123 replies to this topic

[Subdude]

Jimmie Menutis Lounge and Club
3236 Telephone at Wayside
Demolished
"Houston's newest and finest ballroom". Looks like they attracted some big names.


Turner Motel
3250 Telephone
Demolished


Christensen Hotel Courts
3500 Telephone
Extant
"Free Radio in Every Unit"


Las Vegas Inn
3706 Telephone
Demolished


DuBose Tel-Wink Grill
4318 Telephone
Extant


Old Hickory Stick
4521 Telephone
Demolished

Cool cars in the lot.

"We Like It" Trailer Park
4535 Telephone
No longer there.
Notice where someone circled their trailer.


Sembera's Furniture
4661 Telephone
Extant


Skylane Inn ("Home of the Orbit Room")
6747 Telephone
Demolished

[gnu]

man, subdude! you really have an impressive postcard collection!!
i have postcard envy

[MidtownCoog]

Excellent!

I love the drive on Telephone from UH to Alvin. You can make some great time.

Sembera's Furniture is Good Will, right?

And Tel-Wink has not changed one bit!

[gnu]

MidtownCoog, on Wednesday, August 10th, 2005 @ 2:07pm, said:

Excellent!
And Tel-Wink has not changed one bit!

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

except the parking lot looks a lot more "civilized" in the postcard.
its pretty rough now with all the pot holes and big trucks...and I don't think the tree is still there, is it?

[sevfiv]

awesome - do you happen to know of or have any pictures of the santa rosa theater on telephone by park place (long)?

[MidtownCoog]

I like your Ranger Motel sign, sevfiv.

I was sad to see them tear that place down.

[Subdude]

Sevfiv just told me that in a PM. I think in honor of the Ranger I'll post the old motels on OST.

[MidtownCoog]

Old motels on OST (Alt 90).

What funny is Alt 90 in New Orleans has some of the same old school motels.

[sevfiv]

thanks coog

i tried to get to the ranger before the sign was taken away but i was too late (i wanted the blue lettering). i couldn't climb the sign - it was scary, and i sometimes have vertigo-like issues!

[Subdude]

sevfiv, on Wednesday, August 10th, 2005 @ 2:15pm, said:

awesome - do you happen to know of or have any pictures of the santa rosa theater on telephone by park place (long)?

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

In another thread Ashikaga mentioned he had a picture of the Santa Rosa. I would like to see it.

[rps324]

Sembera's apparently furnished a lot of the parade of homes houses on that side of town. I have come across it a few times.

[Heights2Bastrop]

Wasn't the Four Palms Club on Telephone?

[4thWardBoy]

Nice! I have a car lot on 4025 Telephone Road. Very familiar with this road. Very Interesting. Had no idea that Telephone Rd. had so many nice places. Thanks!

[sevfiv]

that's your lot by griggs rd? heh

[Ashikaga]

Subdude, on Wednesday, August 10th, 2005 @ 5:37pm, said:

In another thread Ashikaga mentioned he had a picture of the Santa Rosa.  I would like to see it.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

A few months ago a person on a different forum took a picture of the Santa Rosa and posted it. I'm looking at my printout right now. This is what is at the top of it:

http://64.4.22.250/cgi-bin/getmsg/DSCN0090...rmbox=F116873...

I have the photo in the folder of my e-mail account. If you can tell me a way that I can forward it to this forum for everyone to see it, let me know.

[Subdude]

Detach the picture from the email and save it on your hard drive. Then if you send it to me as an attachment to a PM I can upload it.

[Subdude]

Lyrics to "Telephone Road" by Steve Earle.

Quote

Telephone Road
(Steve Earle)
My brother Jimmy, my other brother Jack
Went off down to Houston and they never come back
Mama wasn't gonna let her baby go yet
But there ain't nobody hirin' back in Lafeyette

I'm workin' all week for the Texaco check
Sun beatin' down on the back of my neck
Tried to save my money but Jimmy says no
Says he's got a little honey on Telephone Road

Chorus:
Come on come on come on let's go
This ain't Louisianna
Your Mama won't know
Come on come on come on let's go
Everybody's rockin' out on Telephone Road

Telephone Road is ten miles long
Fifty car lots and a hundred honky-tonks
Jukebox blastin' and the beer bottles ring
Jimmy banging on a pinball machine

Chorus

Mama never told me about nothin' like this
I guess Houston's 'bout a big as a city can get
Sometimes I get lonesome for Lafeyette
Someday I'm goin' home but I ain't ready yet

[Ashikaga]

Subdude, on Thursday, August 11th, 2005 @ 9:58am, said:

Detach the picture from the email and save it on your hard drive.  Then if you send it to me as an attachment to a PM I can upload it.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

I can't do what you say because I don't own a computer. I use the ones down at the Public Libraries, which is where I'm at now. If you can give me any e-mail address, I can forward it to that address.

