FilioScotia

Wow. That is going to be one gigantic crate all right. The mural itself is 15 feet by 47 feet, but its size is just part of the problem. You have to remember that the mural wall makes a 90 degree curve around a corner there in the lobby. Removing that entire curved corner in one piece, getting it into the custom designed curved crate, and getting it out of the building is going to be a major feat of careful engineering. Now we're getting a clear picture of why this is costing so much, and why it's been so hard to find anyone willing to foot that cost. I do hope one or more of the Houston TV stations is following this to get video of this removal.

I retired recently and moved far away from Houston, so I'm not up to speed with the status of the Hurd Mural in the old Prudential Building. The last time I heard anything about it, they couldn't find anyone willing to pay the steep cost of removing the mural and storing it, and they couldn't find an art venue willing to create a space for it. Everybody was wringing their hands saying "oh what a artistic shame this is", but no one was willing to do what is needed to save the mural. That was the situation as of the first of this year. Has anything changed? Is the mural still doomed?

Sidebar to the Eden's Amusement Park story: I'm fascinated by the fact that a street once named Baker St is now named Hughes St, in the area where Howard Hughes Sr started his oil drilling bit company in the early 1900s. Today the company is named Baker-Hughes, and after a little Googling, I learned why. Here's what the company's website says: In 1907, Reuben C. Baker developed a casing shoe that modernized cable tool drilling. In 1909, Howard R. Hughes, Sr. introduced the first roller cutter bit that dramatically improved the rotary drilling process. Over the ensuing eight decades, Baker International and Hughes Tool Company continued to lead the industry with innovative products in well completions, drilling tools and related services. Now we know why that street on the east end was once named Baker.

Wow. Judging from that map, Eden's was an amusement park that took up the entire south side of the 6400 block of Harrisburg, between what was then Baker St on the west to 1st Street on the east. It also extended southward on land that's now crossed by streets that weren't there then. Texas Ave and Capital apparently didn't extend that far into the east end at that time. Baker is now Hughes, and 1st is now 65th street. It helps to remember that the town of Harrisburg was an incorporated municipality until sometime in the 1920s, and it had its own names and numbers for its streets. The Sanborn Map shows Eden's Amusement Park had most of the usual attractions one finds in amusement parks. It appears it was about the same size of the old Playland Park on South Main, more or less. I used to live in the 6700 block of Sherman back in the 50s, just a few blocks away from this site, and I was friendly with some of the older people who had been living there for many years. But, I never heard anything about an amusement park once existing within walking distance of where I lived. I'm guessing Eden's Amusement Park probably did well in the prosperous Roaring 20s, but disappeared in the Depression Era 1930s. There's been no trace of it for a long time now. It would be interesting to do some serious archeological digging in that area. I bet it would turn up some interesting artifacts from those times.

Short-lived indeed. In 1917, a lot of German names were short-lived. When the U-S declared war on Germany in 1917, anything and anyone with a German name got very unpopular overnight. German Street through Houston's east end was renamed Canal Street. It appears that a Bismarck Park in that area lost that name, and perhaps became Eden Park. Even though Otto Von Bismarck died in 1898, he was remembered as one of the architects of the German Empire -- the Second Reich -- that started that "Great War", as it was known then. All over the country, many people of German extraction changed their names by simply "Anglicizing" them. Braun became Brown. Schmidt became Smith. Stein became Stone. Heinrich became Henry, etc. Even the English Royal family changed their last name from Saxe-Coburg-Gotha, because there was so much anti-German sentiment. King George V renounced all the German titles belonging to him and his family and adopted the name of his castle, Windsor. One of George's cousins, Prince Louis of Battenberg, a grandson of Queen Victoria and in line to the throne, changed his family name to Mountbatten. Just a few examples of the anti-German turmoil that was going on in 1917. Of course, a lot of people with German names refused to change them, and they had to endure a lot of public and private scorn and discrimination for a few years. They are to be admired, because most of the anti-German feeling dissipated in the Roaring Twenties. The same sort of thing, on a much larger scale, happened to Japanese-Americans during WWII.

