tmariar

Thanks, Sev! The website just has this info: "The year 1939 is generally considered to be Hollywood's true golden year. Four new theatres opened that year, all during the month of November, making the pre-Christmas season a busy one for moviegoers. Interstate's Alabama Theatre, was the first and largest out of the gate, and the only one that was not an independently owned house. This was followed by the Stude Theatre in the Heights, the Navaway, and the River Oaks Theatre." "When it opened in 1939, the Alabama was Interstate's tenth theatre in the Houston area, the others being the Metropolitan, Majestic, Kirby, Delman, Eastwood, North Main, Tower, Bluebonnet, and the Yale. In addition, it was the first and largest of four November openings, with the independent Stude, Navaway, and River Oaks theatres following." But I was also able to find this short piece from Boxoffice magazine, July 10, 1948: "R.Z. Glass is now sole owner of the Stude Theatre. Glass, who has always owned half of the Stude, recently completed arrangements for the purchase of the other half from the Interstate circuit. He also owns the State, another suburban theatre in Houston. No changes in personnel are planned at the present. D.L. Murray will remain as general manager of both theatres, with F.A. Ross as treasurer. A parking lot next to the Stude accommodates 800 cars and further improvements are planned, including the installation of new seats. There will be no changes in policy or admission price. Before he built the Stude in 1939, Glass owned and operated three neighborhood houses in Dallas. He built the State in 1941. Prominent in aviation, Glass has been a pilot for 17 years. He does all his traveling by his own plane which he flies himself. He has won second and third places in two air races, the first in Miami in 1936 and the other in St. Louis in 1937."

Does anyone know if the Resurrection Life Fellowship building at 730 E. 11th - not too far west of the instersection of 11th and Studewood - was once a movie theater? And, if so, what it was called? I'll post this in the Heights subforum for now, but if a moderator wants to move it to Historic Houston, that's fine by me. http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3134/3087129975_5dc65e5c09_b.jpg

Oh yeah! Found them with a "source:life houston monorail" Google Images search. I didn't realize that there were old Houston photos in the Life Magazine collection that were undated. I probably missed some good ones in that other thread because I just did search after search of "source:life houston 19xx".

Great that J.R. was able to share those Chron photos with us! You should also check out the monorail photos I linked to here (about 7 lines down in the second list).

Thanks for the ID, Subdude and Sevfiv. Found the below on Houston History:

I think the 1904 City Hall was designed by George Dickey.

Cool!

Thanks! Sorry gnu - just missed that.

Here's another 1946 aerial of downtown to complement the one above. And another. Another. A photo of the intersection of Main and McKinney. The empty lot is where the First Presbyterian church (in the background in this Carnegie Library postcard) had stood - it was destroyed by fire in 1932. A shot looking over the Foley Bros. construction site, and up the 1100 block toward the bayou. Area around Sam Houston statue. Area around the (then) new Navy Hospital. Another 1946 aerial, of a subdivision I can't identify. Ditto. Unidentified street/houses. House/insurance company. Stretch of ship channel with some residential. There are a bunch more than what I've posted here, so y'all should look for yourselves. There are so many different random shots - like Jesse Jones and Glenn McCarthy playing cards - the scope is nearly as broad as the Bob Bailey collection. Thanks. That was my guess, but others know way more about Playland Park than I do.

Here is a short piece about Arrowhead Park (on Old Spanish Trail) and the monorail prototype. Anyone know what the roller coaster is in the background of this monorail shot? In the years for which I saw photos of Houston, they were generally on a particular subject. The article in 1946 must have been just a general article about Houston, though, as there were many 1946 photos taken by the same photographer, but of different things around town.

Yep - that's got to be it. Don't have an answer, but am I right in saying that building is on Crawford, between McKinney and Lamar? I was trying to judge based on where the Texas State Hotel is in the photo.

I hadn't thought about that one - I only thought of the Buffalo Drive Sears and midtown (Main St.?) Sears, and had ruled those out. The Garden Oaks Sears is a good guess! Still there, as far as I know. So is that the driveway to something at the bottom of the photo? It's not as dirty as the street, whatever it is.

I'm guessing the "River Oaks Housing Project" shots (1, 2, 3) might be of the back of the River Oaks shopping center, and then those apartment buildings that were just south of there on Shepherd. But that's just a guess. [Edit: This undated aerial shot makes me more certain that's correct.] I think you're probably right about the "Street with Traffic" (1946) photo, dbigtex - what was then called Buffalo Drive. Maybe the lanes headed into town are right there but blocked from view by the traffic? Here's a 1956 photo of Buffalo Drive for comparison. Still don't have a guess on the "neighborhood" photo. Here's an old shot of River Oaks Blvd. for comparison.

I bet you're right.

