Former Cycles Etc.

The building for Insomnia is quite old... (Picture by author, 4/24) There's a lot of posts about Texas Avenue (74 and counting), but University Drive (not even counting University Drive East) takes a solid second place, and today the focus is on 505 University Drive, not to be confused with 505 University Drive East.

Located just to the east of what is now Aggieland Credit Union, this is currently home to Insomnia Cookies, which opened in 2021.

As usual, I try to focus on what used to be there.

Check out this 1954 advertisement from The Battalion!
The building started out as Student Co-op in 1931 as a bookstore with a radio repair shop inside. In 1944 Ed Garner took it over, added a sporting goods department, expanded the radio repair shop (which now serviced televisions). At some point it was retooled into Garner's Sporting Goods.

In 1972 purchased by Ted Wyatt, renaming to Wyatt's Sporting Goods. Wyatt's Sporting Goods was here until 1988 and had three stores in town at its peak (Culpepper Plaza, Manor East Mall, and here). It was a locally owned store and unrelated to the late Wyatt's Cafeteria.

After the nearly sixty-year old store closed, the next few decades would see it used as a bicycle shop. First was Cycle Spectrum from 1993 to 2002, then Bicycle Station was here from 2002 to 2003, with Cycles Etc. being here from 2003 to 2013 (moving from 104 College Main) and later moved to College Station Business Center in an attempt, I suppose, to get out of the student bicycle business (they closed in 2021). Before they moved I was a frequent shopper of Cycles Etc., but it was annoying that the sidewalk in front of the store was about a foot above the rest of the sidewalk, making it harder to even bring in a bicycle into the shop. (This was one objective improvement of the big University Drive pedestrian improvement re-do, I suppose).

After that it served as a leasing office for The Domain and in 2019, briefly served as Aggieland Phone Repair (already boarded up and for lease before the campus closure in March 2020). After that it became Insomnia Cookies.

Kyoto Sushi

Last days of the original "Kyoto Sushi", picture by author, 2014
Kyoto Sushi (at 113 College Main) doesn't exist anymore, it's now "Mama Sake", but when I entered Texas A&M University in the early 2010s, Kyoto Sushi not only was open but it had another sign facing south, visible from University Drive, that added to the atmosphere.

I had first written about Kyoto Sushi on a large Northgate post (since removed in site updates) and then on another post called 104-115 College Main which is still up as of this writing (albeit out of date) with new posts being split off of it (like this one). From what I had researched from that point, the building was originally the home of College Station's first police department.

From fall 1993 to mid-1994 it was ProTutors Incorporated, and following that, Disc-Go-Round, which it was as late as 2001. Kyoto Sushi came in for fall 2002, but I don't remember if I actually ate there (also sometime around 2010-2011, the front of the building was painted yellow). By night it served as a sake bar, and around 2012-2013 the sushi ceased entirely, and became the bar it is today (though the "Mama Sake" name didn't come in until later, I believe it was still officially "Kyoto Japanese"). Before ProTutors, my records mention a "Northgate Athletic" in 1985-1986 (not to be confused with Northgate Athletic Club where Logie's currently is) and the last spot of On the Double (from 1992-1993). I can't find anything beyond or before that.

I do remember in early 2014 the restaurant portion (guess it was operated by the bar) was called "The Bulgori" (which I had a menu of, and was Korean food, not Japanese) but by April that had already shuttered. The restaurant was okay, I guess. There was even a slice of blood orange with the meal. The upstairs portion was 115 College Main, accessed from a doorway to the right of what I knew as Kyoto Sushi.

Awkwardly-angled 2007 Google Street View with the unpainted bricks but no ugly facade
Until around 2013, 115 was "The Law Office of Drew Gibson & Associates". The lawyer office is still in Northgate and offers full services but I seem to remember them catering to the local area by helping students to get them out of trouble from drunken escapades. Probably as early as late 2014 (I mostly avoided Northgate by that time) it was a bar called One15, which it still is as of this writing. There's an almost-gone "Aggieland Studio" mural on the side of the building. As you can see in the shot below (when the building looked even worse), there's a sign that says "Paradise" above it. That was Paradise Scuba. It moved to Parkway Square in the mid 1990s (soon after that picture was taken, my 1993 phone book still has Paradise Scuba as being in Northgate) and eventually moving to the old Putt-Putt location.

A document written in 1995 dates this building back to 1935, but beyond the original police department building being here (their Texas Avenue building was built in 1978, and I have no idea if they stayed here long) I don't have information on the previous life of the building.

