Amico Nave Ristorante

This one and the other photos were taken by author, February '24.
I had to pull the details of this one from my FM 1179 page, but this one came up for a post as the restaurant announced closing with the last day being February 24, 2024. So, with that in mind, we'll take another look at it.

Amico Nave Ristorante at 203 East Villa Maria Road was built in the late 1970s as a restaurant called "Pizza Planet" (many years before Toy Story, of course) and this lasted from 1979 to 1984. Because of spotty records, it later served (briefly) as Kelly-Moore Paint Company (according to taxpayer records) and a restaurant called Buffalo Joe's as late as 1994, but has been a beauty salon from 1996 to the very early 2010s (Shapers Hair Productions, though might've gone under a different name in the late 1990s). In spring 2013, it reopened as Amico Nave from the same owners (Wade and Mary Beckman) of Shipwreck Grill across the street. In its early years Amico Nave did very well: in summer 2013, when restaurants usually have slow business, the parking lot was packed out nightly. But I suppose all things have to come to an end. Enjoy the photos and check out the post for Shipwreck Grill.

Uh-oh, hours changed! Who could have seen this coming?

While the concrete base is old, this is one of the few new light fixtures for Amico Nave.

The building is visibly older. Currently, plans are in the works to renovate the building to look more like a ship and move Shipwreck Grill into the space.

UPDATE 09-04-2024: Exterior and interior updates to Amico Nave have been completed, with the new Shipwreck Grill opening sometime a few days ago as of this post. ([defunct] removed)

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.

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.

China Wok Express

This may be the start of a series of posts near Villa Maria Road and Texas Avenue, but I can't make any promises. (Picture by author, March 2020)

No fooling...today's post is on April 1st, and it's a brand new one. This building, 612 Villa Maria Road, was built in 1979 and first served as a Tinsley's Chicken 'n Rolls (and originally 512 Villa Maria Road West), a restaurant previously covered on this site. It served as Church's Chicken from 1985 to 1989 after Tinsley's sold out, and Cobblestone Quality Shoe Repair between 1992 and 1995. It returned to food service (and fried chicken) when it served as a Golden Fried Chicken (later Golden Chick) between 1996 and 2000. Sometime in the 2000s (possibly as early as 2002, which Brazos CAD seems to indicate), it became China Wok Express. I thought it was around 2005...notice the the building has a blue roof instead of the current gold-colored roof (which ironically, came after Golden Chick closed). The circle where the China Wok Express logo is used to be where Golden Chick's mascot used to roost...I'm guessing that when it returned to restaurant use from whatever it was previously, Golden Chick did some significant renovations.

View from the southwest. Not sure if I've ever seen that neon on top light up.
As you may know, the government warnings for COVID-19 have put the economy into a tailspin, with restaurants only offering carry-out or delivery, but China Wok Express is not among them, closing entirely and promising to return April 8th. However, the menu board, as you can see below, is so faded that one can barely see the letters, and one of the columns has a big hole knocked through it. I'm not in the neighborhood very often, so I'll have to see if China Wok Express will reopen or if this is their swan song.

Allegedly due to the ongoing COVID-19 crisis, China Wok Express is now closed, with promises it will reopen April 8th, but it's doubtful as the menu board (and general maintenance) are clearly in a state of visible decline.

The menu board is so faded it's almost completely illegible.
By the way, the article linked above (mentioning the former blue roof) is the old Villa Maria/Texas Avenue article that has been updated with revised information and new photos.

UPDATE 03-24-2021: More precise dates for Golden Chick. China Wok Express DID reopen.
UPDATE 04-08-2022: Update with additional tenants, which should patch the holes.
UPDATE 09-08-2023: In summer 2023 the restaurant closed and by September was being torn down, to be replaced with 7 Brew. [defunct] added to post.
UPDATE 02-20-2024: 7 Brew opened 1/2024.

The Captain's Half Shell Oyster Bar / The Boat / Shipwreck Grill

I don't have a contemporary picture on file, but that shouldn't be too hard to find. Ad from The Eagle, October 1985.
Starting as The Captain's Half Shell Oyster Bar in 1985, which appears to have had other locations and likely as well a spin off of the extant Captain Benny's of Houston, today this 206 East Villa Maria Road is the home of Shipwreck Grill since fall 2009, owned by Wade and Mary Beckman.

The Captain's Half Shell Oyster Bar operated here from 1985 to 2002, and following that was another seafood restaurant, "The Boat", from 2002 to 2006. (Despite the name of Sam's Seafood on the tax record, it was not related to Houston-based Sam's Boat). After that, it sat abandoned for a few years, though according to tax records, just prior to Shipwreck changed hands to become "Melting Pot African-Caribbean Cuisine" (though this may have operated as a home-based catering service briefly). From 2013 to 2024, a second restaurant operated across the street, Amico Nave Ristorante. In March 2024, while the corpse of Amico Nave was still warm, the owners of Shipwreck Grill announced they would renovate the former Amico Nave into the new location of Shipwreck Grill, causing them to "abandon ship".

UPDATE 03-06-2024: Rewrite of existing post for Amico Nave addition.
UPDATE 09-04-2024: Shipwreck Grill has sailed away from this spot, having moved to the former Amico Nave at 203 East Villa Maria Road. ([defunct] added)

Brazos Blue Ribbon Bakery in Bryan

This is a beautiful full-color ad of the Brazos Blue Ribbon Bakery at Villa Maria and Briarcrest (1136 East Villa Maria Road to be exact) from a late 1980s Texas Aggies football program. Although Brazos Blue Ribbon Bakery dates back to 1988, it wasn't the first business in the 1984-built building, a recently unearthed Eagle article mentions it was originally the home of Green Light Auto Parts (and also mentions that the business was originally supposed to focus on industrial production, with long-range plans to be moved to Bryan Business Park).

