FilioScotia

Also passed the Capitan Theater on 225 and it still looks great and yep! still no "El"

There never has been an "El" in that theater's name. It's always been just the "Capitan" Theater. Not the "El" Capitan.

And since we're talking about tall buildings, how long will it take for someone to weigh in here with the name of the tallest American building west of the Mississippi River?

Now this may seem like a silly question but by "harrassment" I assume you mean sexual harassment? and not towards females?

Not necessarily. It's entirely possible that the guy quit because he got tired of all the unwanted attention and probable harassment he was getting just for being Corll's roommate. He was probably the victim of the harassment.

This is the first time I've heard that Corll had a roommate. By "roommate" I mean someone who once shared an apartment or rent house with Corll. And it didn't have to be a "gay" relationship either. It could have been something as simple and as innocent as someone renting a room in a house from a coworker. I did that on a couple of occasions when I was much younger.

I'm sure that at some point his name was mentioned in news stories, which wouldn't have gone over very well with some of his coworkers at HL&P because of the kind of guy Corll was revealed to be.

Each of these courts-martial was governed by, "A Manual For Courts-Martial: Corrected To April 15, 1917" dictating the formalization of the UCMJ or Uniform Code of Military Justice in the military arena at that point in time.

The Uniform Code of Military Justice -- UCMJ -- didn't exist in 1917. Each military branch had its own law code, and they were not uniform. There were differences.

General Eisenhower got first hand experience with all that during WWII when he became Supreme Allied Commander of the Invasion of Europe before and after D-Day. The various codes were similar, but not identical or uniform, and Eisenhower's Judge-Advocate General staff -- JAG -- was continually frustrated by the differences in the codes when prosecuting soldiers, sailors or marines. The Air Force was still part of the Army at that time. Soldiers had to be prosecuted under the Army code, sailors and marines under the Navy code, etc.

Eisenhower vowed to do something about that when he could find the time, and that time came after the war when he led development of the modern UCMJ, to put all the military branches under the same set of laws and punishments.

Congress approved the UCMJ in May of 1950 and it went into effect a year later in May of 1951.

Was it Savoy House or Houston House that was in the movie Urban Cowboy? The place that John Travolta stayed. He took that gal he met in a bar to his hi-rise apartment.

It was 2016 Main, and you have it bass-ackwards on who went where in the movie. The girl took him to HER high rise apt. Remember Travolta's character lived in a trailer park in Deer Park.

Is that the current location of 24-Hour Fitness or Galaxy Golf?

Don't know anything about Galaxy Golf -- it's not listed in the phone book -- but it's not the 24 Hour Fitness location.

That's down the street in the 5700 block of Richmond. The late great Windsor Theater was at 5302 Richmond, at the eastern-most end of the Windsor Plaza shopping center, almost at the corner of Richmond and Post Oak.

It was shut down for some years, but some entrepreneurs bought it in the 90s and turned it into an entertainment complex they called City Lights.

I have no idea what is there now. Or if the theater building is even there any more. So sad. The Windsor was one of Houston's first Cinerama and Panavision screen movie houses, and showed first runs of many of the greatest movies of the 60s, 70s and 80s. It was really grand and expansive on the inside with a decor that would knock your eyes out.

Anyone know the location or have a picture of where the Camp Logan Drugstore was located at???

I don't have a picture, but I remember where it was. It was on Washington Avenue several blocks east of Westcott. It had been closed for a long time but the building and sign were still there.

Up until the early 1960's, you could rent a horse to go riding on the trails, through Memorial Park( before mountain bikes were popular), and I believe the stables were taken over by the Police Dept.afterwards, for their horses. Just a thought on the water/tank building.. if the water tower is newer than the Camp, why would someone have built it,after Camp Logan, in an area that the owner had given the land to the city, that would strickly be used as park area built in 1925??

I don't think this is a great mystery. For many years in the 40s and 50s, there were at least two public stables and riding academies on Post Oak between what is now Woodway and I-10. The West Loop hadn't been built yet, and Post Oak was THE main north-south thoroughfare along the western edge of Memorial Park.