UPDATE 04-09-2022: One15 appears to have been closed sometime in early 2022. Also actually fit the address into the post.
UPDATE 04-24-2024: One15 didn't actually close, it moved to 106 College Main (the former Holik's, which as of this writing there's no post for). The space is now Johnny Manziel's Money Bar.

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."

Humpty Dumpty Children's Center

Requested by reader Jon Stewart (no, not that one) comes an ad for the late Humpty Dumpty Children's Center from 1980 (sourced from my GTE phone book from that year). Located at 3406 South College Avenue, I can't exactly tell when it went under, but it appears to have been sometime around 1986 (see later in the article). The plot of land it was on is shared with 3408 and 3404, the latter being in front of the store and serving as "The Guitar Studio" though is clearly a former gas station from a bygone era (this appears to date back to 1930 per county records). Additionally, some further reading indicates the Jones family lived at the site, with "3404A" being the address of one Larry Jones in 1980. Ms. Jones passed away in 2003 (combined with "since 1961" and "25 years", one can assume Humpty Dumpty closed in 1986) with Larry's death in 2009. For a brief time in the late 2000s and early 2010s, 3408 served as Brazos Valley Montessori, and presumably used 3406 as space. Interestingly, when the plot was sold in 2014 from the Jones family, the grantee (a shell company) was listed as "Humpty 3406 LLC", despite the fact that Humpty Dumpty had been gone for nearly 30 years. (current Street View)

Antonio's Pizza by the Slice

Picture from summer 2013.
In the most recent update of this post (November 10th, 2021) we have learned that the subject of the post (split off from this page), Antonio's Pizza by the Slice, closed in very early November 2021 after a run of just short of 18 years, originally opening around November 2003.

Interestingly, Antonio's was actually a branch of an East Coast pizza chain with no locations in New York, but in Massachusetts and New Hampshire, and, until very recently, College Station, Texas.

Back when Antonio's opened at 104 College Main, College Main was a normal road with sidewalks, bike lanes, and two functional traffic lanes. That was until College Station decided to turn their half of College Main into a pedestrian mall (the closure happened in summer 2012) while the Bryan side of College Main was made into an attractive roadway with nice lighting, concrete, and bike lanes. The "new" College Main is a charmless void, without even a single tree and basically serves as another bar-hopping plaza like the main Northgate Promenade.

While the building is estimated to date back to 1930, records are spotty. It was Court's University Shoe Repair from until 1979 to the end of 1984. Lacey's (jewelry store) occupied half of the storefront from late 1994 to early 1996, and split the space with Perfect Tan III. Perfect Tan seems to have given way to Software Exchange, which was here from fall 1994 to the end of 1995 and became Byte Me Computers from January 1996 to April 1997, Cycles Etc. from July 1998 to summer 2003 (Cycles Etc. appeared to have occupied the full space). A 1990 planning document also mentions a proposed Thundercloud Subs in the space, but I'm not sure it ever opened. It did however, open next to Albertsons and at 607 University Drive East.

Like many a student, it was Antonio's at my time at A&M, fairly inexpensive (at least prior to 2014), decent-tasting pizza with large slices and, unlike what many of the campus establishments had, Coca-Cola products. Due to varying experiences with the food over the years, I can't really say anything particularly good or bad about it.

UPDATE 11-09-2021: Rewrote entry with better overview of former tenants, and of course, covering the closure of the restaurant ([defunct] label added).
UPDATE 04-02-2022: Added date back to the pedestrian mall as part of reworking original "104-115 College Main" page.
UPDATE 01-13-2023: Dollar Slice Club, a new pizza restaurant, opened in April 2022. [defunct] tag has been removed.
UPDATE 04-26-2024: Cycles Etc. has posted a picture of when they were located here on Facebook. (I have this picture backed up so let me know if it goes down).
UPDATE 08-17-2024: Dollar Slice Club closed in the summer 2024. Famous Famiglia is signed to replace it.

Diamond Shamrock at Texas Avenue and University Drive East

Diamond Shamrock signage, date unknown. From Project HOLD, cropped and re-balanced.

Located at 501 Texas Avenue South, this Diamond Shamrock existed from 1989 to around 1998 when it was closed in the process of the Texas Avenue widening. The convenience store probably wasn't even a full brand, not even Diamond Shamrock's "Corner Store" (which existed at least as far back as 1990, but I don't believe for any of the local locations until they were converted to Valero). Afterwards, it was absorbed by the U-Haul dealership (formerly Texas Avenue Moving Center) located at 519 Texas.

