61 replies to this topic

[NotGivinUp]

Does anyone have firsthand knowledge of a Houston bar named the Hitching Post that existed in 1954-55? There's a singer living in England who goes under the name P.J. Proby (real name James Marcus Smith) who claims to have sung there with Elvis and Tommy Sands in 1954. His publicity people say it was a "cowboy bar" famous for giving country singers and musicians their start. Proby's website says Biff Collie broadcast his radio show from the bar and it was located at the end of South Main.

I can't find any references to this Hitching Post bar in Houston other than on websites that are talking about P.J. Proby's life and career. Nor can I find anything that corroborates Proby's story about singing with Elvis and Tommy Sands anywhere at all. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

[brucesw]

The name of the bar may be wrong and I don't ever recall hearing it. Elvis certainly made many appearances in Houston in 1954/55 before his career took off nationally, befriended at least a couple of djs, Collie among them. Have you accessed the source Elvis Day By Day? This citation puts Elvis at Eagles Hall in January, 1955, with Tommy Sands on the bill, and a show hosted by Collie for KNUZ. Somewhere I had a link to a piece about the show, which was also broadcast on KNUZ-TV, but I can't find that link now. Perhaps scrolling through that source will yield something or there may be others here on HAIF who have something on that bar. I do not know where the Eagles Hall was.

I'd also suggest just googling on Elvis, Biff Collie and Houston together - you'll get a lot of hits, some of which may be helpful.

[kylejack]

Eagles Hall was 2204 Louisiana.

Elvis audio from that appearance:

Edited by kylejack, Sunday, May 15, 2011 at 11:57 PM.

[NotGivinUp]

Thanks for your replies and suggestions. I have several books about Elvis including both Elvis Day By Day and Last Train to Memphis. I've also been to numerous sites (including Scotty Moore's and several about Biff Collie) that list his appearances in Texas. So far I'm reaching a dead-end on the Hitching Post bar but I will keep looking.

P.J. Proby's staff say it's definite that Proby sang at the Hitching Post in 1954 and so did Elvis and Tommy Sands. Proby also claims that Elvis was in Houston off and on for several months during the summer and fall of 1954 and he was driving a pink Cadillac. I've had no luck verifying that Elvis was in Houston before late November 1954 or finding anything about a him owning a Cadillac before March 1955.

I'm willing to give anybody the benefit of the doubt but like a lot of other people I take history very seriously. If I were anywhere near Houston now I would be at the public library looking for the Hitching Post in microfilmed city directories. If all else fails I may have to do that but I thought I would try here first. Thanks again.

[gnu]

My '57 phonebook doesn't list a Hitchin Post but it does have a Hitchin' Rack at 930 McCarty.
Maybe Proby got his post and rack mixed up! ha!

It looks like there was also a popular restaurant and/or dance hall in Addicks called the OLD Hitchin' Rack.
I saw at least one reference on the web to bands playing there in what seems to have been the 30's and 40's.

[brucesw]

Sent you a PM which I'm sure you have by now. I finally found the link I was thinking of and I was remembering it wrong - the show that was simulcast on TV was from the old City Auditorium. I got that mixed up with the Grand Prize Jamboree.

So for any other HAIFers who might be interested.

Houston Hometown Jamboree

[kylejack]

There's some Hitching Post thing in Angleton...Just looks like farmland now.

[NotGivinUp]

Thanks for all the suggestions. If this 1950's Hitching Post bar played as big a role in Houston history as PJ Proby claims, it seems like people here would have heard of it. I'm beginning to think it's part of a yarn somebody dreamed up to place Proby on the same "stage" as Elvis and Tommy Sands. But I'm keeping an open mind. I hope someone who was around back then will remember whether this bar actually existed - or didn't.

[brucesw]

Another link I just remembered - Pine Grove Press photostream - this is Collie and Sands at Magnolia Gardens, 1950 according to the tag. Sands would have been 13. I searched the whole photostream for Proby or the Hitching Post to no avail. When did Smith adopt the stage name? Was he perhaps performing under another name or just as part of a group?