Saw this on Swamplot: Google is apparently in the process of adding about 10 million photos from the Life Magazine archives to its images search. Just looking quickly (using the Google Images search "houston 1946 source:life"), I've already seen some great large 1946 Houston shots I'd never seen before, including: The old city hall/bus station, and surrounding area. Christie's Seafood A view inside the Cotton Exchange San Felipe Courts/Allen Parkway Village A Sears store being built A "McCarthy Center" sign A sign showing the site for the Ford plant A sign showing the site for the Medical Center The Bayou Club A great aerial From other years (>1946): Inside an H&P store The Goodyear blimp advertising the Shamrock The Houston Press welcoming MacArthur Police officer photographing Eisenhower Houston family during atomic war drill The family's list of things to do in case of atomic war The monorail: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 UofH cougar KILT tower in front, I think, of Joske's Funeral of last confederate soldier Soldier when still alive, at age 116 (color) Survivor of Poe Elementary bombing Construction of JSC JFK, Jackie, LBJ at LULAC convention, Nov 63 JFK and Jackie Nov 63 JFK at Houston airport Nov 63 Sammy Davis Jr. at civil rights rally in Houston 1965 crowd at trail ride opening Houston Livestock Show (color) Mrs. Neil Armstrong at home, after Gemini 8 mission cut short Room in Astrodome or Astrodome hotel? Room in Astrodome or Astrodome hotel? Room in Astrodome or Astrodome hotel? Hoffeinz office, I think - same Hoffeinz watching game Room in Astrodome Astrodome bowling alley? Astrodome shooting game? Astrodome hair stylist? Mrs. Jim Lovell and friend (color) Neil Armstrong, 1969, lighting a cigar (color) Mrs. Buzz Aldrin watching coverage of splashdown (color) Buzz Aldrin at Astroworld (color) <1946: Army convoy passes Houston "A view of the River Oaks Housing Project" - same title - same - can't tell what these are I'm sure others will find or be able to identify things I missed or got wrong. I really hope there are more old Houston photos added as the rest of the Life photos come online. Can anyone tell what's/where's shown in these photos?: Neighborhood Boulevard Street with traffic Update: I found the above photos using "Houston 19xx source:life" Google Images searches. But it looks as though there are at least some old Houston photos in the collection that don't have a date listed, which wouldn't have come up in my search.

I don't know how long ago they were in there, but some urban explorers have interior photos of the Ben Milam. If the gambling office area mentioned previously was still there, I guess these guys missed it. Wonder if there's some urban explorer code along the lines of "take only photos"... hope so.

That definitely fills in some blanks - thanks for posting! It's hard to tell whether the postcard shows the building after it was supposedly moved back on the lot. But, yeah, clearly the same building. I'm guessing the crescent-shaped hotel with 100+ rooms and an office finished up in Mexican onyx was never built.

I got a hard copy of Sister Agatha's book for Christmas last year - it's nice to have the hard copy, but I always end up looking things up in it online instead... So here is a jumble of notes about the Houston Heights Hotel taken mainly from the Galveston Daily News (the source if not otherwise identified) and Sister Agatha's book - if anyone else is ever looking into the topic online, maybe it will save them some time. To summarize, the hotel seems to have been in operation at 345 19th by August 1893, but then closed sometime in 1899. It appears to have served again as a hotel for a few more years in the early 1900's, but was otherwise used for medical services and/or a nursing school until it burned down in 1915. It sounds like photos of the sanatarium should give a pretty fair picture of how the hotel looked. ------------------------------- An early manager of the hotel was Marshall W. Kennedy (whose house still stands - I hope - at 1122 Harvard). 08-11-1893 - The daughter of Mr. Miller, the new proprietor of the Houston Heights Hotel, was buried this afternoon. The funeral was largely attended. About 1895 - Rev. B.A. Rogers begins holding non-denominational services in the hotel. 02-05-1895 - Report of a visitor staying at the Houston Heights Hotel. 06-11-1898 - Report of paving of "Houston Heights road" between the Cooley residence and Houston Heights hotel. Crew was also going to extend the road 2

I knew the hotel was gone, but I have wondered about its history. The TSHA says that the hotel was converted into the Texas Christian Sanitarium, and I've seen that elsewhere. The sanitarium doesn't really look crescent-shaped - but then, maybe the hotel didn't turn out to be cresent-shaped in the end. Also, I've seen in a number of places that the hotel was on the NE corner of 19th and Ashland - Carter & Cooley, for example, say that they are located on the former site of the Houston Heights Hotel. Sister Agatha also references the NE corner of 19th and Ashland. Sister Agatha also mentions, though, that she hasn't found any record of the hotel. I think I might research it a little and see if I can find out more about it and the sanitarium. Seems like I remember reading about a fire at one of the two. [udpate: More information from Sister Agatha regarding the hotel/sanitarium here. I'm combining that information with some newspaper searches and will post a timeline soon.]

The following is an excerpt from an 1892 newspaper article, in the Galveston Daily News, regarding the construction of Houston Heights. It probably could have gone in the History section as well, but I thought it might be of more general interest here.

Saw this on Swamplot today - presumably the same project despite the reference to it being on the northeast corner.

You might ask the member who posted here if he found a photo. Sounds like it was a block west of Wabash Antiques.

The Chronicle is reporting that one of the three bodies found in the storage unit that weren't identified has been identified.

Some additional info, just based on a quick google search: "Located in West Houston on South Wynden Drive in the West Oaks II Sub. Aka McFee cemetery. The 11/3 acres was decicated as a cemetery in 1874, with one acre called the Morse Cemetery. No markers showing, one base is the only sign that there was a graveyard there at one time. No recorded names or dates at site. May be moved or destroyed. (Houston Chronicle, Dec. 8,1994, Stefanie Asin.) ======================================== From AT REST by Trevia W. Beverly. Est. by Grace Morse, by 1992 there was only two markers. Lovett Taft, Died Oct. 25,1864; Mary Bragg, Died July 12,1873. Other names that are buried here are Grant, McFee, Morse." [source] I think some of that information was posted by George E. Wolf, Jr., who I think posts on HAIF as Cemeterywolf. If you PM him, he might have more information.

Sorry I haven't been checking this thread - still don't have power. Would be great if folks outside Houston wanted to sign. Thanks!