only Brake Check in town as of this writing). Originally, when it opened in 2007, the text above was different ("Alignment" was originally "Shocks & Struts", for instance). Before Brake Check opened, it was a Sonic Drive-In, one of the first in town (the other was at 914 South Texas Avenue in Bryan, which remained open and was completely rebuilt in the mid-2000s). It was open even according to the 1980 phone book, likely opened in the 1970s. This location closed around 2004 (possibly 2003) and stood vacant for a few years before it was torn down. (There was a gap of a few years before a new Sonic at Cooner and Texas opened).

The new Brake Check did not have access to Poplar as Sonic once did, as Sonic was once part of a 1970s-era "restaurant row" with Egg Roll House (now Jimmy John's) and the Pizza Hut.

4.0 & Gone

April 2020 picture again, later on we'll get to some livelier but older ones.

With Hullabaloo Hall now covered, I'm going to try to do a complete "walk" down University Drive, excluding the things already covered. What would be 201 University was a gas station (Magnolia brand) demolished when the underpass was originally built, 203 University was Deluxe Diner most of my life and Chimy's Cerveceria for the better part of the last decade, and now we get to 205/207 University.

It is a building with metal siding, 205 University. While it was an eatery called M&M Grill (not to be confused with A&M Grill of the distant past) in the mid-1990s, it was later the flagship location of DoubleDave's PizzaWorks (moved from 211 University), until it moved off of Northgate for good in 2006. It is unknown as to when it was built, one resource (Northgate Historic Resources) says mid-1960s, while BCAD says 1987. (Presumably, 1987 was when major upgrades were made to the building...with "New York Bagel" possibly being the tenant in question, which preceded M&M Grill as per a 1992 document). As of now, 1960s will be marked when the building was built.

This building also has the address of 207 University (though it has not used it in years), likely used for an upper level area (both what is now as of this writing, Icon Night Club and Loupot's had the same thing).

As of this writing, the libraries are closed so it is difficult to find more information on the building's history, but a 2005 phone book seems to place DoubleDave's at "209A", even though 209 (next door) was Aggieland Flowers & Gifts (and did not have a separate entrance).

By 2007, DoubleDave's was gone (still barely visible under the new Schotzi's sign) and replaced with "Schotzi's & Skyybar", with Skyybar presumably on the upper level of the building (the area above 209 University had not yet been built). Sometime around 2013 or 2014, Skyybar simply became Sky Bar but in 2015 Schotzi's folded entirely and was replaced by 4.0 & Go, formerly located at Park Place Plaza.

As you can see, 4.0 & Go is gone from Northgate. Presumably, the high rent drove them off, despite a workable parking plan. By spring 2020 (before A&M was closed for the semester due to virus fears), 4.0 & Go was out of Northgate, listed on their website (as of this writing) as being "in transit".

UPDATE 12-13-2021: A drive-by of the building reveals that the building has been re-tenanted as "Good Bull Icehouse" (no relation to the now-defunct Good Bull BBQ). [bar] has replaced [defunct] in the sidebar.

Hullabaloo Hall and the Three Dorms Before It

The world was shut down in April 2020.
It has a long time since I added any campus TAMU buildings to this site, the last official one being added was...Scoates Hall, back in December 2014.

I used to work at Texas A&M University briefly in 2017, and I had ideas to add a number of new entries focused on TAMU buildings after the last post was done and the blog went on hiatus for one and a half years, longer than any gap in its history. As a result, those were basically cancelled, and the one post I actually had been working on, "At Home" on the Boriskie Ranch appeared nearly two years after it was supposed to. (I had also planned a big rewrite of The Commons)

This particular post was supposed to be added back in late 2014 as "Defunct Dorm Roundup" and even was to include information on Law Hall, Puryear Hall, Cain Hall (which had not yet been demolished by that point, but was no longer dorms), and Hotard Hall. Perhaps more on those another day (especially Cain Hall!)

Crocker Hall, Moore Hall, and McInnis Hall were all separate buildings but all immediately adjacent to each other and formed a "U" shape (with the open part of the U facing west, and featuring a small dorm lounge building), and from the side closest to University, it was Crocker, McInnis, and Moore. All three dorms, much like FHK, Walton/Schuhmacher Hall, the Corps dorms, and the Commons dorms, had a dorm culture in each dorm, and shared amongst other dorms. (It's weird. Observation or Internet threads only gives you a taste).

Crocker Hall was built in 1942, looking like this. McInnis was a "balcony"-style dorm built in 1964 (FHK complex is another "balcony" dorm, but culturally different), and Moore Hall was more like Crocker Hall and also built in 1942.

In 2010, the announcement came that the dorms would be replaced with a larger dorm (first on campus since the 1980s) and after the spring 2011 semester, demolition commenced. By October of that year, the dorms, the nearby "dorm lounge", and a basketball court between them and Walton Hall were gone, replaced with a big hole in the ground.

Not too long after, it was revealed the new dorm to replace it would be called Hullabaloo Hall, despite the fact that Texas A&M Galveston had already had a dorm of that same name. When Hullabaloo Hall (the one in College Station) opened in fall 2013 (at 306 University Drive), it included a new stoplight at Boyett and University, and replacing three other driveways (which were no longer as useful due to medians added on University). Dulie Bell was demolished after fall 2013 to provide more parking space for Hullabaloo Hall, and a new basketball court and a new sand volleyball court at the site of the Special Services Building.

