Culpepper Plaza / Central Station

Signage and Chick-fil-A, May 2019
Culpepper Plaza (renamed as Central Station following a 2007 renovation) opened in March 1976 with a Safeway (later AppleTree) and a full collection of other retail stores. Even into the 1990s it had large stores like Weiner's, Eckerd, and AppleTree, but by the early 2000s these were gone, prompting a large-scale remodel starting in late 2006.

je of Southern Retail did send me a screencap of a video taped at some point in the 1990s; regrettably, it's a photo of a television screen and poor quality. You can see that here. Below is an ad of Culpepper Plaza circa 1988. It lists Quick as a Flash, which is strange since not even the parking lot is connected. It shows some things I can't place, including a popcorn shop (in the 1990s, there was a bagel shop), Starships & Dragons (comics and collectibles?), Games Galore (an arcade) and Singer Sewing Center.

I've created a list of tenants from directory listings and others, but it's far from complete—lots of stores and restaurants aren't even on here. Starting from the block next to 1503 Texas Avenue South we have the following...

1505A - As far as back as 1981, this was the local Bennigan's restaurant. I never ate at Bennigan's, but it had an old mural (of the logo, nothing special) facing Texas Avenue. It survived the Central Station remodeling, but it closed in July 2008 when the parent company imploded. Later, it became an AT&T store, which it is today. This was one of the stores on the "smaller strip" and facing Texas Avenue.

1505B - This location has been serving Asian cuisine for years. Currently (since 2021) it is "F&F Japanese Grill" (Fast & Furious Japanese Grill). From December 2015 to 2019 this was He's Cafe, Ping's Buffet from 2005 to 2015, China Wok Restaurant from 1991 to 2005, and prior to that was "Steamboat Singapore". (H/T to Andrew Y.)

1507 - From 1979 to October 2005 this was Swensen's. Swensen's was a great ice cream parlor (they also had a few food items like hamburgers and hot dogs) at its peak, they had things like kids' meals in paper foldout pink Cadillacs, a "clown face" ice cream using an inverted cone as the hat, and a bunch of other things. It also gets coverage in the 1979 TAMU yearbook, a two-page spread!

After a short time as Little Blue Heron, a steakhouse/seafood restaurant, it became Firehouse Subs in December 2008.

1509 - From summer 2009 to late summer 2014, this was the location of Spoons Yogurt (the FIRST Spoons in the chain). It looks like it was part of Swensen's originally (the space, that is). Spoons was great while it lasted and looked to be a growing chain. Under the name "3 Spoons Yogurt", locations opened as far away as Clemson, SC, Lawrence, KS, and Knoxville, TN, but they all failed. Only the locations built in Texas (Huntsville, Waco) did well and remained open. Spoons closed in fall 2014 and became Galaxy Ice Cream & Bubble Tea (a/k/a Galaxy Tea House), but Spoons Yogurt reopened in the space by late September 2015...and restored the cafe to its original appearance before closing for good in early 2020. By spring 2021 it became the current tenant "Rush Bowls".

1511 - Current location of the UPS Store. This was Games Galore back in the late 1980s and early 1990s, and in the late 1990s/early 2000s was a Mail Boxes Etc. store. I don't know what used to be here. In 1980 this was "Mother Nature Home of Nutrition".

1513 - This was "Schmaltz's Sandwich Shop" from 1980 to 1996, though I don't know where it fits in exactly. It was Dollar Tree from 1996 to 2007. Because of this, I would assume that the current "Eyemart" is where Dollar Tree was previously.

1515 - Holding the address of also 1517 (both the same tenant), this was Godfather's Pizza from 1980 to 1988. Eventually (a "Luvz Jewelers" was in 1517 in the mid-1990s) this became of Muldoon's Coffee House (at 1517) from fall 2009 to fall 2014. Following this it became Eyemart.

1519 - Supercuts has been here since 1989.

1521 - Pancho's Mexican Buffet was here from early 1992 to around 1999. I never liked it because of the large, creepy "sun masks" hanging above the dining area. Los Cucos replaced in 1999, and prior to Pancho's was Cow Hop Junction (a spin-off of the Northgate restaurant for more casual diners), and before that (1982-1987) was Texas Tumbleweed. A 1980 directory lists "Little Mexico" for this tenant.

Now we move on to the 1600 building, starting at the side closest to Dominik.

1601 - At the very end of Culpepper Plaza, this space has traditionally housed a large restaurant though sadly it hasn't been a restaurant for a number of years. From what I can piece together, It was home to Rosewood Junction from 1977 to 1981, Padre Cafe in 1984, Jumping Jack Flash in 1987 (very brief), Creole Cafe – 1987 to 1988, Taco Tempo – 1988 (if opened, only for a month), and Mama's Pizza in 1989-1991 (relocated from 1037 Texas Avenue). From 1992 to 1999, this was Bullwinkle's Grill & Bar was located at the very end of Culpepper Plaza, closest to Dominik Road. I do vaguely remember visiting it when I was younger, and it's still talked about on TexAgs sometimes.