Diamond Shamrock had previously been a Sigmor Shamrock store (a predecessor company to Diamond Shamrock, though it might have converted to Diamond Shamrock briefly before being rebuilt, as at least one Sigmor store saw a conversion), as was a few others. The U-Haul dealership appears to have originally been on the site of a Philips 66, and records indicate they used a building leftover to do operations, but after Diamond Shamrock died, they moved to that building and removed the old one for more parking.

The style of Diamond Shamrock (black, multiple colors) had to have been more common but no pictures exist of that style on GasSigns.org.

Prior to Sigmor Shamrock, it was Mais Super Market (sometimes used interchangeably with Louis Mais Grocery), which dates back to the 1930s.

Despite having a Facebook page for this webpage which I (try to) update weekly, I despise Facebook. However, there is one group, "Bryan-College Station: Now and Then", which usually shares my posts with their larger audience, had a bit more on the actual backstory of 501 Texas Avenue South. I can't guarantee that this link will work without the page bugging you to sign in, but the page description has been recreated here with minor edits made for clarity.

We are so happy to share these photos that were contributed by Jeff Mais, who said: "This was the Mais' grocery store that was located at Texas Avenue and University Drive. Actually it was in the path of University Drive and was torn down due to "right of way" for the expansion of the road to the bypass. My grandfather Louis Mais and his wife Lydia started the store in the 30's. It began with Louis running a small gas station. He eventually bought the gas station. Aggies would use the location to catch the bus there and would often asked if they anything to eat. He started selling sandwiches and then just kept adding items that were in demand. Soon he had a small convenience store that made deliveries, and got rid of the gas pumps. Then Louis built a bigger store next door to the old one in the 50's which had a meat market, produce section, and also sold barbecue. My dad Donald tells me that he used to deliver groceries to Bear Bryant when he was the head football coach at A&M. As a child, I remember many people gathering in the back of the warehouse after hours to drink beer and talk about their hunting and fishing tales. The store was closed in 1969 to make way for the new road. Louis and Lydia Mais were hard working people who love the community.

The photos were taken by Donald Mais, who was the son of Louis and Lydia Mais. I am the grandson of Louis Mais (Jeff Mais). I lived in College Station until I was four (1966), then we moved to Houston where I grew up.

As an additional note, the gas station was a Conoco. Despite dramatically shaving the right of way (the building of Mais was almost perfectly where the modern eastbound lanes of University Drive East go, there was enough space at 501 Texas for a new gas station. "Fill-Em Fast" opened in 1972 which became a Sigmor station (#997) which was built in 1978. At some point in the 1980s, Sigmor began to rebrand its stations as Diamond Shamrock. It's unknown if this station ever got the brand changeover, but in 1987 the station was torn down and rebuilt as a Diamond Shamrock (still #997). This is the building that exists today.

UPDATE 08-05-2021: Substantial update on the history of the property. New title and labels.

Loupot's Northgate

Loupot's in 1995. (PH)

Prior to when College Main was closed off (June 19th 2012, a day that will live in infamy), it was the only block which was resembled a dense city in College Station. And sitting on the corner of this block was Loupot's (335 University Drive), which closed the same year (in March). One of the oldest establishments on Northgate and once the "official" bookstore on campus, Loupot's had been around for years, though from what I've read, it wasn't always in the building, and when it was, it wasn't in both levels.

From what I've found, it wasn't bought by Loupot until 1979, and in the past, Loupot's was named "Loupot's Trading Post" and "Loupot's Books & Britches". The upper level was added in the 1980s not too long after the building was bought, as that had been the previous home of an X-rated bookstore (The Adult Library, though I read an ad that mentioned it being the home of "Sun Theater", same business, different name). Some ads I had found (but sadly don't have a copy right now) mentioned that they had shows for a quarter (and escorted ladies were free), which was around in the 1970s and 1980s. This had an address of 333 University. The adult theater was upstairs at 333 University, with Loupot's downstairs. At some point, they eventually closed and Loupot's ultimately would expand upstairs.

Anyway, Loupot's managed to expand to a few different locations, namely a location in Southgate (now home to TexAgs) and in a location at Holleman and Texas Avenue (now Salata). These closed shortly after the Northgate location. A fourth location was planned (according to a sign) to the grassy area just north of Blinn College on Villa Maria (where Blinn later added more parking). Loupot's continued to maintain its large store on Northgate, which later upgraded to electronic signage and made Internet history with its "reverse-boarded up windows" in 2005 (around the time of Hurricane Rita). However, in 2010, the family sold to Nebraska Book Company (Neebo), which already owned the Traditions bookstores (formerly Rother's), and then they started closing stores. The Loupot's-branded stores went away in March 2012, but eventually, their other stores, branded as Traditions (Southgate, University Square, and one closer to Blinn at Briarcrest and Villa Maria) closed as well.