To David Morris Purdie in the thread after this video on his Facebook Page: I have no idea who you were seeing and thinking it was a second Kitirik, but there was only ONE Kitirik. Bunny Orsak was the one and only, and when KTRK cancelled her show in 1971 it went away for good, and she was never replaced. I grew up with that show too, and have worshipped Bunny as Kitirik from afar since the first day I ever saw her in 1955. I was 12 years old then. 26 years later in 1971, I was a grown man pushing 40, but I teared up a little the day I learned she'd been cancelled. Someone warm and loving had disappeared from Houston TV. I'm not denying that you clearly thought the person you saw was another Kitirik, but KTRK never brought the show or the character back.

Respectfully Danny Mac, Speaking just for myself, please write in plain English. There are still a few people who haven't learned the short-hand language of Text Messaging, and it's hard for me to read your postings.

And I didn't intend to imply that you were thinking of a "simple" renovation. I used the word "simple renovation" to make the point that there's a universe of difference between doing a cosmetic renovation, and doing all the work necessary to restore a crumbling building's structural integrity. Clearly, a renovation would cost a helluva lot less than an overhaul, but it's not going to get either one. I agree with your concerns over the way MDACC has handled its problems with this old building, and the way it's managed its expansion in and around the TMC. As for "options to the south", isn't that sort of what's going on down at the corner of Fannin and OST? Isn't MDACC doing some building there? And for the poster wondering what the new structure that will replace the Prudential Bldg will look like, I think we can safely predict that in architectural style and general appearance, it will look pretty much just like all the other MDACC buildings between Fannin and Braeswood. Those people are nothing if not predictable.

A simple renovation is just cosmetic and easily done, but it won't solve the problem. MDACC Operations VP Bill Daigneau says the foundation is slowly cracking and sinking and this is causing the building's superstructure to pull apart and fall in on itself. There are cracks in ceilings and walls from top to bottom, including the lobby wall with the mural, and they're spreading. MDACC's attitude is that it's beyond saving. He said if they did nothing the building would collapse in a few years.

I don't disagree with your assessment of the building, but I have to ask if we're talking about the same frescoe? I've examined the frescoe at MD Anderson up close and in person, and nowhere on it will you find "emboldened young white men wielding blueprints, and contented Negroes picking cotton." What you will see is a ranch, with people of various ethnicities spreading their harvested food out for what appears to be a picnic, children playing in the background, and some men of undeterminable ethnicity loading a hay wagon. Not a cotton field anywhere. Personally, I think it's an important representation of life in the southwest, as seen through the eyes of an major artist of the 40s and 50s, and Peter Hurd was a major artist and muralist. It's a shame the art world doesn't appear to be interested in preserving it. At least not interested enough to raise the money needed to remove and move the mural somewhere else.

In a radio interview on KUHF back when all this started in 2008, Bill Daigneau of MDACC said the old building is slowly falling in on itself. There are visible cracks in ceilings and walls from top to bottom, including the lobby and in the mural itself. It's no longer safe for people to be in it, and repairing it would cost more than demolishing and building new. Also, let's face it. It's just a refitted office building that's not suited for what MD Anderson does. They want something built for medical research and hospital care. Here's a link to audio and transcript of that story in KUHF's news archives in April of 2008. There also some interesting photos of Peter Hurd painting the mural back in 52. http://app1.kuhf.org/houston_public_radio-news-display.php?articles_id=31046 For those who wonder why removing the mural is so difficult, here's some information about the "fresco" technique of painting. "Fresco Painting is one done with earth colors, mixed with distilled water on a specially prepared plaster wall. There are several kinds of mural paintings: Oil paints are used on canvas and the canvas pasted to the wall, and a secco mural, which consists of letting the plaster dry and then painting on the wall tempera color. An example of this is Peter Hurd’s mural in the Prudential Life Insurance Building, Houston, Texas. A Fresco Mural is one of the most lasting, the most expensive, and the most difficult types of mural decoration. Few artists will even attempt it. There are frescoes in Pompeii, Italy, which were covered with ashes and lava. After they were uncovered, the colors seemed just as brilliant as they were at the time they were painted. An example of another well-known fresco is the evocation of Genesis by Michelangelo on the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel in St. Peter’s in Rome. Fresco demands perfection in painting; mastering the art of making a perfect joining of one day’s work to the next is also the fresco painter’s goal. The cutting of the edge of the finished part to provide for the next day’s plastering was done before the painting was finished."

