Jake Freedman Domain Privee Casino & Residences At 11083 Old Main Street Rd.

IronTiger · January 13, 2014

OK, I reread the topic, and it was on the first page.

brhaltx · January 14, 2014

I talked to my friend; he remembers the building, and his family was living on Craighead at the time of the fire. He says someone was trying to save the building at the time it burned down.

He didn't have much else to say about it otherwise.

The family sitll owns land on Craighead. He says that the casino property is owned by Rice, and the current building is a Rice data center. (HCAD lists it as belonging to a company in New York.)

Starryart · January 23, 2014

FYI... there was no indoor pool.-only the large casino building. The bar had an ebony grand piano and lighted stain glass panels of devil women (wine, women, song). There was a bookcase on the west side of the room that would swing away to reveal a hidden office for times when they would get raided. on the back side of the building were private gambling rooms.

In one photo posted you can see a three car garage but that was expanded to a 6 car garage with two garage apartments (grandma and grandpa lived in one and his gardener lived in the other) and the gambling hall was also lengthened. Someone said that photo was circa 1950 but I know it was much earlier that. probably 1930. There were a lot more trees and shrubbery that were full grown by 1955. A large rose garden was in front of the pool.

The house had a large curved staircase. One of the upstairs bathrooms had black sink and toilet and bathtub. Everything was very art deco. I have a few pieces of furniture from the house. The extension at the end of the house was a huge kitchen. My grandma canned pickles, jams and sauerkraut there.

philoritx · December 20, 2014

I just stumbled on this thread by accident. I sorta lived in this house for awhile. Technically, I dated the daughter of the woman (Esther) who lived in the house in a caretaker role. I wonder if this is kinfolk of Starryart. When I was drafted in 1970 I was living in a quadplex on West Gray and had no other permanent home address and had to use that Old Main address of my by-then fiancée, so all my Army paperwork shows that as my PHA. I have a lot of photos of the place somewhere. Interesting note...I think everyone near my age remembers where they were when we landed on the moon. I was scraping down the sides of the swimming pool. We had decided to try to clean it out and get it functional again (we did!) and recruited the oldest son Ben, who was living in the servant's quarters in the rear at the time and someone else (maybe DeeDee or Nathan) to help. Someone came down from the house and said we were close to landing so we went in and watched.

We never went in the casino part much. I remember high ceilings and dark walls with some risqué murals. I am not sure that it even had functioning lights at that time. I remember the tiny hidden office with the revolving bookcase door that I saw mentioned. I thought it was like something straight out of the movies.

I remember the first night I took C**** home. We drove up to that big gate with the guard shack and all...I thought I must be dating a movie star! Soon found out she was just living there in an arrangement that I never knew all the details of. I am not sure what Esther's connection was to the owners. When I came back to the States after my Army service, it was gone. All that was so long ago it almost seems like a different life.

Texas girl · December 25, 2014

I lived in this house for several years. My grandfather started out as a guard at the gate and later became the caretaker when Mr. Freedman moved to Las Vegas. I learned to swim in the pool and played in the rooms in the gambling section of the of the casino. We stayed there when hurricane Carla came thru. After my grandfather passed away my mother and my brothers and sister and I moved in the big house. There were three bed rooms and two full baths up stairs with a fire place in the master bed room. There was NO indoor pool just three huge rooms in the casino. One was the bar with padded green walls and a lighted bar with glass shelves. I still have some of the glasses from the bar. The room in the middle had black light pictures on the wall of the devil and his women. Off to the left was a small office with a revolving bookcase. behind the bookcase was a small room for hiding gambling equipment and a safe that was left behind. The third room was empty. but it had a small office off to left by the back door. On the walls were pictures of all of Mr. Freedman"s race horses. If you would like more information about this place I would be happy to give it to you.

Howard Huge · December 25, 2014

I lived in this house for several years. My grandfather started out as a guard at the gate and later became the caretaker when Mr. Freedman moved to Las Vegas. I learned to swim in the pool and played in the rooms in the gambling section of the of the casino. We stayed there when hurricane Carla came thru. After my grandfather passed away my mother and my brothers and sister and I moved in the big house. There were three bed rooms and two full baths up stairs with a fire place in the master bed room. There was NO indoor pool just three huge rooms in the casino. One was the bar with padded green walls and a lighted bar with glass shelves. I still have some of the glasses from the bar. The room in the middle had black light pictures on the wall of the devil and his women. Off to the left was a small office with a revolving bookcase. behind the bookcase was a small room for hiding gambling equipment and a safe that was left behind. The third room was empty. but it had a small office off to left by the back door. On the walls were pictures of all of Mr. Freedman"s race horses. If you would like more information about this place I would be happy to give it to you.