Eastgate

Here's a look at another major neighborhood in town: Eastgate. Unlike Northgate, Eastgate hasn't quite gotten the "student saturated" appearance. Part of this is preservation of an actual neighborhood. The definition of Eastgate is the official, city-supported version, so we'll roll with that.

Here's a few things about Eastgate you should know. I covered Dominik Road a while back, so we'll go ahead and skip that. We're also going to skip the College Station City Hall and the first fire station, mostly on the basis that it's fairly well documented elsewhere (and we mentioned it here, which is where these things tend to wash up). The "Eastgate" businesses are mostly limited to a large area at Walton and Texas Avenue (though a few exist tucked in the back).

This was a proposal we got in the early 1990s, where Walton comes into Texas Avenue (originally, you couldn't turn left in or out of Walton--those parking lots were long yield lanes).



Unfortunately, this never happened, and all we got was some abstract art and a new stoplight.

But look at those businesses...a convenience store, only two familiar faces (Alfred T. Hornback's and Acme Glass), and no Layne's. Based on the placement of Eastgate Food Store, I'd put that at early 1990s or late 1980s.

Starting down the list, we have 101 Walton-103 Walton. 103 Walton was Robinson Pet Clinic in 1989 (but 103A, the space seems small enough so that there's no B...103 must be on the right). 101 was presumably Texcomm. Both are vacant these days.
The empty green roofed building, May 2014

105 Walton, which was a UtoteM since at least the early 1970s (and probably since Day One), became a Circle K in 1984 (if briefly) before becoming Eastgate Food Store in the late 1980s and early 1990s. After decades of being a convenience store, it became Military Depot, a retailer of military-related goods around '92-'93. A few pictures of the Military Depot facade...
You can barely make out the EAS here, I don't know if the shadow was from the military badge or not (probably)
Another view.

Valley Cycling (a 1990s business) was what I remember being in the "main" section of Eastgate at 107 Eastgate. This I do have a picture but it's only postage-stamp sized, and it's on my computer but I'm not going to dig it out right now. , as you may know, was where Textbook Solutions is now. Later, it became a vintage clothing/nostalgia-type store ("Left-Handed Monkey", which lasted...not very long. Blissful Wishes Bridal was here for a while, but eventually by the late 2000s, it was Textbook Solutions, which it remains today.

109 Walton wasn't always food related ("Wing Zone" being here in the early part of the 2000s, records indicate), and it's also where the "Guitar Shop" was in the diagram. Regardless, this is where Leaning Tower Pizza was here at 109 Walton for several years (Partners Food Delivery was here for several years prior apparently, back in the 1990s--but the tenant space for this one is largely drawing a blank). Primo Pizza & Rolls took over when Leaning Tower fell down in spring of 2013. Leaning Tower was an interesting place--it made a particularly greasy pie with a unique cheese mixture. It was also pretty grimy (that's why the pizza is piping hot). It had some garden furniture for an "eat-in" area and had "free delivery" that had a significant discount if you picked it up in store, which means it wasn't actually free at all.

Primo Pizza, a Charles Stover concept, initially planned to reopen the restaurant with a new name and theme and a similar recipe (the recipes were bought along with the store), but instead revamped the recipes and made a more upscale carryout pizza that had pesto on every slice (this opened in late summer 2013). For whatever reason, Primo shut down in February 2014 due to underperformance, but the way it was worded indicated that the closure could be temporary. After all, the sign remained up!

The pictures I took in May 2014 revealed the restaurant was gutted.

Primo Pizza in better days, September 2013
Gutted PP, May 2014
Gutted PP, May 2014. This is where the counter and menu were. The kitchen was behind that wall. This configuration was intact for both LTP and PP&R.

So why did Primo close? Now, I don't know the reason why, but like with Sully's I can make a few guesses.

There's always a chance that Primo Pizza will reopen since Charles Stover still has the recipes and name, but it definitely won't be Eastgate. Here's Primo Pizza's webpage, archived in PNG form.

Further down the line we have Eastgate Hair Shop for Men, I'm pretty sure this hasn't been updated in years (111 Walton) and Oasis Pipes & Tobacco, which moved here from a spot on University evicted for the Plaza Hotel redevelopment and was reduced to rubble soon before the Plaza Hotel came down. The business (and the sign) transplanted to here, 113 Walton, but didn't last long either. There appeared to be some baking equipment scattered in the building. This may have been a holdover from Partners Food Delivery.

Looking inside Oasis, May 2014
Eastgate Barbershop and Oasis, May 2014
Oasis, a body piercing shop, and an apartment finder service, May 2014

119 Walton is called "To The Point" now and the older spot of Textbook Solutions.
123 Walton (no 121 Walton, apparently) is now "Aggieland Apartment Finders", and way in the back behind the strip mall area tucked away is Lost Souls Fixies (it seems pretty sketchy in the areas behind the center).

Over on the other side, we see Alfred T. Hornback's, May 2014. This popular bar (120 Walton Drive) was here for many years, and although not built as it, had a large floor with pool tables and country music. Eastgate was not a huge draw like Northgate was and it closed permanently in summer 2011 though remained open for special events. After DC (Dixie Chicken, not DC Comics) moved out of the building that later contained Blackwater Draw Brewing Company. There's also a small professional office next to it, but I didn't read it too closely (nor is it particularly important to this narrative).