The mural isn't painted "on" the wall. The mural "is" the wall. It's a fresco, which means it was painted on the wall while the plaster was still wet and soft, before it dried and became solid. The paint is mixed with the plaster. To save this mural, the entire wall has to be removed in small sections, very carefully, so the sections can be taken out the much smaller doors and put together again somewhere else. Making the job even harder, the mural is painted on a corner in the lobby. Over about 40 feet, the mural curves around the corner and makes a 90 degree turn. Removing the mural, moving it, and storing it safely until a permanent home can be found is going to be very expensive. At least half a million dollars, according to those in the know. The Hurd Museum in New Mexico has made every effort to find the money, with no success that I've heard of. They also haven't been able to find anybody interested in providing a permanent space for it. Even the art world doesn't care much what happens to it. It's not just MD Anderson. They've worked with the Hurd Museum for more than five years on this, with no success. So don't blame MD Anderson.

We all know that Fedex and UPS packages can be dropped off in a nearby office, or at a neighbor's house or apartment, but anything coming in by US Mail MUST be delivered to the addressee or taken back to the Post Office. It's a federal crime for US Mail to be delivered or given to anyone but the person to whom it is addressed.

We have similar memories of Valian's Brucie. Their pizza really wasn't all that good, but we didn't know that then. That was when "pizza" was new in Houston. It was "different", and we thought it was so good because we had nothing to compare it to. Almost nobody else in town was serving pizza then. I think all this nostalgia for Valian's has more to do with our memories of the fun we all had back in the innocent 50s and early 60s. Gathering up a carload or two of friends and going to Valian's for pizza on a Friday or Saturday night was just part of the fun.

SSgt Macario Garcia was a highly decorated veteran of World War II. President Truman presented him the Congressional Medal of Honor for conspicuous heroism in a battle in Germany. I think it's highly fitting for a major thoroughfare in Houston's predominantly Hispanic east end to bear his name. Here's his story in Wikipedia. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marcario_Garcia

Actually, the AlRay was named for the two guys who bought it in 1960. Al Zarzana and Raymond Boriski. Zarzana died this week, and there was a big story about him in the Chron. He owned several movie houses around town. http://blogs.chron.com/bayoucityhistory/2009/11/obituary_al_zarzana_73_theater_owner_1.html

I remember how upset some people were when the McCarthy mansion was torn down. Another loss for preservationists, at a time when preservation was struggling to be part of the local conversation. Come to think of it, it's still struggling. I also recall hearing that a lot of the house's structural fixtures ended up at Bruce Bowen's Architectural Antiques shop on Fannin in midtown. Same story for the old Hobby family house on Main at N. Braeswood.

Gunn is still around, and he's into all sorts of things. He has an outdoors program he syndicates on a bunch of radio stations around the state. Check him out at http://www.texasoutdoornews.com

To know Chris Chandler was to love him, he said with thinly disguised sarcasm. Chandler was KPRC TV's weather guy in the mid sixties, until he talked the station manager into giving him a half-hour personality show that would lead up to NBC Nightly News at 5:30. Chris Chandler's "personality" was, shall we say, prickly. He was opinionated, which isn't altogether bad, but he was always popping off about local people and issues, saying unkind and insulting things about people in the news. Although I don't remember him being political, he was an early version of present-day TV hosts like Glen Beck and Bill O'Reilly. So, with that reputation in mind, here comes John Wayne's movie company to film The Hellfighters in the old oil fields in the Baytown area. Naturally, they hired some local actors and personalities for small roles and Chandler was hired to play an obnoxious local TV reporter. A VERY small role. But watching the way Chandler acted out on the locations you would have thought he was one of the stars. He got one of those Hollywood style folding chairs with his name on the back and, even though he was only in a couple of scenes, he spent a lot of time lounging around near the center of the action where the cameras were rolling. I'm told he was always trying to ingratiate himself with the film's real stars, and generally annoying the hell out of the director and production crew. When the movie was done, the premier was held in Houston. If you've seen the movie, you know there's a scene where Chandler as the TV reporter gets in Wayne's face at the scene of a well blow-out, and Wayne hauls off and decks him. The Houston audience applauded and cheered. A side-bar to Chandler's story. When he left the TV weather position to do the daily personality show, KPRC moved his backup weather guy into the full time gig. That was a young KPRC Radio DeeJay named Doug Johnson.