The e-mail address of the person who took and posted the picture is:

"vstream02@earthlink.net." Maybe if you e-mailed him he would forward it to you.

I've reached my allotted computer time limit here at the library in Port Neches. I won't be back on until 1:00 p.m. when the library in Bridge City opens.

[Original Timmy Chan's]

Subdude, on Wednesday, August 10th, 2005 @ 1:19pm, said:

Sevfiv just told me that in a PM.    I think in honor of the Ranger I'll post the old motels on OST.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

If you can find one of the Alamo Motel on OST at Calhoun (across from the Whataburger), that would be excellent.

The Alamo is still there today, and still looks good from the outside.

As a UH alum, I sometimes wonder if that wouldn't be a good place for UH student housing. I know there's an old motel in Alpine (also on US 90/OST, by the way, just a few hundred miles down) that a lot of Sul Ross students live in. The Bienvenido, I think it's called. I think it still has motel rooms, but a number of people just rent them by the semester.

UH did turn an old motel across the Gulf Freeway (next to Fingers?) into graduate student housing, so it can be done. The photos of the place look very nice.

I love OST. In fact, I usually take OST to get to Gulfgate, rather than the South Loop. It's a much more interesting drive, and only takes a few minutes longer.

[Heights2Bastrop]

I found This Article on the Four Palms. It was a famous "Pressure Cooker" bar on or near Telephone Road.

[Ashikaga]

Subdude, on Wednesday, August 10th, 2005 @ 2:59pm, said:

Jimmie Menutis Lounge and Club
3236 Telephone at Wayside
Demolished
"Houston's newest and finest ballroom".  Looks like they attracted some big names.


Turner Motel
3250 Telephone
Demolished


Christensen Hotel Courts
3500 Telephone
Extant
"Free Radio in Every Unit"


Las Vegas Inn
3706 Telephone
Demolished


DuBose Tel-Wink Grill
4318 Telephone
Extant


Old Hickory Stick
4521 Telephone
Demolished

Cool cars in the lot. 

"We Like It" Trailer Park
4535 Telephone
No longer there.
Notice where someone circled their trailer.


Sembera's Furniture
4661 Telephone
Extant


Skylane Inn ("Home of the Orbit Room")
6747 Telephone
Demolished

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

I just looked at a street map of Houston. Telephone Road is indeed a major thoroughfare. It traverses and bisects almost all of the city north/south.

[HeightsGuy]

Subdude, here's another one for ya:

Telephone Road
Rodney Crowell

Rain came down in sheets of thunder
Lightning bolts split pine trees down to the roots
In the shadow of the Astrodome
With a hurricane coming on strong
We used to hit the streets and go swimming in our birthday suits

Skiing in a bar ditch behind a Moped
Thirteen stitches on the corner of a sardine can
We were dirt poor Houston kids
Our whole family living on the skids
But we always had a nickel for the coming of the ice cream man

Mosquito truck blowing up DDT
Barefoot heathens running wild and free
Air raid buzzer at a noon day scream
Living in a dream on Telephone Road

I used to love them cherry cokes
down at the Prince's Drive-In
The cheeseburgers taste so good I about come untied
There's a China Tree I remember
I used to climb in and out of my window
The night I left was on the day before my grandma died

Sawdust spread out on a dance hall floor
jukebox ripping at an all out roar
Barmaid smiling at a 10-cent tip
living is a trip on Telephone Road

Magnolia garden bandstand on the very front row
Johnny Cash, Carl Perkins and The Killer putting on a show
Six years old and just barely off my daddy's knee
when those rockabilly rebels sent the devil running through me

Drive-in movie in the trunk of my car
One-eyed sailor in an icehouse bar
Spit Shine Charlie and ol' Peg Leg Bill
dressed up fit to kill on Telephone Road
Barbecue and beer on ice
A salty watermelon slice
at the Little Taste of Paradise on Telephone Road

[Ashikaga]

danax, on Wednesday, August 24th, 2005 @ 8:53pm, said:

Wow. Those songs are classic and hilarious. I am going to have to dig the real tunes up now. Now I know part of the reason we have our current reputation and it sure shows how much we've changed.

I was just talking today to a 47 year old woman who grew up on Maxie St. over near Wash. & Durham. Old Texas rednecks were still everywhere. Northside too. Houston's gone "big city" in the past 40 years.