More businesses, May 2014. Behind these is Crossfit 979. Acme Glass is a viable company that's been here for years, but The Event Company has been closed for a few years (wedding planners). The business at 118 Walton hasn't updated its website since July 2013. Acme Glass at 116 Walton does a good business, this one is pretty stable, the building next to it appears to be the old Greyhound station (114 Walton), but it seems vacant and used for storage (a visit in 2011 revealed a filthy but late 1990s era washing machine). I don't know when it went out of service, but it was a while ago. 108 Walton was Wilson Plumbing, but now is the home of Layne's.

Layne's, May 2014. The former Sully's is in the background (check that out here). For what it's worth, Layne's opened before the first Raising Cane's (in 1994 vs. Cane's 1996).

Behind these businesses is Eastgate Park, a place in four segments: it's the medians between the parking lot and Walton, and about four or so vacant lots on Foster. However, city records show that this has been parkland since the late 1930s. Abstract art was installed in 2000.

Of course, that's just the tip of the iceberg, I could also go into the story of Munson Drive, which you could find and read about on MyBCS but since I read a scrapbook of articles, when Munson expanded to Lincoln in the late 1990s, the residents of Munson got the city to put up gates to prevent people from cutting through their neighborhood, which upset everyone else but it took nearly a year of fighting and countless letters to the editor before the city voted to remove the gates (and because at the time, Munson was where all the well-off and politically powerful people were, giving them enormous influence in the city). Or Thomas Park, which had always been owned by the city (all 16 acres) since 1938, but it wasn't until the 1970s when it began to become an actual park. The flagship of this was Thomas Park, which wasn't developed until the late 1970s. According to the great but dated College Station 1938-1988, it mentioned one of its accessories being a "plastic bubble dome which allowed indoor swimming during the winter months."

Either this plastic bubble was impractical and/or fear of lawsuits from people asphyxiating in chlorine gas meant that it would be never be seen again, because I know that Thomas Pool is definitely never open in the winter months to my memory. But such a thing did happen, and you can see some B&W pictures here and here which I originally scanned for Project HOLD.

That's all for now...

The Lost Buildings of Luther Street and Wellborn Road

At one time, the block where Berkeley House is featured a fine dining establishment in a converted house (from Center Magazine)

This is one of the posts I've had for years on the blog and despite tons of rewrites still may come off as disjointed, and needs a bit of a proper introduction.

Today, the entire block features a large apartment building, Berkeley House (opened fall 2018), a student-oriented complex. It is impossible to take a good photo of it, as it comes up to the street, and I can't take a photo from the other side, as Wellborn has a curb next to it. As a result, Google Street View will have to suffice, though it is currently not updated yet, only showing the old thrift store that was there.

When I was a kid growing up in the mid-1990s, this corner featured a small convenience store that sold Chinese food, perhaps some of the first (Americanized) Chinese food I've ever had (that or Confucius Chinese Cuisine). Later on it became a thrift store but my father had an old 1940s map of the campus and surrounding area that listed the building as "Hrdlicka Café". What was this café, and how did it become a thrift store?

Over the years, through research and other help, these answers and more were revealed.

In 1919, a house at what would be 801 Wellborn Road was built by Ed Hrdlicka ("1" on the map below). Eventually, the house passed on to Ed's daughter Marilyn, and her husband Jack Fugate. In the late 1970s, the house was converted into a restaurant—Fish Richards Half-Century House. Fish Richard's menu featured seafood, lamb, and prime rib along with a selection of wines.

Apparently the reason that Fish Richard's closed was due to a divorce by the couple that owned it (some ads in the final days of Fish Richard's discussed a new future location), but the building burned to the ground in 1988, and the 801 Wellborn address went unused for years, until the construction of Berkeley House.

#2 on the map was 803 Wellborn, and wrecked sometime in the late 1990s, likely around the time of the demise of Piknik Pantry (below). This was the home of Fugate's printing press and laundromat businesses and later home to Fish Richards Bakery, the bakery operation of Fish Richard's, which sold a variety of baked goods all day, every day (except Sunday afternoons). I read somewhere (but lost the source) that this was the original supplier for Subway when it came into town in the early 1980s. Ad can be found here.

#3 on the map was 805 Wellborn. This was the likely site of the eponymous Hrdlicka Café from 1920 to the mid-1940s, a student beer joint, dancing hall, and storefront grocery store. "Uncle Ed" leased the store shortly before his death in the early 1950s and by 1957 it was operated by Ed Krolczyk, who tried to make barbecue from "any kind of meat" and claimed to make a great barbecued raccoon.