Some more people who might be able to help: Glad Music Co. They have quite a bit of history on their website but don't know if there's anybody there today who goes back that far.

[NotGivinUp]

Thanks for the links and I'm following up on them. Some great pictures there.

Proby is a native of Houston and used his real name - Jim or Jimmy Smith - when he was performing there as a teenager. He wasn't singing as a member of a group either. This is from a bio page on his website describing his performances 1954-1956...

"The first place where Jim performed was the Hitching Post, a cowboy bar at the end of South Main Street in Houston, where the two-years-older Tommy Sands was singing"....."Also George Jones and Elvis Presley (who was almost four years older than Jim) played there sometimes."

...Smith/Proby left Houston in 1957 after high school and moved to California. He started using the name PJ Proby several years later in California and when he moved to England in 1964.

[little frau]

We moved out South Main at Hiram Clark in 1957 into a brand new house. There was no development out there at the time, except maybe the huge light and power installation (don't know when it went in) and of course the South Main Drive Inn. Waukesha was out nearer Post Oak but mostly it was bare land.

The housing subdivision we moved into had only 3 streets and it was in a prairie, nothing near at all. No convenience store, no gas, no grocery.

What I'm saying is, that in 1954 I'd think that "the end of South Main" was probably somewhere around O.S.T.

I do remember the Big Chief Motel as a landmark. And Playland Park.

[NotGivinUp]

Yes, there's a reference to O.S.T. on Proby's website too. I found the following on another bio page on the same site...

"Jim met and worked with Tommy Sands and Elvis Presley, George Jones, Tennessee Ernie Ford, The Collins Kids and many others while growing up in Houston at places like The Hitching Post, The Eagles Hall, The South Maine Olde Spanish Trail for the leading D.J.s at the time, Cliffie Stone & Biff Collie."

Taken literally he's saying The South Maine Olde Spanish Trail is a venue but I doubt that's what he means. Proby has talked about a Hitching Post bar in various print, radio and on camera interviews within the last 10 years with references to both South Main and O.S.T. Therefore I'm guessing the HP bar was supposed have been at or near the intersection of O.S.T. and Main St.

[sevfiv]

It looks like it could have been the Trading Post club at 11215 Main (just south of present day Willowbend).
From 1955:



FWIW, the old Grant Motel (gone now too but was most recently the Palm Court Inn) claimed Elvis slept there:

[Earlydays]

According to the book, "Elvis in Texas - The Undiscovered King 1954-1958", Elvis played in Houston at:
- Magnolia Gardens 1954, 1955
- Cook's Hoedown Club 1954, 1955
- Paladium Club 1954
- Eagles Hall 1955
- City Auditorium 1955, 1956
- Sam Houston Coliseum 1956

[NotGivinUp]

sevfiv,

Looks like that address for the Trading Post is over 2 miles from S. Main @ O.S.T. so I don't think it's the location that Proby's talking about.

Is your source a 1955 phone book or a city directory? So it doesn't have anything on S. Main for The Hitching Post, Hitching Post or maybe even for Post, Hitching?

That motel sign beats Burma Shave's hands down :-)

[sevfiv]

It's from a city directory - I checked Main St. and that was the closest thing I could find. The only other "social club" type establishments listed in the mid fifties to early sixties were:

Al Pliner's 88 Supper Club at the Friendly Courts Motel (about a block away from the Trading Post)
Troubador (I can't remember the address at the moment but it would have been closer to OST)
Plantation Club (near Murworth)
End of Main Ballroom (near the current south Loop)
Las Vegas Motel's private club (next to the End of Main)
Copacabana (next to the Grant Motel)
The Lamplight (near Braeswood)

[NotGivinUp]

Thanks. Is there a listing that gives an address for the Paladium Club (originally the Texas Corral?) on S. Main or on O.S.T.? I've also seen it spelled with two l's - Palladium. BTW where was the Eagle's Hall?

