Month: March 2021

Taking a trip to Grocery Stores of the Past (Part 1)

Editor’s note: In lieu of an April Fools prank this week’s post comes to us as a guest submission from commenter Anonymous in Houston. I’ll be back Sunday with the demo post -Mike! The Portal to Texas History website operated by the University of North Texas Libraries offers a tremendous database of primary historical resources including videos, newspapers, photographs, and more. While there is a lot at the Portal which might be relevant for those …

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Etta's as it appeared in 2019 Image source from Streetview

This Week in Demolition: Etta’s Lounge meets its end, and an address on the NRHP

Welcome back loyal reader, This Week in Demolition we see the loss of one of a popular former club with a long history, along with a few interesting residential addresses. Let’s start of with Etta’s Lounge, the building has a unique history as one of Houston’s first 7-Eleven locations. Opening around the end of 1952 or early 53, it was operating only a few months after the first 7-Eleven had come to town. These early …

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This Week in Demolition: Site of explosion comes down one year later

This Week in Demolition, we take a moment to reflect on a tragedy just over a year later, the special houses this week will be in the second paragraph. On January 24, 2020 a deadly explosion occurred at the Watson Grinding Facility in Spring Branch. Two employees were immediately killed by the blast, and a third man who lived near the facility died later from injuries related to flying debris. Sadly most neighbors were unaware …

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The building's exterior is quite pleasant, it's reminds me of the "lego" version but a bit nicer.

Sunoco’s attempt at earning their Stripes

In this fast-paced world of corporate acquisitions it sometimes gets confusing as to who owns what. Family owned concerns are getting harder to find as time goes on, often selling to firms promising an investment that never comes. Stripes was no stranger to all this confusion, having gone from arguably the strongest independent chain in Texas to a subsidiary of 7-Eleven in the short span of only 3 years. Stripes started out as a family …

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A photo of the building from 2012

This Week in Demolition: A philanthropist’s River Oaks Mansion and an abandoned Federal Building

This Week in Demolition, we’re spoiled for choice! Let’s start out with some houses of note. Our most expensive residential demolition of the week is no doubt 3315 Del Monte. Located in the heart of old River Oaks this 1960s mansion is not original to the neighborhood. It was built by Albert Alkek, one of the early pioneers of the Texas petrochemical industry being involved early on with Sinclair oil. After Mr. Alkek and his …

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Taking a look from the corner you can see the

Whos been painting Eckerd?

Remember Eckerd? Sure you do, it was the second largest pharmacy chain in the United States at one point! And its blue and white color scheme with purple, red, and gold accents are peak “90s aesthetic”. Even if you’re not familiar with the store, you’e likely to agree they looked awesome! Eckerd stores looked nice, had locations nearly from coast to coast and were all unfortunately doomed. This was largely due to the 1996 merger …

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This location started off simply enough as a mid 2000s suburbans Walgreens. When adding the Village Medical the store got a full facelift.

Walgreens and Village Medical a match made in Houston

Did you know over the past year, Walgreens has been using Houston as a test market for a new store type? The announcements for the new stores were quiet, but the concept has made a huge impact. Growing up in and around Houston, most folks were very familiar with their neighborhood drug stores. In some neighborhoods it’s one of the closest options to a grocery store, and sometimes the only option. Even out in the …

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This Week in Demolition: A former bank on a historic downtown plot

You can now subscribe to receive post updates via email. This can be done via the Subscribe box to the right of this post on the desktop version, and below the post on mobile. Thanks! This week in Demolition, we see multiple interesting demolition permits filed. Starting off with some of the more interesting houses we have 1149 Waverly an interesting 1920s cottage (no interior photos sadly!) in the Heights, also in the Heights a …

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The Houston store was built in a K-Mart Power Center which replaced Houston's final drive-in theater.

Goodbye Fry’s!

Think back to your formative years on computers. If you’re anywhere close in age to me, then these years span a wide timeline of operating systems from early memories of basic commands in Windows 3.1, ending during the time of Windows XP. I have lots of early computing memories which beyond screeching dial up noises involves going to stores like CompUSA, Best Buy, Microcenter, and on one occasion a trip to Incredible Universe. Unfortunately, these …

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