By the 1960s it was replaced with a convenience store, the Piknik Pantry with Amoco gas (certainly by 1972), though 1980 phone book says "811 Old College Road", indicating not only a rename later (likely holding over from the days when Wellborn and Old College were one and the same, as Wellborn did not extend to Villa Maria but instead curved to Old College) but a renumbering (or just an error). Piknik Pantry & Chinese Food (it sold Chinese food later, and research even shows that an old Chinese restaurant at 3030 E. 29th, Sing Lee, had the same owner) mets its demise in the late 1990s and was quickly replaced with 2nd Chance Resale Shop, operated by Twin City Mission. Based on Chamber of Commerce newspaper clippings, this probably first opened in late 1997 with Piknik Pantry meeting its demise shortly prior. Sometime in the mid-2010s (2016 I believe) it moved to a new location and in 2017, it was torn down for Berkeley House. According to a comment I received in 2015, it featured an all-you-can-eat buffet on Sundays (back in the '80s) for just four or five dollars. The same comment references the gas pumps as well.

There were two more businesses in that block that I haven't labeled.

At 809 Old College (location unknown) there was Astraptes, an "adult disco" nightclub. There's rumors on forums (where it was misspelled as "Astropates", among others) that this was the closest thing to a gay bar College Station had, and according to Houston LGBT History (link sort-of NSFW), it was, mentioning after closure it reopened in 1983 (if briefly--and it's the only Google result that spells the name correctly).

This one is from the 1980 phone book published by GTE.
There was a fifth business, the Peanut Gallery, at 813 Old College, and that seems to be based on what was there on aerials, that it was the metal building directly next to Piknik Pantry. By the 21st century this was just storage for the resale shop. Today, of course, everything described in this post is long-gone. The thrift store and everything around was leveled in 2017 for the aforementioned Berkeley House apartments. Officially it uses 805 Wellborn but some references use 801 Wellborn, site of the Hrdlicka/Fugate homestead.

Extensive update done August 2019, new name April 2020

Stover Bros. And How It Came To Be

This post was originally focused on the Stover Bros. eatery in Village Foods and what led up to it. It was derived from an interview with Charles Stover. For the entries in this blog, please see:

- The Exxon on Boonville (Stover Boys first location)
- Square One
- Westgate Center (Stover Boys second location)
- Eastgate, regarding Primo Pizza
- Village Foods
- Post Oak Mall Part 2: The Food Court

Thanks.

Grand Station Entertainment

When this opened as Lowe's, the frontage roads were still two-way.
While Bryan got a Lowe's store sometime in the mid-1990s and College Station 2010, College Station did have an even older Lowe's store. As it turns out, we did get a Lowe's back in the mid-1980s, on the bypass. It was much different than the Lowe's of today, much smaller and featuring slightly more departments before streamlining (like electronics!) but it didn't do so well, and closed circa 1989. From what I can read up, it became Brazos Valley Golf Driving Range (2400 East Bypass), but by the 1990s it was known as Wolf Pen Bowl & Skate, which featured a large roller skating rink, a snack bar, and of course a bowling alley, which I remember as being slightly better than the MSC's but not by much. Toward the back was PowerSports Gymnastics (which was fairly large and did have a small upper level viewing area, like Acrofit's, except larger). There was also, apparently, a vertical wind tunnel in the early days when it opened around 1994, but that seems to have been gone soon after (if it was ever built).

Unfortunately, I have no pictures, save for the ad below. It seems based on the ad that they sub-leased the space, and I recall hearing that after it closed it was used as storage space. Sub-leasing or not, I also seem to remember that you could access the gymnastics area through the main bowling area.

Ad for the gymnastics portion, originally "Powerhouse" (not PowerSports)
It later became Power Gymnastics (the "Sports" being conspicuously removed from the sign) before finally disappearing around the mid-2000s, which was about the same time Acrofit kicked the bucket. The last time I remember going to the skating rink was probably closer to 2004 (sixth grade, always an awkward experience), but by 2007 it was acquired by a new owner. While this meant the loss of a different bowling alley in town (Triangle Bowl in Bryan, which was even more run-down than the other two alleys) it meant that Wolf Pen Bowl & Skate would be renovated. The plan would be like "Boonville Station", a similar project planned in 2005 in Bryan but never got off the ground, and soon Wolf Pen Bowl & Skate closed and was gutted for a new bowling alley, an arcade (though the original Wolf Pen Skate had a few arcade games, I think), glow-in-the-dark mini-golf, an expanded eating area, and laser tag. This, of course, was Grand Station Entertainment, which remains today. The ugly blue facade remained for a number of years afterward until around 2015 when it was rebuilt.

The other side of the facade.

I don't know if the Wolf Pen Bowl built in front of the store (the aerial suggests the building was expanded to the front and the parking lot altered) or not, but one wonders if they had simply expanded. There's certainly enough space to.

The back of the building still looks like a warehouse.

The covered former lumber yard area is used for storage, and fenced off.

These televisions, located in an outside eating area, were presumably installed in the renovation, but were outdated from day one.
Last updated in July 2020

College Station Conference Center

From KBTX, which most definitely did not take it off from the city's Flickr account

1300 George Bush Drive

Yesterday (from when this post was made), College Station Conference Center was shut down...basically condemned due to concerns that the roof would collapse. And to me, that may be "well, it was old and needed to be torn down anyway for a more modern building", but to me it was kind of special.