[kylejack]

kylejack, on Sunday, May 15, 2011 at 11:55 PM, said:

Eagles Hall was 2204 Louisiana.

Edited by kylejack, Friday, May 20, 2011 at 2:19 PM.

[NotGivinUp]

Sorry, I missed that before. Thanks.

[NotGivinUp]

A helpful forum member suggested I contact a Houston businessman he thought might remember the Hitching Post, so I took his advice. The man said he didn't but was kind enough to contact someone he has known for many years who knew both Tommy Sands and Elvis back then. That person said the only place Elvis performed on South Main in the early days was his one stint at the Texas Corral (renamed the Palladium Club). This contradicts singer PJ Proby's story that Elvis performed regularly at a famous bar on South Main called the Hitching Post but I'm still trying to keep an open mind about it for now in case someone else has more information.

[tinker]

Hi, Notgivingup,
I’ve just read this discussion with great interest. I’m in contact with P.J. Proby and I’ve asked him what he remembers about the Hitchin Post. His memories are quite vivid::
“The Hitchin Post was at the end of Main, near the Drive-In and the Old Spanish Trail. It was at the crossing of South Main and the Old Spanish Trail. The place has been gone for over fifty years now! It was located on the spot where they later built an hotel, just before Playland Park. In those days it was the end of the city of Houston. It was the first place where Elvis performed in Texas, when he was still unknown. It was the place where Biff Collie hosted his radio show Billie’s Cracker Barrel Corner.”

P.J. Proby must have been 14/15 years old and was still a kid. He wouldn’t have been advertised in those days, but he hang out with Tommy Sands and the others whenever he could. Biff usually let him to do some DJ-work and let him sing an opening song for the shows. Also George Jones appeared regularly in the Hitchin’ Post in Biff’s program “Collie’s Corner” (named “Biff Collie’s Cracker Barrel Corner” by Proby).

I believe that The Hitchin’ Post may have been a local name they gave to a bar that had a different official name. Of course the question is which bar is meant by the referral to The Hitchin’ Post? Like you I take history very seriously. It’s an interesting puzzle to combine people’s subjective memories with known facts. Alas I live in Europe and have never been to Houston. I hope to visit one day

In the book “Elvis Day By Day” the writer mentions the following appearances by Elvis:
25 Thursday November 1954 * Paladium Club, Houston, Texas. He says: It is unclear whether this was the first Houston date that Biff Collie booked, or if Elvis played the Houston Hoedown at another location earlier in the week. In any case, the ad for the Paladium Club on Friday indicates that Elvis will be held over for two more nights "by popular demand."
26 Friday * Paladium Club, Houston (Elvis sends a telegram to his parents.)

Was the Paladium still called the Texas Corral then? It sounds like a place where the horses would have been hitched up in the old days. It’s very well possible that locals still called this bar the Hitchin Post in stead of the Paladium Club.
I have two theories:
- The Hitchin’ Post was a colloquial name for the Texas Corral, aka The Paladium Club. Is there any evidence that the Texas Corral was located at the crossing of South Main and the Old Spanish Trail? Other evidence on the Internet seems to indicate The Paladium Bar was on University ground, which seems to add up with the location of the medical grounds at the crossing of South Main and Old Spanish Trail. See the topographical map of Houston 1955:
http://www.lib.utexa...cinity-1955.jpg
- The Hitchin’ Post was a bar that was demolished shortly after 1954 and was replaced by a motel. Could this be the Big Chief Motel that Little Frau remembers from 1957? Or would this have turned into the Grant Motel, later palm Court Inn, where they claim Elvis has stayed?
We would need to find out:
- the location of the Texas Corral / Paladium club and the the date of the demolition of this club
- the location and the history of the Big Chief Motel, The Grant Motel and the Palm Court Inn

I hope this helps a little. I can assure you P.J. Proby has a very good memory of the old days in Houston. Thanks for keepin an open mind.