In 1998, BBRB moved to Dominik Drive in College Station where it would become the genesis for Blue Baker, and this location became a Must Be Heaven in 2000, which survives today. I was never impressed with MBH (Must Be Purgatory, perhaps) but I admire its willingness to stick out in a difficult location. Even though Must Be Heaven still occupies the space, that smaller sign is gone, it's now just a rusty metal frame.

UPDATE 08-12-2021: Appended new date and link for BBRB. Also in spring 2021 they split with Brenham's Must Be Heaven and renamed the restaurants as Sweet Relish Café.

West Villa Maria Shell

The station following "renovations" in 2013. Picture by author.

I snapped a few pictures of this gas station recently (as of 2013). First off, it's old, from 1982, with one of the earliest references with the food mart (at 1439 West Villa Maria Road) being Nash's Food Store in 1984, and by 1989 it was a Zip'N, which it remained until around 2006-2007 when it just became "Villa Express" (which is there in the pre-renovation picture, albeit quite faded). There was a minor upgrade in 2003-2005 as well, where it kept the Shell station designation but upgraded logos to keep the brand.

Also originally, it did not have access to 2818 at all, the west "exit" to the gas station just went onto a power line right of way, which was unpaved and just dumped you on back on Villa Maria. The snow cone/smoothie shack was there as long as I can remember, and the gas station has two other spaces, including 1437 and 1435. From archives, 1437 was Beetle's BBQ (though occupied 1435 as well), and I've hear people tell me that there was a "music/drum shop" at one time as well. In the picture below, you can see Xtreme Hitz, which is at 1435 and according to Facebook, opened March 2012 (but I never saw them going to summer classes at Blinn that summer), so maybe they opened in October. They appear to carry hip-hop related clothing and clubwear. In any case, I don't remember anything in my travels about a clothing store co-habitating with a gas station (mostly banks, restaurants, and aforementioned dry cleaners).

Early 2013 car shot. Because it was taken out the car window, it reflected my shirt. Oops.

For years, the Shell has had for years a billboard near the Exxon at La Brisa announcing the prices. Over the years, I've sadly watched the prices climb (and the sign fade, get repainted, and fade again until vanishing for good).

After a few years running under the "new" facade, the gas station closed up shop for good by 2018. However, the Shell signage still towering over the station. In 2019, it slowly started changing over to a Citgo station and reopened.

UPDATE 03-31-2021: Minor updates. I should mention the new convenience store is "Pit Stop".

The Lost Buildings of Villa Maria Road and Texas Avenue

The Walgreens replaced a corner of several businesses before. (Picture from 3/30/20)

Most of the things that were torn down in my youth were usually buildings that were not particularly large or old buildings from decades before. Rarely was something that came and went in my youth, particularly a building that was less than a decade old being torn down. It did happen, however.

For a brief time between 1999 and 2005, there was a Texaco station ("Aggieland Texaco"), which became a Shell station a few years later, following an agreement with the merger of Chevron and Texaco which would see the Texaco brand almost vanish from Texas itself. This happened with a number of stations around town. 2907 Texas Avenue was the address based on pre-2005 "restaurant report cards" and 2909 based on tax documents. There were also some other stores in the strip, but I wasn't able to find out what they were, nor do I know what the Texaco station replaced.

From The Eagle, though I remember that they had another aerial with the buildings still intact.

One of the things I do know was that many of the newer Shell stations (including this one) had started offering Krispy Kreme doughnuts, which were shipped in from the Houston locations at the time. Of course, Krispy Kreme donuts aren't all that after they turn cold, and the novelty probably lasted for a year at most before they were removed (the Houston stores closed soon after). It also had brown brick on the outside.

The buildings as they appeared in 2004

I was relieved that when they took out the block, the Golden Chick (blue roof in the picture above, and outside the red outline above) was not torn down, but by that time it was already closed.

Articles at the time mention a furniture store also biting the dust, but (and I assume it's the house-like building, possibly converted, on the Dellwood side) I wasn't able to find any information on it.

Soundwaves (2919 Texas Avenue) was the blue-roofed building: based on what I could find, it moved to Post Oak Mall after demolition before disappearing for good, but it was not part of Soundwaves of Houston, even before it was torn down (Soundwaves existed at that spot as far back as 1980). Other residual information says that Soundwaves did home theater installation, but in 1980, it did car audio installation. I read somewhere that the building was a head shop back in the '70s, but that's for another time (when Carnegie reopens, perhaps).

The building toward the back was China Garden (2901 South Texas Avenue), which had two levels, though the Chinese buffet had closed prior to being demolished. According to MyBCS, the rumor was the woman who owned it committed suicide, but I don't put a lot of stock in that (being a rumor and all). It was previously a Mr. Gatti's location before it closed at an unknown date.

This other new building has a Dellwood address. (Picture from 3/30/20)

What replaced it was a Walgreens and a smaller building that was mostly vacant for years following, with a UPS store coming in first, then Little Caesars about five years later (opened in fall 2010), then a Boost Mobile a few years after that. Even though I did miss the Shell/Texaco station out of nostalgia (and it would be nice to have a modern gas station on that side of the road), the stores that replaced it had more usefulness. The building(s) that the Texaco replaced I also don't have information on. Remember, if you know something I don't, feel free to contact this site at admin@carbon-izer.com.

Updated April 1, 2020, including new title
UPDATE 03-26-2021: New address and more accurate dates found! Also Golden Chick had closed by that time.