tarnashun

u-tote-um....there was one by my house in freeway manor on edgebrook and old galveston. for awhile there it was u-tote-um for convenience and weingarten's for groceries. on sundays there was a mexican couple that sold tamales out of a cart in the parking lot. during the late 60's u-tote-um got big enough, with citywide outlets, that they advertised on television, usually channel 69. stop n' go opened up around then and the u-tote-um went to seed and disappeared around '72 as i remember. i have remembered the name because of the totem pole signs.

in the 1960's, if you were coming from south houston down I-45 to go across town to visit ,say,your aunt carverene like i was, just before you hit the newfangled downtown overpass, on the right, you would see this huge corrugated butler building the size of an airplane hanger. it was the markle steel fabrication plant, and on the front of it, about two stories tall was a multicolored animated neon spectacular which pictured a construction worker in a hardhat sitting astride an airborne girder giving the thumbs up to hoist him higher into the air. letters a mere 6' (or so it seemed i guess) proclaimed MARKLE STEEL, one word on either side of him. every week we would go to my aunts house, and every week i would look for this drawing in light. i am 48 now, and i make neon glass for a living in atlanta. i am working on my webpage and want to put the markle steel guy on my site with my bio. if anyone out there in texas has pictures of it to share with this texas transplant, i would be no end of grateful. plus i just want to see it again. thank you.