For starters, it had the first permanent building off campus for the CSISD, holding first through 12th grade, built in ~1949. The high school would move out in the 1950s or 1960s and again in the 1970s (the latter building will be explored in a new post coming soon). It also had a green triangular overhang and a newer very 1980s wing built in front of it (which was there at the opening of the Conference Center in 1982), plus it was one of the few areas to use the "old" College Station logo, which has been excised practically everywhere else. It used to be on the water tanks, even in the pool at Southwood. Additionally, in the 1949 wing, it had wooden floors (carpeted) which was great: it gave the floor a nice spongy, comfortable feeling not found in newer buildings (the last major wood-floor building on campus, for instance, was Special Services Building). And more importantly, there I was volunteering at Project HOLD, which sadly eliminated its full time job position not too long after I worked here.


In 2010, I tried to get a volunteer job there, as I had done last year. Regrettably, they could not accept me, so I did the next thing: create my own archives. Do my own research. And publish what I found in an easy to view, easy to access format. This website that you're looking at, Brazos Buildings & Businesses, hosting on csroadsandretail.blogspot.com or possibly carbon-izer.com, is the result of that.

Here's another picture of the Conference Center (the newer wing), from the same Flickr page as the image on the top of the page came from. As you can see, it's solidly early 1980s. I do miss those hexagonal tiles, though.


When I originally published this post, I included a hand-drawn map of the building as I remembered it. Turns out the city had their own floorplan, which I saved since the original link is dead. I wasn't too far off the mark:


Anyway, in late 2012 or early 2013 it was announced that the building would not reopen, and instead it was demolished for College View Alternative School, hosting both Venture and Timber Academy.

Updated Nov/15 to merge updates and update something else.

Der Wienerschnitzel

This picture is taken June 2019, the other menu shots were taken around 2012.

The Wienerschnitzel (called "Der Wienerschnitzel" in the early days) at 501 South Texas Avenue (Bryan) is definitely a relic, dating back to the late 1960s. That is a good thing: there are simply too few A-frame Wienerschnitzels left in the wild. I don't know this particular restaurant's opening, but I saw it in local newspapers (The Eagle, of course) back in the early 1970s, and this type was no longer built after 1973. However, all building searches mention elements built in 1992 (the oldest being 1982), which indicates that the rumors I've heard of this building burning down at some point and being rebuilt are true. There's no interior seating (only a few concrete seating benches inside), the drive-through is low and narrow, and the storeroom is accessed on the other side of the store (they load food supplies in the second level).


This ad comes from 1970, which proves that the Wienerschnitzel has been operating at this site for over 40 years.






There used to be a Wienerschnitzel in College Station, near Walmart as well, but it no longer exists. Rumors exist of Wienerschnitzel returning to south College Station.

Update 8/2019

At Park Place and Texas Avenue

An unexciting strip mall. (Photo by author, 4/20)
Before the current strip center here was built around 2005, the site at 1808 Texas Avenue South was originally Long John Silver's No. 5347 (may have originally gone by the chain's old name "Long John Silver's Seafood Shoppe") in 1980, and shut down around 2004 when it was discovered it was a front for a drug operation (unfortunately, The Eagle's archives don't really exist online).

The strip center today has a Verizon store (changed logos after the parent company did), "Cash Store" (payday loans--and apparently that IS its legal name), and Naked Fish sushi restaurant. Naked Fish remains open despite less-than-excellent health scores and originally the home of Doc Green's.

Doc Green's, a soup/salad/sandwich chain out of the Atlanta area, made its first stand in Texas here in late 2007 (and in Austin a few months later) with a logo that is no longer used by the company. Unfortunately, neither one did particularly well. The Austin one closed up in less than a year due to back taxes being owed, and the College Station one died a similar death.

In July 2012, Jenny Jenkins wrote in to say this:

Doc Green's opened February/March 2007. I worked there for a very short time (March to May/June). It was run by some disgruntled former Freebirds managers that thought they could run a restaurant better than Freebirds (where I also worked for a couple years). They couldn't have been more wrong. They were so horribly disorganized that I can't believe they lasted. For example, they were open for months and still hadn't installed paper towel dispensers. They couldn't keep up with ordering and wouldn't order the same things so the menu changed constantly just because they'd run out of stuff. It just was really poorly done. I'm not sure when exactly they closed, but I know it was longer than expected. They were pretentious for a restaurant that casual but the food was pretty good.

Doc Green's closed at the end of 2008 with Naked Fish replacing it in early 2009. Naked Fish continued to operate for about fifteen years before closing. Cash Store was also not an original tenant, it was originally Systek Computing. Systek moved to a strip center behind the newer plaza when it was built by 2011 and ultimately moved on.

UPDATE 04-23-2024: After being last updated in April 2020 with a photo, I went back through the post and updated it.

Ramada Inn / University Tower / Plaza Hotel

University Tower, taken from a car parked catty-corner at what was Diamond Shamrock (Project HOLD)

May 24, 2012, 6:40 AM:
There probably hadn't been that many people on the Polo Fields since the last Bonfire burned, and the busiest intersection in the city, University Drive and Texas Avenue, was closed down. The occasion? The Plaza Hotel at 410 Texas Avenue South was coming down. It was rare to see an implosion in College Station (two years later Kyle Field was imploded, but a large-scale structure implosion hadn't been seen before in College Station, or since).