One of their last messages on the message board was "HOLY CRAP!!! TEXTBOOK RENTAL SALE!!!", which always felt a bit tasteless due to the mild swearing but that distracted from the fact that if they're selling rental textbooks, they're probably going under.

The former Loupot's in 2013.


After Loupot's closed, by late 2014, it was to become a place called Z Bar & Bistro, which made me hope it was something better than The Corner across the street (sticky chairs and tables, smells like old beer constantly, poor service), though it eventually fell through.

As of early 2016, there appears to be some work going on at Loupot's. It will probably be a bar, but it's better than an empty building, right?

UPDATE 03-07-2021: After six years after its annnouncement, Z Bar & Bistro opened around October of 2020. It serves sushi and has a rooftop seating area. Also, the post had [2010s] removed from it.
UPDATE 09-20-2021: Renamed post from "The Loupot's Building", added [restaurants] and [College Station] to post. Also made a few smaller fixes.
UPDATE 06-21-2023: Sometime around 2022, Z Bar closed (with its time spent at 335 University a fraction of the time it spent under construction), with "Toku 12" in its place.
UPDATE 04-24-2024: Clarification to above. After December 2022, Z Bar briefly closed and reopened as Toku12.

Scoates Hall

This picture is from Flickr, but I still took it myself.

Who loves old buildings? I do! I took these pictures of the 1932-built Scoates Hall (officially at 333 Spence) in June 2012 shortly after renovation plans were announced (I think Scoates was last renovated sometime in the 1950s or 1960s, I have a hard time believing that a lot of what I was seeing was 1930s vintage). Unfortunately, I didn't have good picture taking skills or a good frame of reference to where these were (the floor plan threw me a loop, you can't directly access the two halves of the building, and even the second floor connections require some maneuvering), so the pictures aren't entirely adequate. I can however tell you that the water fountain in one shot is totally gone, the stairs were reinforced with new guardrails (the old rails used to terrify me--especially since they were below a taller person's center of gravity), and the new hallways look nice and shiny, though of course something is missing from before renovation.

Check out the shots here, on Flickr.

Former Fitzwilly's

Courtesy of Project HOLD, a black and white photo. While not nearly as ancient as this suggests, it does represent a time gone by. 803 University.

For most of my life, 303 University Drive was a restaurant named Fitzwilly's, a two-story bar and restaurant with decent burgers and wings. It closed mid-way through my college career, and I was saddened by the loss, not only because it was on my regular rotation but because it had been such a staple on Northgate, in an era where a decade might as well be eternity.

Of course, the building predated Fitzwilly's for years, with the building being built in 1930, hosting apartments. Titled "The Varsity" (a TexAgs mentions it was the "Alamo Apartments", which may or may not be the case). From second-hand stories on TexAgs and comments here, the building was dilapidated (at least in the later years), the manager was the same woman for 44 years, and the building had no air conditioning or central heating. It's worth noting, though a lot of dorms on campus didn't have air conditioning either (Walton Hall didn't get air conditioning until the late 1990s, at least). It also didn't have a phone line, which led it to be excluded from phone books in the 1970s.

The historic date and land use is backed up by city documents.

While the directory I have seen below is from 1939 (and a bit difficult to use since nearly every road name has changed, but the addresses have been renumbered).

Inspiring "Varsity II Apartments" on Wellborn, perhaps?


While I can't readily pull up an aerial from 1939 (they do exist, but not in a format I can readily use), the buildings on Northgate did retain the configuration until at least the early 1960s, and the buildings do align with the directory. In this picture, you can readily see where the Fitzwilly's building was.

This picture was taken directly from the Northgate Chevron post

- The private residence to the southwest (where that Citgo station was) is the private residence listed (two addresses, possibly because of the two buildings).
- The Varsity is the no-telephone building where Fitzwilly's later was.
- The vacancy is where Dry Bean Saloon is now.
- The next building is where the former "Miranda's" portion of modern day Dixie Chicken is. The "main" building (originally Aggie Den) was built later, which created Bottlecap Alley——notice that in this era, "Bottlecap Alley" is enough to fit two rows of cars comfortably. Try fitting one car into Bottlecap Alley today. This is the original "North Gate Cafe" (there was a Northgate Café in modern-day ICON in the 1990s, but they are unrelated)
- and finally, the building to the northeast is the famous Old Army "Charlie's Grocery", which finally disappeared in the 1980s after sub-dividing part of their store out to Texas Aggie Bookstore, which remains today (though in the 1990s had to make that "AggieLand").

