Texas Oaks Motel & Apartments

We'll have to make do with Street View for this one; again (2011) One thing that wasn't covered on that old Carbon-izer page which we've been getting our Texas Avenue information from recently was the old Texas Oaks Motel & Apartments, near the corner of East Duncan Street and Texas Avenue (1800 S. Texas Avenue). The first reference comes in 1942 in papers (not much older than that, they weren't built yet in 1935) and some references of expansion come post-war. I'm not sure when they offered apartments (they had 1&2 bedroom apartments) but there were expansions done to the property post-WWII.

There's not a lot of information to go on otherwise. It rebranded as "Texas Oaks Motel & Apartments" in the early 1970s around the time it changed hands from Preston Dishman to Sheeraz Ali Lakhani, and was initially competitive with other complexes, but eventually fell into disrepair. By 2003, the motel and two other aged motels near it (Casa Loma and Holiday Plaza) were considered to be nuisance businesses with a disproportionate amount of police calls to them (22 rooms and 52 calls for police calls for assistance over a six month period).

Here's the 2012 Street View which had a last-minute repaint as well as removing signage that advertised "color cable TV" (wildly outdated). In 2012 everyone who lived there got evicted and it was demolished within a year. Eastep Auto Sales, a used car dealer, replaced it in 2015, moving from across the street.

Gath's Chicken-N-More

This cropped photo is taken from the article below, but it's unknown to when it was taken. Not from the article, though.
I'm not committing to another Texas Avenue series but I want to continue south from Texas Avenue from Weiner's and go with the same theme of "Carbon-izer's Texas Avenue page", this fast food spot on 720 N. Texas Avenue has been a few outlets over the years. Its oldest records indicate a Popeyes Chicken & Biscuits in 1985 (that's what the restaurants looked like back then), by 1987 it was already Jim & Sue's Catfish & Steaks, then John's Katfish Kitchen (1988-1989), then Gath's Chicken-N-More (1989-1993, see article here, archived from here), then Gath's Wholesale Electric Company (1993 to 2006, but sat vacant into the early 2010s), then Fargo's BBQ (2013 to early 2017, before they moved to the former Western Sizzlin/Barnhill's/New Barnhill's/Ocean Buffet), then Mariscos Perla del Mar (lit. "Pearl of the Sea Seafood", opened 2017) which it is today.

Editor's Note: A number of posts have receieve updates. Just search for "UPDATE 04-08-2025" in the blog's search bar to find them.

Weiner's Bryan

From July 9, 1972. The "North Bryan Shopping Center" was never built; Weiner's was besides itself.
As part of a bigger project that is involving breaking down/updating the Texas Avenue page on my other website, Carbon-izer as well as adding some much-needed Bryan entries to the site, comes another entry, Weiner's, at 1520 N. Texas Avenue. We briefly mentioned Weiner's in the Culpepper Plaza page, but the Houston-based discount apparel store existed from 1972 to the chain's bankruptcy in 2001, with not even Weinerman able to save the store chain from its demise.

Best Pawn quickly picked it up and opened in 2002. By that time, there was more commercial development in the area, with H-E-B Pantry catty-corner (well, hidden behind on Old Hearne Road anyway) and the AppleTree-anchored Culpepper North. Best Pawn also had a long run (not quite as long as Weiner's) and operated until September 1, 2021. After a full renovation of the building, Poco Loco Supermercado opened in July 2023, though it doesn't have a fuel station component.

Finfeather's 7-Eleven

It wasn't too long before this 2005 picture that the gas station was conveniently located. (source). I fixed it up from Newspapers.com so it looked a little nicer.
One of the posts that was added in 2010 (March 2, 2010; there were originally far more posts from 2010 and 2011 than the current Index would suggest) focused on the north end of Wellborn Road and Finfeather. Today, we're re-visiting that (a post resurrection of sorts—parts of this post are fifteen years old!) by examining a former 7-Eleven at that corner.

In the mid-to-late 1970s Villa Maria Road was extended from Texas Avenue all the way out to FM 2818, creating two stoplights, one at Finfeather and the other at the extension of Wellborn Road from F&B Road. In the days when pre-bankruptcy Southland Corporation was first on the scene with new 7-Eleven stores/Citgo gas stations on the fringes on the development, a store opened up at Finfeather and West Villa Maria Road in 1978 (3300 Finfeather Road). In 1993 it became E-Z Mart due to Southland selling off hundreds of stores across different markets. (In Houston, the stores had already been sold off to National Convenience Stores, aka Stop 'n Go; in Waco, the stores were sold to Circle K; it really depended on the market).

Despite the fact that going to Bryan more often than not meant a visit to the pediatric dentist, I always liked the intersection growing up. Maybe it was because it was unique among the other crossings on Wellborn Road that Wellborn dipped below the railroad grade by up to sixteen feet before they came together again at the light, maybe it was the fact that both signals would go down even if it was only one train on the track (for safety reasons, obviously, even though it wasn't a true "two-track" crossing), maybe it was the fact that one track curved and one didn't.



The intersection as it was c. early 2004. Click to see full resolution.
The underpass construction officially started in late 2004 (though the real construction began in 2005); around this time the convenience store converted to "E-Z For You" (as I mentioned before here). By late 2010 the intersection was complete and the gas station, rather than closing, converted its signage to electronic. I think by that time it also changed over to an Exxon. Sometime between 2016 and 2018 the "fake" E-Z Mart was rebranded as "Just 4 You", a completely different logo but still keeping the old orange-and-green theme. No doubt that the station suffered due to the construction but the apartment communities along Finfeather kept it in business, but if the gas station did poorly following its complete cut-off from Villa Maria, the shop portion facing the Villa Maria side did even worse.

Casey's Wash House was one of the oldest tenants I can find in the space, but it appears to be built at the same time as the main store. Other tenants that have come and go included The Fishman (fish market, 1990s), Omar's Upholstery (early 2000s), and a few barber shops. (It appears that there is a hair salon in the spot as of this writing).