I remember you could rent horses for long rides on trails that ran through the park in all directions. I also remember you could hire a wagon loaded with hay and a couple of horses to pull it for a "hay ride party". I went on several of those in the mid 50s, and as innocent as they may sound to today's kids, let me tell you that a lot of serious making out and heavy duty groping went on underneath all that hay. Yes kids. Your moms, dads, and grandparents really did do "that sort of thing." As often as we could.

Ahem. Anyway, as I was saying, these recent photos of that trail just west of the west loop looks a lot like any one of those trails I remember riding on horse-back and on hay rides back in the 50s. Judging from the satellite photo, it appears to have been the original route of N. North Post Oak. That shed and water tank were probably left by one of the stable owners. After all, they had to feed and water several dozen horses to stay in business.

Personally, I don't believe there are any physical traces of Camp Logan left to be found. If there were, I think they would have already been found and we wouldn't be here wondering about it.

All of this brings back bad memories of those days. The media couldnt get enough of it and kept broadcasting to the world, especially here. The timing was even worse because the films like Tx Chainsaw all started coming out at theaters. There was a short story just yesterday afternoon on KUHF around 4:15 that discussed the recent identification of a person thru DNA and there is a good possiblity that other unknowns will be identified.

The chief Forensic Anthropologist at the Harris County Medical Examiner's office -- Dr. Sharon "Bones" Derrick -- was able to identify one of the 27 victims using mitochondrial DNA extracted from his skeletal remains. It helped that the boy's family suspected all along that he was one of Corll's victims, but the ability to extract usable mitochondrial and nuclear DNA didn't exist until very recently.

When the DNA was finally extracted from the bones just two years ago, Dr. Derrick knew where to look for a possible match. Here's that story by one of the reporters at KUHF.

http://app1.kuhf.org/houston_public_radio-...s_id=1225135134

West Mansion Group Wants Volunteers

Houston Public Radio reports the non-profit group that's trying to raise money to buy the West Mansion is hoping to beef up its corps of volunteers with a volunteer reception Friday at the Nassau Bay Hilton on NASA Rd One.

Check it out. http://app1.kuhf.org/houston_public_radio-...s_id=1223960539

Thunderball!

Oops. You're right. It was the movie AFTER Goldfinger.

I don't remember specifically what the event was, probably a ballgame, but I remember a guy wearing a jetpack flew around the dome, rounding the bases. The noise was deafening.

In the 60s and early 70s, Keds gym shoes had a guy named "Colonel Keds" demonstrating a jet backpack inside the Astrodome. In fact it was the same jetpack used in the opening scene of the James Bond movie Goldfinger.

He was a regular pregame feature at Astros' games. The guy would lift off from about halfway down the left field line, fly at about a hundred feet over the infield and home plate, and come down about halfway down the right field line.

I only saw him one time and it was breathtaking to watch. You are right though. The jetpack did make the devil's own noise.

I had been speaking to tmariar briefly of ideas to help. Now that I am back I can focus. Get me some blank spaced out layered forms for signatures and I will get down and get plenty of sig's. You would be surprised how "willing" some can be after a few cold ones. Whatever it takes! Something simple like this (minus the martini)

I salute your willingness and eagerness to do something, but I'm afraid we are nearing the end of the line for the West mansion. No one has actually lived in it for more than 60 years now, and nobody -- NOBODY -- is showing the slightest interest in buying it from Hakeem Olajuwon. Not at his asking price anyway. I don't think petitions are likely to strike a spark of interest where none has been seen before.

But I've been wrong before. I hope I'm wrong about this, but I've been around long enough to know that pessimists are rarely disappointed.

At the same time, my hat is off to the three Bay Area ladies who're working tirelessly through their 501c3 Preserved in Time Foundation to raise the money to buy the house. Who knows? They might succeed, and I'll be the first to admit my pessimism was wrong.

Only 50 signatures so far? There have to be more people who care about the Jim West Mansion than that.

Apparently not. Outside of several ladies who've been working hard for five years to find a buyer, and a few people here on the HAIF, it doesn't appear that anybody cares for the West mansion. In fact, the only people who've ever cared for it were the original West family who built it and lived in it for a few years in the 20s and 30s. Even they moved out when old man West died in 1941, and it has sat vacant for most of the time since then.

NASA used it for a few years in the 70s as the home of the Lunar and Planetary Science Institute, but moved out because of the obvious problem of trying to fit the work of a scientific organization into a structure built as a home.