[NotGivinUp]

tinker, I don't know what "the old days" means to you but according to the Houston Chronicle Archives 04/08/2004 the Texas Corral club didn't exist until after the end of World War II...

[indent]Tony Sepolio spent the last year of WW2 in London playing every night at Piccadilly Circus for Allied solders. He then returned to Texas, hooked up with Jerry Irby and opened a club at Old Spanish Trail and South Main called the Texas Corral. In 1950 Sepolio bought the club from Irby. He changed the name to the Paladium and operated the club until 1957.[/indent]

The Paladium was closed when Houston Astrodome construction plans would have put the club in its stadium parking lot. According to Ballparks of Baseball concerning the Houston Astrodome...

[indent]Trying to lure a major league team to the Houston area, Hofheinz built a model of a domed stadium and presented it to National League owners. On October 17, 1960 Houston was awarded a franchise. Voters then approved an $18 million bond to build the stadium. Plans were drawn for the domed stadium and construction began January 3, 1962.[/indent]

[little frau]

I'm not young anymore. My memory is not the best, but being in high school during the very early 60's, and "dragging" Main St. from Hiram Clark to downtown every weekend, I'm having a hard time putting anything on S. Main at O.S.T. in the Astrodome's parking lot. The old Prince's Drive Inn was 'right there'. We'd go from there to Bill Williams in what is now the Medical Center all the way to the old, original MacDonalds Drive Inn, complete with car hops. (not the McDonalds of today).

Not saying that the old club didn't close 'because' of the Astrodome, just that it may not have been that close to the actual domed stadium site.

In fact, there was no Astrodome at that time but even more so, S. Main and O.S.T. was not 'that' close to the future Astrodome at all.

[tinker]

Hi NotGivinUp,
Thanks for the info. So the location of the Paladium Club was indeed at the crossing of South Main and Old Spanish Trail and existed from 1950-1957. It was then demolished for the building of the Astrodome. Since Elvis played there in November 1954, this must be the Hitchin' Post that Proby is referring to.
Before it was called the Paladium Club in 1950, it was called Jerry Irby’s Texas Corral. Do you have any idea whether the place existed under another name before that time? In Billboard 25 December 1948 it says that Jerry Irby has just purchased a nitery that seats a 1000: The Texas Corral. What was this place called before 1948?
Would anybody have an address of the Paladium Club/Texas Corral?

[acamarillo]

Not trying to hijack this thread, but since there is research being done on old bars and clubs... has anyone seen any reference to the Blossom Heath? I'd like to know its location. My dad tells stories about going there when he would come in from Fort Sam in the early 50s. Re the Hitchin' Post/Texas Corral - would that have been located at the triangle of OST and Main where the Antone's Deli was later?

[NotGivinUp]

The Houston Chronicle only says that Tony Sepolio wasn't the operator of the Paladium after 1957. I haven't found the date the club closed. In the book Lone Star Swing by Duncan McLean (1998) there is a picture of a dance ticket with this information...

Admit One Couple Free
Corn A Poppin' Dance
At Texas Corral - 8100 S.Main At O.S.T.

Tune in KLEE 5:00 p.m. Week Days Corn a Poppin Show
Saturday 3 o'clock With Sleepy Bob
Also Texas Corral Show 8:00 and 10:30 Nightly
Benny Leaders - The Western Rangers
Jerry Irby - Texas Ranchers

Ride the 9300 South Main or Playland Park Bus
Madison 6526
Thursday JUL 14 '49

[brucesw]

The address 8100 S. Main does place the Texas Corral right at the junction of OST and S. Main, on the west side of the street. The Astrodome does not front on Main at all, it is between Kirby and Fannin, east of Main Street. There's no way this club was torn down to make room for the Dome unless some investors bought the land for some other purpose. Keep in mind also the MLB franchise for Houston wasn't even approved in 1957, much less construction underway on a stadium.