In 1979, the building finally was converted into a two-story bar but I've been unable to secure the names of said businesses very easily (a 1985 city directory even listed "Edward Jones", which is at 303 EAST University Drive). Luckily, capn-mac has his own chronology (I've also learned "Bogie's" was there as there as the last bar to inhabit the building before the "renovation" mentioned). From what I have, in 1980, it was Alamo Bar & Grill, which probably (compared to the building layout today) a dump and far more obvious about its former status as a run-down apartment building it was before. There was also "Sebastian's Tavern" as well around 1982-1983, but Bogie's was in the 1983 phone book but not the 1984 one. It's possible that the building sat vacant for a bit before being renovated again (which would make since). The link posted above also mentions said "renovation" to the building, which is probably what made the building it is today: a skylight was added at about this point, and probably the interior was rebuilt to restaurant code. It was in this phase from the late 1980s (1987, perhaps?) that it was the Flying Tomato Pizza (the city directory lists it as "Flying Tomato & Pizza-N-A-Pan"). By other independent sources, they had a hot air balloon that dropped Frisbees and other prizes. I don't know how I came across this, but it wasn't from this location, as by the time my family moved here, Flying Tomato was now Two Pesos.

Proof.

As for Flying Tomato, two comments I received (from "The Twice-Tasted Life" and James Durbin, respectively), mentioned a few things about it, namely the plants in the restaurant.

I remember the Flying Tomato very well. It was "Flying Tomato Pizza in a Pan" featuring square pizza slices in a variety of tasty flavors. I met my first wife there, and she was their "Flying Tomato" in parade marches of the day. They had a pool table or two upstairs and the mezzanine was lines with plants. The company started with a restaurant in Denton near the UNT campus. LOVE your blog, and I'd hate to see it go, but you gotta do what you gotta do.

The atmosphere was very nice when it was The Flying Tomato, with lots of plants, a fireplace if I am recalling correctly, and a big roomy space overall.

Flying Tomato closed in April 1991 and Two Pesos opened in its place in May. Two Pesos was basically a Taco Cabana knockoff (as briefly discussed here), which by all accounts was cheap and tasty. Unfortunately, Two Pesos had copied Taco Cabana a little too closely to the point that a case went all the way to the Supreme Court that affirmed that Two Pesos copied Taco Cabana's format too closely, and ultimately the restaurants ended up selling out to Taco Cabana, though there was already one there at the time, so it closed in 1993.

Two Pesos also had a turn at the building's facade: while we can't see what the building looked like in the days pre-Two Pesos, we do have this picture from a Northgate redevelopment plan...

Not in the Northgate color palette.

In 1994, it became what it would be known as for nearly the next 19 years: Fitzwilly's. Unfortunately, Fitz's, despite having good, cheap food (wings and burgers) fell out of favor with the Northgate crowd. Even when it wasn't crowded, service was slow (and also, food portions shrunk in the last year). It was still liked by an older crowd, but that's not what the Northgate landlords wanted, so the lease wasn't renewed and it went to Eccell Group, which has all but exited the Northgate area these days (Daisy Duke's has been sold, Café Eccell has moved, and La Bodega has closed as well).

While not in the gaudy "cotton candy" colors of Two Pesos, The Backyard seems a bit boring.
The Backyard is the name of the replacement (opened August 2013, Fitzwilly's closed in May of that year), which has a far darker interior than Fitzwilly's, more expensive food, and other changes I didn't particularly like, and due to aforementioned color restrictions, the new owners just painted it the same dark beige tone we've seen everywhere else. I didn't take a picture of the back area of the restaurant--while Fitzwilly's had a few tables and some delightfully dated blinking incandescent lights, the newer facility's back area was significantly rebuilt. If you crave more Fitzwilly's pictures that are in color, you can visit the Yelp page. Since leaving college, I've heard The Backyard has revised its menu to add more sandwiches (the old menu was burgers and tacos).

In 2018, the Backyard, like Café Eccell opened a "co-branded" La Bodega outlet inside.

UPDATE 01-04-2021: Removed previous update notes and added the actual months/years when Fitzwilly's and The Backyard opened. Somehow it wasn't added before.