That's AWESOME!

Any old pics to share?

nm5k · January 24, 2015

Not sure how I got it in my head that there was an indoor pool.. Maybe I was confused to the location

being as it was so overgrown at the time. I can see from the older pictures that you could loop around

the driveway without stopping even in the old days. So I guess what I thought were carved out driving

trails in the overgrown grass, were actually tracings of the original drive that looped around the garden

area, or whatever it was, east of the house. I think it was the summer of 1974 when we went there.

I remember I was driving the first car I had back in those days, and I'm pretty sure I was 17 at the time

as I remember that summer pretty well. In the 1973 archive image, it doesn't look as overgrown from the

air as it actually was that next summer we were there. I vaquely remember we went there one night late that

summer, and the police came and ran everyone off. I think that was the last time I went there.

And I guess it was 2 years later when it burned down. At that time, I didn't have any real clue as to it's history.

But even in it's run down shape, I could tell it must have been a pretty fancy place in it's day.

The grass and weeds must have been 3 ft tall when we were there. It was pretty thick as I recall.

Hard to believe it's been 40+ years since then.. Where did all the time go...

Cathy Harwell · September 23, 2019

I use to spend the night here. I was friends with DeeDee. We cheered at Fun Football together. I saw the Casino as well and knew about the hidden doors, there were glasses still hanging up and velvet walls. However, it was spooky to me and never went back in. Her room was up stairs and when the wind blew it was a little scary. We would listen, sign and dance to Elvis Presley. Dee Dee and her family were very nice. I lost contact with them after they moved. I am not sure what happened and as it is stated they tore it down. It was old and needed a lot of work. It is sad since it was a piece of history. If I am not mistaken it was next to Brockstein Brothers on Main St. by the over pass going to Sugar Land.

Robert M · December 8, 2022

My knowledge of Domain Privee was in the late 1960s early 1970’s. I lived In Windsor Village and our neighbors across the street the Felchak’s grandparents were caretakers. They lived in the garage apartments not the big house as we called it. Later Easter Felchak their daughter took over as caretaker and they lived in the big house. I went there many times and spent the night. There was only an outdoor pool. The big house with a very large kitchen for the attached casino and a smaller one. The casino had a Porte couchere entrance to the right side of the house facing the pool. When you walked in there was a grand entrance with a coat check - the wearable cigar and cigarette cases were still there. There was an unbelievable bar and you turned to the right and there was a room with two stain glass devil artistic huge pieces and a piano. Then you went into two or three huge gambling entertainment rooms on with a side room and a revolving bookcase with a safe. Many memories there playing inside a historic art piece we had no idea though at the time.

Highrise Tower · December 12, 2022

There isn't any photos on page 2 so I'll add some with context. Jake Friedman Domain Privee Casino & Residences.

The location of the property was on Old Main Street Loop Road (in the 1930s the road was simply named Old Main Street Road) near Craighead Drive. The property is also located off of South Main Street, AKA Highway 90.

Aerial photo from 1958 showing the road layout around the property.

I love the star and other landscape patterns. Simply amazing! This was modern-day TMC3 level.

By 1976 the property appears to be overgrown with grass and trees.

I thought the location looked familiar so I typed in the address for Rice University's South Annex: Library Service Center & Data Center which is located at 11620 South Main Street. The two properties matched!

I wonder the original address on Old Main Street Loop Road? The modern-day address is 11620 South Main Street if anyone wants to go look at historic photos.

Edit: Earlier in the thread the original address came up: 11000 Old Main Street Road.

Google Earth from December 1944:

Google Earth from June 2022:

Spoiler

Bob Bailey Studios Photographs. wow!!

Highrise Tower · December 12, 2022

I found some of the complex specifications that includes financials, dates, acreage, architects, and location!

River Oaks Scrapbook by Hugh Potter. Volume 16 - October 1937 to July 1938.
Contains copies of the River Oaks Corporation advertisements; River Oaks magazines for 1937 and 1938. Clippings from: October 1937 to July 1938.

Jake Freedman's Domain Privee Casino & Residences was built in 1938.

From the newspaper The Houston Chronicle dated June 26, 1938.

Half Million Dollars Worth of New Homes Here.
At the let, third row, is the $35,000 home of Mrs. J.C. Bering. It is at 1822 River Oaks Boulevard, in River Oaks. J. Leon Osborn is the designer. At the right is the $65,000 palace of Jake Freedman, being erected on a large tract of about 15 acres just west of the San Antonio Highway near the South Main underpass. B.B. McElroy, architect, drew the plans and specifications, and Lenard Gabert, architect, is doing the construction supervising.