Taco Cabana is a unique restaurant, starting in 1978 from a single location in an old Dairy Queen in San Antonio they brought they idea of Drive Through Tex-Mex across a good portion of the Southern United States. Taco Cabana was so successful early on they even experienced a few imitators by the 80s such as Two Pesos who would later be famously sued by Taco Cabana. By the 90s the family involved with founding …
Read moreAuthor: Mike
My name is Mike and I am the founder of the Houston Historic Retail! I have been running this site since 2015. For more information check out the About page!
This Week in Demolition: Is the Eiffel Tower included?
Happy Easter loyal reader! I hope you’re enjoying what is likely a day off for you, I hope you have time to spend with your family and those around you. As such we’ll keep today’s post short. We have no real commercial demolitions this week, the closest being a former home turned church but nothing of interest. Moving onto homes it seems the time of the “Modern Ranch” is coming to a close. By this …
Read more
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 …
Read moreThis 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 …
Read more
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 …
Read more
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 …
Read more
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 …
Read more
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 …
Read more
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 …
Read more
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 …
Read more
Recent Comments