Those times and people are largely gone. Those songs need to be radically updated;

Steve Earle's song, updated

We all came to Houston, the family Salazar.
Straight from the river to the trunk of a car
Abuelita stayed home but the rest of us are gone,
Cause we can't make money back in Michoacan

We all found work building Perry Homes
Digging ditches in the sun puts an ache in my bones
I saved and bought some tools so I could help with the roof
but when the Migra came I left them cause I have no proof

.................

Just having some fun, no bad feelings intended and I hope I haven't offended anyone.  There could be a humorous song made about any group of people.

These photos and songs really give us perspective on how radically things can change in 40 years. The area's changing again and the song is going to need updating soon.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Wow, you really know how to make someone feel. I'm a 47-year-old man.

[Subdude]

HeightsGuy, on Wednesday, August 24th, 2005 @ 7:04pm, said:

Subdude, here's another one for ya:

Telephone Road
Rodney Crowell

Rain came down in sheets of thunder
Lightning bolts split pine trees down to the roots
In the shadow of the Astrodome
With a hurricane coming on strong
We used to hit the streets and go swimming in our birthday suits

Skiing in a bar ditch behind a Moped
Thirteen stitches on the corner of a sardine can
We were dirt poor Houston kids
Our whole family living on the skids
But we always had a nickel for the coming of the ice cream man

Mosquito truck blowing up DDT
Barefoot heathens running wild and free
Air raid buzzer at a noon day scream
Living in a dream on Telephone Road

I used to love them cherry cokes
down at the Prince's Drive-In
The cheeseburgers taste so good I about come untied
There's a China Tree I remember
I used to climb in and out of my window
The night I left was on the day before my grandma died

Sawdust spread out on a dance hall floor
jukebox ripping at an all out roar
Barmaid smiling at a 10-cent tip
living is a trip on Telephone Road

Magnolia garden bandstand on the very front row
Johnny Cash, Carl Perkins and The Killer putting on a show
Six years old and just barely off my daddy's knee
when those rockabilly rebels sent the devil running through me

Drive-in movie in the trunk of my car
One-eyed sailor in an icehouse bar
Spit Shine Charlie and ol' Peg Leg Bill
dressed up fit to kill on Telephone Road
Barbecue and beer on ice
A salty watermelon slice
at the Little Taste of Paradise on Telephone Road

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Thanks! I wasn't around then, but is so cool in a way that Houston, and especially Telephone Road, used to have such a rough, funky, down-in-the-dirt image. Maybe a little bit dangerous. Maybe we come off as a little bland as compared to back in the day. Our image then seems like it was a lot more larger than life than it is now. I also get that impression from the Fuermann books.

[Ashikaga]

Subdude, on Wednesday, August 10th, 2005 @ 2:59pm, said:

Jimmie Menutis Lounge and Club
3236 Telephone at Wayside
Demolished
"Houston's newest and finest ballroom".  Looks like they attracted some big names.


Turner Motel
3250 Telephone
Demolished


Christensen Hotel Courts
3500 Telephone
Extant
"Free Radio in Every Unit"


Las Vegas Inn
3706 Telephone
Demolished


DuBose Tel-Wink Grill
4318 Telephone
Extant


Old Hickory Stick
4521 Telephone
Demolished

Cool cars in the lot. 

"We Like It" Trailer Park
4535 Telephone
No longer there.
Notice where someone circled their trailer.


Sembera's Furniture
4661 Telephone
Extant


Skylane Inn ("Home of the Orbit Room")
6747 Telephone
Demolished

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

To me, this topic and category has been the best one. I look at those photos from a historical perspective. For example, the motels with people around the swimming pool that have been demolished. It would be interesting today to go to one of those and stand there and look. One would try to envision what once happened many years ago on that spot of ground. You would see everyone on a hot summer day cooling off in the pool, and all of the kids shouting, "Mommy, watch me!"

[sevfiv]

the blue top at 4351 telephone:

[EastEnd Susan]

sevfiv, on Sunday, November 13th, 2005 @ 11:42am, said:

the blue top at 4351 telephone:

It somehow looks different with the communications tower in the background. Thanks for posting them.

[Ashikaga]

EastEnd Susan, on Sunday, November 13th, 2005 @ 4:04pm, said:

It somehow looks different with the communications tower in the background. Thanks for posting them.

Is this motel extant?

[sevfiv]

Ashikaga, on Monday, November 14th, 2005 @ 10:36am, said:

Is this motel extant?

yes - i was just there to take the pictures