While it doesn't have the requisite "swimming pool for wild parties", Hullabaloo Hall had other features similar to off-campus dorms (including "study rooms", etc.) and two retail tenants, a Starbucks, and a convenience store. When Hullabaloo Hall first opened, it featured a location of Rattlers' inside, but the contract ended within a year (now it's just "Aggie Express" or whatever Chartwells calls its convenience stores these days).

Shipley Do-Nuts, Southwest Parkway

Do-Nut You Forget About Me. (Picture from author, 4/20)


If I had to describe "which road best represents my childhood", it would have to be Southwest Parkway. There was the Citgo there at the corner of Southwest Parkway and Wellborn, before Southwest Crossing was built, a common fuel and convenience stop (more will be discussed when the gas station is added), the Texaco station at Welsh Avenue, those weird townhome-style apartments catty-corner to that (Embassy Townhomes), South Knoll Elementary School (where I went to school, and was once covered on this site, though mostly I described its dark, pre-renovation corridors), and small streets where family friends lived.

Further down the road was Parkway Baptist Church and Bee Creek Park, where seasonally Adamson's Lagoon (which I also used to have a post on) would be a great spot to take the family. It's not nearly as good now, I haven't been to it for years (my siblings grew up and left home), but it did decline objectively, with the floating snake and frog eventually being chained to the pool floor (if they're even still there—and I do remember the incident as to WHY they're chained), the crowds increasing (with the price), and the removal of the diving board.

Parkway Baptist Church was where my Boy Scout troop was located (I never became an Eagle Scout) and, it's hard to notice from the street, but a few houses down you can see that there's a duplex with one side of the house having slightly different brick than the other. The reason for this is because around 2000 there was no fence from Southwest Parkway and it was used as a front yard (there's a small alley off Welsh). However, one night a drunk driver careened off of the road and crashed through the side of the house, killing a young girl in her sleep. I don't have the news story with me but that's how I remember it happening. As I passed the area pretty frequently I could see where the front of the house was boarded up, and although it happened gradually over the next 12 years, eventually all the houses between the church and Welsh had fences built along Southwest Parkway.

Finally, there was Parkway Square, featuring Kroger (of course), but also Baskin-Robbins, a video rental store, and a McDonald's that was often visited. I know I've covered Arby's and what I mostly remembered as a vacant building but there was one place I haven't covered yet, haven't even mentioned it as of this writing except for a throwaway line on the Post Oak Square article. That would be Shipley Do-Nuts, located at 1716 Southwest Parkway, originally built in 1984.

The "do-nut" shop is best known before its most recent facade update around 2017-2018, with its appearance which removed the message board as well as changed the main signage piece. The new remodel also removed the tiny marquee lightbulbs around the signage, which used to light up and dance around the sign. I don't know the specific reason they stopped, whether it being too expensive to maintain, machinery got broken down, or ordinances preventing it. (Probably both).

UPDATE 03-12-2022: As of this writing, I'm working on a full Southwest Parkway page on Carbon-izer.com, so check that out soon. One thing that I failed to mention in the original 2020 article is that a car apparently took drive-through a bit too literally and crashed through the front of it, so the brick in the center front is not original. It happened sometime in the 2000s and was the ol' "confused the gas pedal for the brake" problem. I also failed to mention the shop was opened in 1988.

Exxon Rock Prairie and Wellborn

There was another Exxon located on Rock Prairie's other end. More on that another time. (Picture by author, Apr. 2020)
Sometime around 1997 or 1998, Rock Prairie Road was extended from Victoria Avenue to Wellborn Road, eliminating the need to trek back on North Graham toward Victoria. Within a few years, an Exxon station was built and later, a stoplight (I'm pretty sure the stoplight came before the railroad crossing--which upgraded and extended Gandy Road into a full extension to North Dowling Road).

This Exxon station (at 12727 FM 2154) anchors the southeast corner of the intersection, with the Shell station coming in about 3-5 years afterward.

Brazos CAD isn't all that clear when everything was built, indicating the car wash was built a full two years before the convenience store was in 2000. In the first year or two, the Exxon featured an A&W restaurant, which had returned to College Station-Bryan after a 20+ year absence (there was a location near the modern-day intersection of University Drive and Texas Avenue, but that's for another post). A&W's attempt at what was then south College Station didn't last long at all, and I had to make sure of it through some digging on Project HOLD to make sure it wasn't just the power of suggestion getting to me, but by early 2001 A&W was gone, and a Sonic took its place in the summer of 2001. The addition of Sonic added the traditional Sonic canopies to about seven parking spaces, and evidence suggests these were functional carhop spaces.

In 2008, the Sonic moved to a new space next door and the space was abandoned. By early 2009, it was operating as Taco Casa, which reused a lot of Sonic's infrastructure by painting the red trim on the canopies orange to match Taco Casa's branding scheme. But it too closed after a few years (sometime in mid-2011). It didn't help Taco Casa's case that 2009 and 2010 were plagued with major construction. The Exxon actually lost about a dozen parking spaces in the front, with an entrance to Rock Prairie also closed (though that became three new spaces). Sometime within this same time frame, the signage updated to electronic numbering.

Finally, around early 2013, the space was filled with Little Caesars, which ditched the interior seating for a walk-up counter and the only Little Caesars in the area with a drive-through.

The main "Tigerland Express" food mart was there from the start, with a third tenant serving as a liquor/tobacco store (but is only accessed from the inside, despite the presence of an exterior door). Finally, the car wash is next to the convenience store.