Thousands showed up to the implosion, crowding the streets, making it there quite early (or in some cases, extremely late). It was a diverse crowd: students that stayed for the summer, families, the old and the young alike. After a ten minute delay, 6:40 AM was the moment the quarter-ton of dynamite in the upper levels detonated and the building crumbled to the ground, with one of the four people imploding it. The mayors of College Station and Bryan, TAMU chancellor John Sharp (can't resist a chance at publicity), and a fourth man, Joe Ferreri. When the building cracked apart, with the elevator shaft separating from the building in the process, people cheered, a massive dust cloud blew toward Bryan, and every car alarm in the public viewing area went off.

It was Joe Ferreri that built the hotel and the tower in the first place. The story goes that Joe Ferreri was a successful restaurateur in town, and Texas A&M president James Earl Rudder himself (long before getting a tower, a high school, a dormitory, and a freeway named after him, but after becoming a World War II hero) approached him with a business proposal.

Rudder explained that he was having trouble recruiting faculty to A&M because professors’ wives thought the town was boring. The solution, Rudder proposed, was a hotel across from campus with an Olympic-sized swimming pool, a banquet hall and a faculty club.

Ferreri wasn't so sure. But the former Navy soldier said he knew he couldn’t say no.

"When a general says, 'Do this or this,' you say, 'Yes, sir,'" Ferreri said.

At the time, College Station had no shopping centers of any type, there was nothing on Texas Avenue past what is now George Bush Drive, some scattered subdivisions east of Texas Avenue, and scattered subdivisions out to what is now Holleman, but that was it. Bryan was somewhat larger but it was comparatively farther away from campus.

I can't nail down an exact opening for the Ramada Inn, but from what I can tell it was 1964 (Brazos CAD still had the page up under the 2011 section).

Imagine seeing this beautiful sight traveling down Texas 6! Doesn't it look nice on a postcard?

At the corner of FM 60 and State Highway 6, College Station's first chain motel (maybe?), Ramada Inn, opened, complete with a tall, lit "Uncle Ben", Ramada's mascot. It delivered on all of Mr. Rudder's wishes, and within a decade new hotels and businesses were opening up and down Texas Avenue.

In the early 1960s (1960-1964, I was unable to nail down an exact date), when the Ramada Inn opened, it was the fanciest thing in town. Replacing eight homes that sat on the property, and outstripping the MSC in class and elegance, the Ramada had both motel-oriented rooms and hotel oriented rooms. It was also the only place to drink in town due to dry laws. Like many fancy hotels, during the 1970s, it held a few small retail tenants besides the restaurant, a travel agency and a hair salon (The Hair of Affairs).

Beefeaters: The restaurant in Ramada in the mid-1970s. What exactly is "heavy beef"?
There was another building that was on the premises that was not demolished when the hotel was built, and to this day is still somewhat of a mystery. You can see a picture here, just on the other side of the UtoteM store. Previously, I had written this was a location of a store called "100,000 Auto Parts" which had the same address of Ramada Inn (410 Texas Avenue, which it had up to its demise) but it turned out it was 410 North Texas Avenue in Bryan, so I don't know. I don't ever remember this being occupied in the 21st century. Brazos CAD says it was built in 1949, under "Units on Univ Dr".

Previously, I had written this was a location of a store called "100,000 Auto Parts" which had the same address of Ramada Inn (410 Texas Avenue, which it had up to its demise) but it turned out it was 410 North Texas Avenue in Bryan, so I don't know. I don't ever remember this being occupied in the 21st century.

When the Ramada was getting consistently full on a nightly basis, it had to expand, so parking was placed behind Meadowland (replacing more homes, of course) and a 17 floor tower was built in 1980-1982 (Brazos CAD says it was built in 1984). The construction involved demolishing the east end of the hotel and enclosing the swimming pool under a huge glass skylight. The top four floors were sold out as loft-style housing to wealthy Aggie alumni, all of which got rich off of the oil boom.

By the time it opened, oil prices were bottoming out, with a recession hitting Houston and College Station, with many restaurants outright closing. Jobs were lost. Banks closed. Real estate plummeted. In 1987, Ferreri declared bankruptcy and lost the hotel. I can't find exactly what happened in the process, but it looks like Ramada Inn either closed it or sold it, but the Ramada name ended up going to an existing hotel further south on Texas Avenue and in fall 1989, the building was reopened as a combination hotel and upscale student dormitory. Gone was the Ramada Inn name, as the company was now in a smaller building further down on Texas Avenue. Rather than Joe Ferreri, control went to California-based financier Leonard M. Ross, who renamed the building. UNIVERSITY TOWER shown from red neon to afar, but it soon fell into disrepair, partially because the hotel part disappeared more and more each year until finally becoming student dorms entirely in early 1994. Meanwhile Ferreri ended up going back to restaurants and opened an Italian restaurant in the former Ira's in the Kmart parking lot.