Kitty Borah was never Kitirik. There was one and only one Kitirik, and that was Bunny Orsak. Kitty Borah was another KTRK personality who had a business oriented show called Kitty's Corner in the early sixties. Kitty did news features and interviews with people in Houston's business community. She got out of TV in the mid sixties and went to work doing PR for Shell Oil. I believe she retired from Shell back in the late 90s. Cadet Don's real name was Al Eisenmann, and he did his the morning kids entire show and the exercise portion all by himself. Al wrote a book several years ago. The Divine K-9, about a much loved family dog. You can get it on Amazon dot com. Here's what his publisher said about him: From selling newspapers on the streets of Charleston, South Carolina during World War II, to hosting a children's TV show at a Houston TV station, to Hollywood...Al Eisenmann has worked in the entertainment industry as a performer, writer, producer for over fifty years and is now living in Waco, Texas with his wife Holly and their loving pet...Keeper. Al's son Ike has had a long career in Hollywood, starting as a child actor in the 70s. He's 47 years old now, and he's still making his living in show business. In fact, he has a role in the current movie Race To Witch Mountain. He plays the sheriff.

That's true. The economy had nothing to do with that. T&C was just in the wrong place at the wrong time. Extension of Beltway 8 was what killed it. Sakowitz failed because all its very high-end stores were free standing, and because of the popularity and growth of shopping malls, such as the Galleria. The 80s oil bust didn't help and they were all closed by the 90s. Let us not forget the Savings and Loan debacle. That had huge impact on Houston's economy at about the same time that oil went south.

There was just one Kitirik. Even though her show left the air long ago, Kitirik will always have a special place in my heart. Bunny Orsak/Kitirik brought genuine warmth and love for kids to that show. A generation of Houston children remember her as "real", and nothing about her was fake or put-on. It's a good thing KTRK didn't try to replace her because it just wouldn't have worked without Bunny in the cat-suit. I believe "Witch King" is thinking of Kitty Borah, a former KTRK personality who hosted a weekly business news interview program called "Kitty's Corner" for a while in the 1960s. She got out of TV and went to work in corporate public relations at Shell Oil. I think she retired from Shell in the late 90s. Here's a link to a local blogger named Society Spy. She wrote up a big soiree someone threw for Dave Ward's 61st birthday a few years ago, and a number of current and former TV types were in attendance. Complete with pictures of some of them. http://www.societyspy.com/archive/05_parts.htm You'll find Kitty Borah's name somewhere in there

I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but the old Prudential Bldg is coming down. It's literally falling apart and it's beyond repair. Look for it to be imploded or demolished before the end of this year.

My wife and I returned to Houston in 1988, after ten years in east Texas. That was just before Houston's enonomy started picking up again. By then every neighborhood in the county had foreclosed homes everywhere. By the thousands. We thought we could pick up a foreclosure at a bargain price, but after several weeks of looking at trashed out houses we gave up on that idea. So we decided to shop for a new house, even though most name-brand home builders had ratcheted down to almost nothing to get through those times. We were looking in the CyFair ISD, and we finally found a small General Homes area named Sommerall West behind Langham Creek HS that still had some model homes and a sales office. We were stunned to learn we could get a new home for less than most of the foreclosures in the same general area, so we bought one. For 68,500 dollars. That was in May of 88. After we picked our 2100 sq. foot floor plan and the empty lot, it took General Homes more than three months to build the house. That was because there were almost NO carpenters or house contractors in Houston at that time. Most had moved on to other cities not as hard hit by the oil bust. We finally moved into the house in September of 88 and it proved to be the best investment we ever made. The economy started showing a pulse again around 1990, that little General Homes neighborhood Sommerall West was bought up by Friendswood Development in 1991, and it's now the much bigger Copperfield West Creek Village. We still live there, we paid off the mortgage early 6 years ago, and today it's worth 140K. I hope. I think I and Flashman can speak from experience in saying that this too shall pass. If you're able to stay in your house, do so by all means and by any means necessary.

That's probably true. Who can say? I just remembered another Sand Mountain "moment". I definitely recall seeing and hearing Townes Van Zandt singing Pancho and Lefty there sometime in 1966. It's such a haunting song I never forgot it. Years later, in the 80s, when I heard Willie Nelson and Merle Haggard's recording for the first time, I flashed back to that night at Sand Mountain. It gave me goose bumps all over again. To this day hearing that song always makes me think of TVZ.