So what we have is a stunningly beautiful and palatial European style house that nobody wants. I hear that Hakeem Olajuwon wants 11 million dollars for the house and the 11 acres it sits on. Unfortunately nobody wants it at that price.

He wants to demolish the house and sell the property for whatever it will bring, but he can't because it's under deed restrictions that expire in 2012. So if no one buys the house and land before 2012, the West mansion will disappear and lord only knows what will take its place.

Don't bother appealing to Houston City Council, because it's not in Houston. It's in Pasadena, and Pasadena City Council couldn't care less.

I signed too! Lets stop the demolition madness, already!

Keep in mind the West mansion is in Pasadena. Not Houston.

One of the people leading the effort to find a buyer told me that for all its shortcomings, Houston actually offers more avenues for protecting historic structures than Pasadena.

She says Pasadena has NOTHING to help the mansion.

Thanks Isuredid for posting these newspaper theater ad. listings, shows which movie theaters were in business at the same time, which could have been affiliated, and which ones were independently operated, at that particular time, of course.

I have found that people often confuse the East End/ SE End - Broadway street theaters.

The Bluebonnet was located at 1015 Broadway, one st. North of Lawndale (near Harrisburg).

The Broadway was located at 1325 Broadway, just South of Lawndale (near Harrisburg).

The Plaza is listed on the above ad as *3816? Broadway, near intersection of Broadway & Gulf Frwy. (I-45S) (in Park Place). It is listed under Independent Suburban Theaters, possibly why it did not survive very long with the competition. (Heard also, as mentioned in an above post, that it competed with the Broadway & Santa Rosa.) *Can anyone verify the Plaza address for me? it's blury in the ad.

My magnifying glass shows the address of the Plaza Theater was 1325 Broadway. Apparently the Broadway Theater was named the Plaza in an earlier life.

Astrodomain was a very commonly used word. May never hear again it seems.

Actually, the "Astro-Domain" never worked out as a concept. In the 1950s, before Houston got its National League franchise, and before old Colts Stadium was built, that area was "out in the country", several miles south of the medical center. There was NOTHING there. Fannin and Kirby dead-ended at OST, but were extended when promoters and Colts owners Roy Hofheinz and R.E. "Bob" Smith built Colt Stadium.

A few years later, the county and Hofheinz built the dome where they did in the belief it would attract a lot of commercial, entertainment and residential development and make everybody rich. The building of Astroworld and the Astroworld hotel just poured fuel on those hopes.

But the grand scheme never came to pass and the hopes started fading early, because the area around the dome never became the bustling entertainment and commercial complex Hofheinz and others dreamed about.

Most hotel corporations never saw any potential there and steered clear of the immediate area. The only other quality hotel of any size I can remember was the Marriott at Greenbriar and North Braeswood. Motels don't count.

The Dean Goss Dinner Theater was the only "entertainment" oriented business I can recall. The only restaurants were on South Main and OST where they didn't have to depend on catching people coming and going from the dome or Astroworld. Even the Dome Shadows night club was over on the other side of South Main for the same reason.

So in the end, the "AstroDomain" idea never really caught on. As it is with most commercial ventures, the only winning formula is: Location. Location. Location. Astros owner Drayton McLane could see that, and it's why he decided to build his new baseball stadium in downtown Houston.

I had never heard of Bobby Riggs before that match, and I too saw him as a loud-mouthed Chauvinistic pig. However, after all was said and done, I realized so much of his antics were just a part of his act. I think all along he hoped the event would be a shot in the arm for tennis, as well as for women

I have a number of wonderful memories from the Dome. I was home on leave in

Many a Houstonian has memories of the Astrodome. I remember people walking around, smoking cigarettes, and the whole dome had this rustic, small town in a huge stadium feel to it. check out this article I found about Cigarette Haze Control in the Astrodome:

http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m5PR...ag=artBody;col1

I remember the games before smoking was banned in the dome.

People smoked everywhere. In their seats, on the concourses, wherever they happened to be. By the middle innings of a game there was a grey haze in the higher levels of the dome. The cig smoke rose to the dome ceiling and stayed there. By the 6th or 7th inning it looked like a layer of fog hanging down from the rafters. People in the skyboxes and the purple loge level seats had it bad.