What was once advertising as an upscale hotel in 1990 (see page 4), the horror stories of students living in the tower are talked about to this day throughout message boards and real life. Tales of no hot water or broken down elevators live on and you'll be hard pressed to find someone who lived in and enjoyed the Tower after maybe the first or second year it opened.

At some point, the dorms were converted back into traditional hotel rooms, Ross eventually converted more of the dorms back into regular rooms (with a gala in the top level suite, Buzz Aldrin as the guest of honor) and renamed the hotel as the Plaza Hotel & Suites (this happened around 2004), which replaced the University Tower brandings with a large "P", but it just looked cheap and ugly. All during this time, Ross simultaneously hawked the site to the city in their quest for a convention center site while letting the hotel go to waste (it's worth noting, for instance, that Ross also owned the fourplexes at Meadowland, which were nasty enough to have the hotel at 104 Texas Avenue seal off its back entrance.

In 2007 (about three years after the Plaza name took over), a kid drowned in the swimming pool. In 2008, the kitchen scored a 47 on health reports due to no hot water, which almost never happens (in the University Tower days, it offered a cafeteria, which I bet was nothing worth talking about). After continued problems (and terrible, terrible hotel reviews) the hotel shut down for good in 2010 and sat abandoned for over a year.

It started to get reports of vandals and trespassers, and eventually the windows on the top level suite were knocked out and had to be patched with plywood. In in late 2011 the hotel was sold off as the holdings of Ross went bankrupt. I don't know if he's sold off his $165 million mansion in Beverly Hills yet, but there you go.

In January, the building was planned to be renovated once more as student housing, with the "design [being] complementary to the Texas A&M campus", but the decision was soon made to demolish it after all. After donating the furniture (probably not the mattresses), recycling any material they could, and letting the police and fire departments use it for training, it was gutted, making the building resemble a parking garage (albeit a tall, narrow one) more than anything.

Soon after posting the original version of this post, reader John E. of Southern Retail sent in some shots of what was left. Thanks!




There's also a great video on YouTube on the history of the building and the backstory of Joe Ferreri. There's great period music too, though I couldn't identify all of it.

After the last of the rubble was cleared away, the area sat as a muddy lot for the remainder of 2012. Of course, if you drive by today, you'll find new, huge structures on the site: Northpoint Crossing. Shorter, denser, and larger than the old Plaza, the former home of the tower has completely changed, along with the old Chevron, UtoteM/smoke shop, and Kettle in the area. As of this writing, the new article on Northpoint Crossing isn't done yet, but it will be covered here.

In a way, I'm a bit sad that the hotel had to go that way. Since the the Rise isn't an attractive building, I kind of wish University Tower had done something in the 1990s instead of letting it deteriorate. Rather than the boxy, "generic 70s hotel" tower (the former Holiday Inn/Days Inn/Heaven on Earth Inn in Houston had the same problem), they could've enclosed the entire building in glass, taken out the Gulf/Chevron on the corner of Texas and University, demolished the last of the original motel that wasn't part of the connected portion, closed off Meadowland Drive and turned the whole thing into a combo dorm/retail center, a la Dobie Center, so we could have something to compete with Austin in the 1990s, plus it would've filled in for any fast food establishments that WEREN'T on Northgate already. The downside to doing so would that it still would've been far away from the rest of Northgate (a long walk down past the University Apartments), which I think was/is also why Northpoint Crossing isn't doing as well as it could. With Century Square now built, that's probably less of an issue, but it's still far away from campus proper.

Extensive update June 2019 after 15 previous updates

Sunset Gardens

Welcome to Sunset Gardens!

3020 South Texas Avenue

Quick, what's between Sonic and Wings N More on Texas Avenue? A bunch of things, actually, including the old location of Petal Patch, a Domino's Pizza, lawyers offices, a fitness place, a pool store, and a burned-out greenhouse/garden store that has been more or less untouched since the late 1980s.

Yes, this is Sunset Gardens. Considered an unclaimed property since 1992, Sunset Gardens was destroyed in a fire in March 1988 by reasons unknown, and supposedly, according to MyBCS, due to the fertilizer contamination, would require lots of cleanup dollars invested if that area was to be ever utilized again.

I have no idea what Sunset Gardens looked like before its devastating fire: seems that there's no readily accessible satellite imagery from those days. However, I do have this ad, which given the original October 1985 publication date, indicates it first opened in 1983. Notice the logo: you can still see in the modern pictures, three decades after it opened. I took a trip out there in spring 2012 to take pictures.

Something MAY be happening out there, I took a trip in late 2017 to see that the site had been cleared, and the sign knocked down. I tried to pull out the iron(?) "sunset" logo but it was bolted in from the other side. Additionally, the fire date is sourced from the fire department yearbook.



Same area, different view


The sign, relatively untouched, even with some of a labelscar attached, in a similar font to the "Parkway Square" font near the Kroger. Unfortunately, it's been marred by the anti-bevel crowd, which is a stupid issue I care little about.


Looking out.


A bit of foundation visible.