However, This thread on HAIF gives the location of the Grant Motel as 8200 S. Main, while this post in another thread, citing a 1969 directory, shows Lee's Den, an eatery, at 8100 S. Main, and the Grant still in existence so perhaps the club was not demolished but simply closed.

The December 1948 Billboard article mentioning Jerry Irby taking over a 1000 seat nitery on S. Main gives no indication of the previous name; so far as we know, it was already the Texas Corral and just became Jerry Irby's Texas Corral. A search of those BB archives for Hitching Post Houston or Hitchin' Post Houston does not seem to find any evidence of such a club.

[NotGivinUp]

tinker said Biff Collie had a radio show - “Collie’s Corner” (named “Biff Collie’s Cracker Barrel Corner” by Proby) - broadcast from the Hitching Post (or Texas Corral / Palladium Club). Does anyone else know anything about that show and the location of broadcasting?

So far I've only found that Biff DJ'd a show on KNUZ starting in 1948 that was a remote broadcast from the Glad Music Company's record store on 11th Street. He later MC'd the "The Houston Hometown Jamboree" (possibly aka the "Grand Prize Jamboree") as a remote broadcast beginning in 1954. The location apparently alternated between the City Auditorium and the Eagle's Hall depending on the season:

Billboard - Mar 6, 1954
[indent]Houston's Hometown Jamboree set for its bow March 13, with a whopping lineup of country talent slated to appear. Potato Pet Hunter, KRCT, Baytown, Biff Collie, KNUZ Houston, and Jack Starns, at Beaumont, handling the talent. Show will air via KNUZ every Saturday night from City Auditorium, Houston.[/indent]
Billboard - Jul 10, 1954
[indent]Jean Shepard inked for a return date at the "Grand Prize Jamboree," Houston, with the show moving to air-conditioned Eagle's Hall for the summer.[/indent]
Billboard - Nov 13, 1954
[indent]"Grand Prize Jamboree," Saturday night country music show emanating from KNUZ, Houston, sponsored by Grand Prize Beer, continues to play to stand-up business, with recent guests including Lefty Frizzell, T. Texas Tyler and Leon Payne. Regulars includ Jerry Jericho, who has just signed with RCA Victor's Label X; Tommy Sands and George Jones. Biff Collie is em- see; Jack Derrick, comedian; Ken Grant, announcer, and Buddy Covington, producer.[/indent]

[brucesw]

I find just one mention of Collie's Corner in Billboard, in January, 1956, on KPRC, 950 (the KTRC in the BB article is a misprint).

I find no mentions of Crackerbarrel Club or Cracker Barrel Club in BB that are relevant.

Collie started in Houston in Feb 1948 on brand new station KNUZ as a sports reporter but apparently quickly became a popular dj. In October 1950 I have an ad for him as morning host on KLEE. Apparently he later returned to KNUZ, possibly when KLEE was sold or perhaps because the owner of the station was known to be very difficult and fired people on the spot for something they said or played he didn't like.

I also know that he later did mornings on KPRC before leaving town, possbly as early as 1955. I'm not sure when he left town but beginning in 1956-57 he appeared on and apparently became the emcee of the Phillip Morris Country Music Show, a traveling show of country artists sponsored by Phillip Morris that eventually became a national radio program broadcasting from the city where it was appearing.

From the BB citation Collie's Corner was on KPRC but he could have used the name earlier.

[little frau]

We got our first TV sometime in 1954 and I have memories of my dad tuning in a country music program named Biff Collie's Hoedown Corner. I'm surprised that name has not turned up in any of the very good research you folks have done.


I remember watching it one time when there was a very young girl, maybe 7-8-9 who was going to sing. She was given an introduction and then she didn't appear on the stage. Of course, it was all scripted but after much looking for her in different places, the bass fiddle player simply spun his instrument on its leg and lo and behold, there she was. She'd been "hiding" behind it the whole time. I've often wondered if she ever made it big.