I remember the Astros and dome management finally started paying attention when players started complaining about the smoke. Even if it couldn't be seen down on the ground at field level players said the smell was still strong enough to affect their play.

I forget what year it was, but that's when they banned smoking in the dome. Forget what the smoking did to the non-smoking fans. The management did nothing till it was made clear to them that it was affecting the money-makers -- the players.

Thank you for clearing that up. I sure would like to get my hands on a taping of that show, just for sake of curiosity. Imagine who the guests were? Wow, and I do mean WOW!

I would call KTRK and ask to speak to someone in their archives department. Can't guarantee they'll have anything by Kitty Borah but that's the place to start.

Sadly, vast amounts of Houston's early TV have been lost forever because it wasn't filmed or recorded. And countless files of what WAS recorded on film and tape have been thrown out because of storage problems. That old stuff takes up a lot of space.

Oh my God! So there really was a Kitty's Corner!

I was about the seek therapy to help me connect that title (kidding). It always stayed in my mind but since I was only about 6-8 yrs old then it seemed more like a dream I had as a child, but it truly existed. The great attached link only mentiond her name and the show but how did it differ from Kitterick's show? What was Kitty's Corner's format? I am guessing it must have been around circa 1966-68ish???

Kitty's Corner was NOT a kids' show. It was for grownups, and it was on in the late 50s and early 60s. It was one of the first news features and interviews shows. It wasn't a talk show and didn't have a live audience, but later TV talk shows generally followed the same format Kitty Borah developed and used.

There's still a JAIL there on Mykawa. I think they just built a newer building over it??

Actually, that "jail" is just a temporary holding facility inside the HPD Southeast Command Station, which now occupies some of the land that was once the City of Houston Prison Farm. People arrested and taken there for processing are transferred to the County Jail as soon as it can be arranged.

That was another channel 13 show that I can barely remember: Kitty's Corner. Back in October 1966, according to the Houston Post TV guide that I have, it aired at 8:30 in the mornings. Cadet Don was on from 6:30 to 7, then came back from 7:30 to 8:30. That TV guide had "Kitty's Corner" spelled that way, just the one K. But it did list the Kitirik show (4 PM) as "Kitirik's Karrousel".

You're thinking of Kitty Borah, a former KTRK personality who later went into corporate public relations at Shell Oil. Here's a link to a newspaper item that mentions her and a lot of other former local TV personalities.

http://www.societyspy.com/archive/05_parts.htm

You'll find her name somewhere down in there.

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Yes Corll lived in an apartment complex in the early 70s on San Felipe called Woodway Square. The entire complex has since been torn down. I think that's where one of his first murders occured.

A lot of the Woodway Square Apartment complex burned down in the biggest and most spectacular residential fire in the city's history. What didn't burn was later demolished because the place was finished as a profit making rental complex. Here's what the Houston Fire Museum website says about that fire:

A heavy box could not overcome a fire spreading across wood-shingled roofs in the largest apartment complex in Houston. Fire destroyed 30 of the 105 buildings in the Woodway Square apartments on July 31, 1979. An unprecedented sixth alarm was signaled, and it took another alarm and mutual aid companies before the conflagration was brought under control. Several buildings north of the complex were set afire by burning embers from the Woodway fire.

On the day of the Woodway Square fire, city council turned down a proposed ordinance outlawing wood-shingled roofs. Fire officials had been trying to get the ordinance for several years. The ordinance was back on the table the following day, and city council unanimously approved fire resistive roofs for future apartment complexes.

To that I will add: that ordinance included single family homes. Existing homes were grandfathered in, but new homes built after the ordinance was passed were required to have fire-resistant roofs. Further, wood shingles on grandfathered homes could only be replaced by fire resistant shingles.

I have personal memories of that provision causing a lot of consternation in some pricey upscale neighborhoods where Homeowners' Associations required wood shingle roofs. They were outspokenly angry when they learned they couldn't replace wood shingles with wood shingles. Me? I loved it. I never liked wood shingles and I jumped at the chance to replace them with something less vulnerable to fire.

Sorry for hijacking the conversation about Dean Corll. I'll go back to my room now.