This structure was saved, except for the burned puncture.

UPDATE: Added opening date, and the ad based upon which this was derived.
UPDATE 6/17/18: Added fire date and site update. A duplicate picture was also removed.

Southwest Crossing

The sun angle was bad, plus it was taken on my old cell phone camera (circa 2011-2012)
Southwest Crossing was built in the mid-2000s, I believe it was late 2005 or early 2006 when it was completed. As far as a 15-year-old center goes, tenant turnover is surprisingly low, so here's what we got so far, starting from the side closest toward the university (from the left, should you be looking at it head on) and ordered in terms of addresses. You can see a PDF here (archived from here) of the center. Note that they call it "Southwest Crossing at Bee Creek", though the creek behind it is not Bee Creek, though it does drain into it.

The first thing to see is the stand-alone Layne's Chicken Fingers (which I don't have a photo of), the second Layne's ever and their first expansion. Still branded as "Layne's of College Station" as it was known when it opened in November 2006, and was far more modern than their Eastgate store. This has the address of 1301 Wellborn Road. When it opened and for many years before the franchisee bought the parent company, it offered nothing but chicken fingers, Texas toast, fries, and small containers of potato salad and sauce. The cups didn't even have Layne's branding. With the purchase of the stores by the franchised version, they now offer milkshakes and additional sauce varieties.

Behind that was originally C.C. Creations at 1311 Wellborn, and the first big tenant to open, moving from their warehouse center on Holleman. Interestingly, in 2013, they moved out, consolidating with the Trophies location (Harvey Mitchell Pkwy. and Southwood) into the former Red Oak Sportswear building (very close to where they were before). Later on, this became a fly-by-night tutoring operation (one-on-one, not a group "here's how to pass the tests" type) called Aggieland Tutoring. Around 2017, part of the space became Texas State Optical (now MyEyeDr), and another part briefly became Vivint Smart Home. A section still remains vacant and is rumored to become a restaurant (a drive-through was installed but never used).

The next building, 1411 Wellborn, has four spaces. The first one (Ste. 100) was originally (2006-2007) The Beverage Oasis, a liquor store, then Haix Stores, a shoe store that operated from summer 2009 to 2013 (the signage remained up for a while after that). Tacobar replaced it in fall 2016 and closed in late 2021 in preparation of moving to 404 Jane Street. Nick the Greek opened in suite 100 in February 2023 to replace Tacobar. It is the first Nick the Greek location in Texas (and the gyros are excellent). Suite 200 was originally New York Subs (1411 Wellborn Ste. 200) which opened in 2007 (reported as "New York NY Fresh Deli" but the signage was New York Subs). I can't confirm or deny it was the same restaurant at 301 College Main. In early 2009 it was rebranded as Sub Culture (legally overnight, likely because the master franchising company out of Arizona went under) and finally closed in 2011. In early 2012 it became "Harold's Hot Dogs & Ice Cream", a local outfit serving hot dogs and ice cream. Harold's itself was also a rename from the displaced Maggie Moo's from Rock Prairie Crossing. Harold's also expanded the menu to hot dogs but it closed in June 2014. (While some bemoaned the loss of its oatmeal cookie ice cream, promises to add a fryer to add french fries went unfulfilled...how could you serve hot dogs but not fries?). In spring 2015, it reopened as another Kolache Rolf's location but closed permanently in 2018. It is currently planned to be a location of Mochinut, which will sell mochi donuts and Korean corn dogs. The next tenant (Ste. 300) opened in January 2006 as University Book Store, one of the first tenants to land in the center. It only lasted a few months before the chain went under and ended up being a leasing office for the Woodlands of College Station apartment complex for several years. It ended up being Anytime Fitness, then Aerofit Express (closing before the chain was sold), and finally Marethouse Fitness, a locally-owned fitness center that had signage up during COVIDmania but later opened by late 2020/early 2021. Suite 500 (no 400) The Beach Tanning Salon (Ste. 400) was one of the original tenants opened in 2006, but it closed by the end of 2014. Later it became the similar Tiki Tan, but it closed in the summer of 2019.

The last building has two tenants with the address of 105 Southwest Parkway, holding a C&J Barbecue (third location) and Hungry Howie's Pizza, the latter being the first College Station-Bryan location in town. Both opened in 2006. The Hungry Howie's is still the only HH's Pizza in the county, as a second location in town closed after a few years). Here's two more pictures from 2012 of the center building.




Two more things that weren't covered in the original post is Copper Creek Condos behind the shopping center at 301 Southwest Parkway (built in 2016). Predating the center (but listed as "pad site available", so it's up for redevelopment) is a Citgo. The Citgo was built with a 7-Eleven in 1986. In the early 1990s the market was sold to E-Z Mart, which began to shed stores later. Since around 2002 it has been a Zip'N, though as a brand name is kind of meaningless.

UPDATE 02-15-2024: Everything has been updated in a major rewrite, from the fate of Layne's to the legacy Citgo. A new PDF was added, too.
UPDATE 04-21-2024: After their first opening got canned, Mochinut opened for the first time on March 27, 2024. I was their first customer.