Subdude

From slide 9 it looks like there's a "Future Historical Building Renovation" in the works.

Good catch.  Please let that be for refurbishment of the trashy Main Food Store across from the Hillcorp building and next to 1010 Lamar.

Methinks that the "GARAGE" door opens to a tunnel to the garage across Capitol, which appears to be of similar vintage to the now departed annex.

That is correct.  I had sort of assumed that they would rebuild the tunnel through the Gibraltar Savings parcel to reconnect to the garage and Magnolia Hotel.  

The article says this component would be on the North side of W. Gray where Sur La Table, Local Pour and  Brasserie 19 currently are.  

Thanks.  I'm glad to hear that.

Back when plans for redeveloping the River Oaks Shopping Center were first mooted (leading to the Barnes & Noble building) there was a diagram floating around that showed a residential development where the River Oaks Theater is.  I wonder if that is still what they have in mind.  

OK did some research.  Info from the May 26, 1986 and May 28, 1986 Houston Chronicle stories

 

"Explosion shatters building"   and  "Downtown fire damage set at $2.5 million

Worry expressed over transients"

 

To summarize:  On Sunday morning 5/25/86 firefighters responded to reports of a natural gas leak at the Gieseke Building, 800 Fannin at Rusk.  The building promptly exploded, fortunately with no loss of life as it was a Sunday morning after all.  Tenants of the building at that time included two restaurants, an optometrist and a pharmacy.  There was a vacant pool hall upstairs.

 

Points of interest for haifers and intersections with this thread:

 

The empty pool hall upstairs was, I believe,  the former location of Le Cue, which was the place in Houston in the 50s and 60s where people like Minnesota Fats and Jersey Red would play when they were in town.  By this point Le Cue had moved to a location in the Village above Swiss Haus.

 

The Gieseke Building was the location of the downtown Roy Rogers, as I previously mentioned.  In the May 26 story, the Chronicle quotes Luke Mizell, owner of Luke's Hamburgers, one of the restaurants destroyed.  I believe he had the former Roy Rogers location there, which ties in with his ownership of the Galleria Luke's about the same time.  I don't know if the financial loss from the fire had anything to do with why Luke's didn't survive, but it seems that it couldn't have helped.

 

That's all I have for now.  I'd like to know more about Le Cue.  Growing up I knew of its existence but I never got the chance to go there.

Thanks.  I had never heard of that building, the explosion or Le Cue.  I looked on Historic Aerials and there does seem to have been a building across the street from the Montagu Hotel so I'm guessing that is it.  It looks like Le Cue was pretty famous in the pool world.

The San Antonio Rose

Harlow's

Slick Willie's on Westheimer

The Texas Opry House on Richmond

Goofy's Game Room on Buffalo Spwy.

Rockefeller's, Fitzgerald's and Leo's Mexican restaurant in the Heights

Kay's Lounge on Richmond

Studebaker's

Westheimer Art Festival

Anton's

The Bavarian Beer Gardens

Harlow's was the place to go after an evening at Cooters!

fwiw, there were Roy Rogers restaurants around until the early 80s. when I worked downtown there was one in a building on fannin I used to go to a lot. I'll always remember the message "Roy Rogers says it's western etiquette to clean up after yourself". I think that location may have been in the building that explodes and took out the golden pot Chineserestaurant behind it.

Can you elaborate?  What explosion was this and when?

refresh me on what building that is with the solid brick wall facing us in this picture.

Thanks

That's the back of the 1010 Lamar building.

Here you go:

 

Buy Volvos.

They're boxy

but they're good.

We know they're not sexy

this is not a smart time to be sexy anyway

with so many new diseases around

Be safe instead of sexy

 

It's funny, but I think Volvo made their biggest mistake when they stopped being boxy and sensible in favor of trying to be stylish to compete with luxury brands.  I'm sure they thought it made sense from a profitability viewpoint, but it was a big bet that hasn't exactly panned out.  They pretty much gave away the segment for cars that were seen as plain and sensible to Subaru, which has been setting new sales records every year.  Fifteen years ago a lot of those Subaru owners would have been driving Volvos.

The 1950 downtown photograph is incredible in the amount of detail it shows.  You can imagine how futuristic the Melrose Building must have looked at the time.

Volvo unveiled the 2017 S90. Nice looking car. I like how the beltline doesn't have the tendency to go upward and make the side and rear windows into slits, forsaking any visibility for style.

http://www.theverge.com/2015/12/2/9837424/volvo-s90-sedan-announced-detroit-auto-show-2016

True, but to me the design is kind of generic 2015 luxury car.  Not bad, but at first glance not terribly different from the Hyundai Genesis or VW Passat.

One more time on off-topic posts.  Any more and the topic closes.

Waddell's elected not to rebuild at the same location, and most of the lot was used for parking until Christ Church bought it for expansion.  There were a number of furniture retailers on Fannin:  Waddell, Haverty's and Stower's come to mind.

Looking at historic google earth images, there seems to have been a structure there in February 2004.  

 

In the historic aerials at http://www.historicaerials.com/it looks like there was a blocky looking building there until 1995.  In the 1966 photo there are diagonal lines that look like buses or trucks lined up.  Someone said a while ago that it was the bus station?  When did Greyhound move to Midtown?

Yep, Greyhound bus station.  I believe it moved to Midtown in early 1970s.

Lol, BS...direct from a troll. Things have slowed in Houston, but it's still growing and doing better than most, it's not all gloom and doom as you've bought. That's not reality, that's 'stinking thinking,' like someone miserable with their head in the clouds. Some are hurting, but some are hurting everywhere throughout America. I said America because the US economy hasn't thrived in years (it's barely holding/maintaining) and is very shaky near collapse (see: 2016). Up until recently, Houston was very hot, but the oil matter has caused it to cool to more in sync with the slower US economy, not die as you so pessimistically surmise. BRUTAL for America in 2016 sounds about right...that's when all the bubbles will probably burst, and America will slide, Houston of course, included.

Keep it on topic please, and take the off topic stuff to the off topic section.

Here's a picture of Waddell Furniture pre-fire:

Guys, keep it on topic please. 

That was the Medical Arts building.  It was demolished I believe in the late 1970s/early 1980s.  I read that it had structural problems and pieces were falling of, so it might have been considered a hazard.  

Note duplicate topics merged.

If it does, the city needs to change the name of the street back, since St Joseph's "Parkway" wouldn't have much meaning.

I don't know about Bauhaus, but there is definitely an echo of the MCM style of the University of St Thomas.

I think it was where Academy is now, at 59 and Morningside.

Oh I can't wait until the neighbors get wind of this.  

Any activity?