gnu Posted February 3, 2006 Share Posted February 3, 2006 What was in the Hyde Park Crescent before the townhomes were"built". For some reason I don't think I ever went down there before then. Were there single family houses down there, or old apartments, or what? Just curious. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dbigtex56 Posted February 3, 2006 Share Posted February 3, 2006 (edited) Houses, and very nice ones at that. Early 20th century - one that I most fondly remember was clapboard and had a turret, similar to some houses I've seen in the Heights. They had been well maintained, not restored, situated on large lots. There was a park/esplanade north of the apartment complex on Commonwealth. An article appeared about these houses in one of the free local papers at the time they were demolished, but I don't remember if it was Houston Press or the Voice. Needless to say, people were pissed.A couple of similar houses stood on Hyde Park (north side) east of Commonwealth as well. Seems like they had been owned by some cheritable institution, and there was some question/dismay/anger about how the sale was handled at the time.edit: corrected subtitle Edited February 3, 2006 by dbigtex56 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gnu Posted February 3, 2006 Author Share Posted February 3, 2006 Houses, and very nice ones at that. Early 20th century - one that I most fondly remember was clapboard and had a turret, similar to some houses I've seen in the Heights. They had been well maintained, not restored, situated on large lots. that's what i was afraid of... seems like it would have been tough for them to pull all the lots together for it but i guess they succeeded. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gnu Posted February 4, 2006 Author Share Posted February 4, 2006 (edited) An article appeared about these houses in one of the free local papers at the time they were demolished, but I don't remember if it was Houston Press or the Voice. Needless to say, people were pissed. Found an article on it in the Press archives. Man I really don't know how I missed that story way back then. Pretty sad. Especially seeing what they replaced the old houses with. http://www.houstonpress.com/Issues/1997-08...ature_full.html Edited February 4, 2006 by gnu 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gnu Posted February 5, 2006 Author Share Posted February 5, 2006 dbigtex56 said: However, some of the homes which formerly stood at or near Hyde Park Crescent were owned by a religious or charitable institution - I'm not sure which one. No relation to the Richmont property that I know of. It was not exactly a convent but a couple of friars and a charitable foundation. This is an excerpt from the Press article I posted earlier: http://www.houstonpress.com/Issues/1997-08...ature_full.html Two Franciscan friars live in a yellow Victorian house that backs up to the Kolbe Project, a gray Victorian with a rainbow banner hanging from an upstairs porch. Here the friars operate a ministry for gays and lesbians and a home base for hospital visits to AIDS patients. In four other houses -- a red brick, a bungalow and the houses behind them -- two nuns run Wellsprings, a shelter for homeless and abused women. The next house on the cul-de-sac, a duplex, was until recently occupied by another group of Dominican sisters. The Hyde Park enclave exists today by virtue of the Ryans, an Irish-Catholic family that for three decades lived in the yellow Victorian that now houses the friars. Over the past 20 years, the Burkitt Foundation, a private foundation run by the Ryans, bought up the Hyde Park homes and paid thousands of dollars to refurbish and maintain them. At the beginning of June, the Burkitt Foundation owned 11 properties in the Montrose area assessed at $2.6 million, all of them devoted free of charge to charitable use. In addition to the six on Hyde Park, the foundation owns two nearby houses on Commonwealth, which are occupied by the International Center for the Solution of Environmental Problems and the Houston Recovery Center, a residence for female former drug addicts. The Houston Area Women's Center recently vacated another Burkitt-owned house on Castle Court. Still another Burkitt property on Westheimer, the city's last bungalow-style firehouse, is used by neighborhood groups such as a nonprofit art gallery and the Neartown Association. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
editor Posted February 6, 2006 Share Posted February 6, 2006 Somebody said a convent was there and Tremont owners threw the nuns out and that was why it went to hell it was cursed.Nuns don't curse people. It's not part of their religion. Nice attempt at spreading anti-Tremont FUD, though. Maybe it will turn into an urban legend. We all know you have an axe to grind against Tremont. You don't have to make stuff up to support it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
hydepark Posted February 6, 2006 Share Posted February 6, 2006 Nuns don't curse people. It's not part of their religion. Nice attempt at spreading anti-Tremont FUD, though. Maybe it will turn into an urban legend. We all know you have an axe to grind against Tremont. You don't have to make stuff up to support it.You are correct there are enough open public records to support without fiction. Nuns surely did not, and woud not say that.. the surrounding neighbors said it but I did repeated it.I wish they had saved the old building and a few of the trees. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
hydepark Posted February 6, 2006 Share Posted February 6, 2006 It was not exactly a convent but a couple of friars and a charitable foundation.This is an excerpt from the Press article I posted earlier:http://www.houstonpress.com/Issues/1997-08...ature_full.htmlDose anyone know what company acquired Hydepark orginally when it was going to be developed..or anything about how the deal wentdown? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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