got beer?

 

I'd like to say I had a beer in the Mule Lip Bar in Mingus but I didn't.  I think the actual bar is in the newer stone building to the right, but the handwritten sign on the historic building had more character! The Mule Lip even has its own Facebook page with the disclaimer "We don't serve women--bring your own!" For a small place of about 200, the town supports at least two bars (the Boar's Nest offers darts and shuffleboard) and Lori's Liquor Store. The Outlaw Cowboy Church balances out the activities in Mingus.

 

Mule Lip Bar

Mingus, Texas

FM 193 and 108

3.4.2016

masonic home

 

We are training this week at the Mid-Cumberland Health Facility in Nashville, Tennessee.  Two buildings dominate the more modern brick buildings at the complex.  At first glance the older buildings appear to be Southern antebellum style; a closer look shows vacant dormers, boarded windows and a chained door.  These abandoned, creepy buildings once housed the Masonic Home School and later mental institution.  Talk about southern Gothic!

the ladies of paris on broadway

 

Broadway was once the shopping hub in downtown Lubbock but today there's little to attract customers.  Lester's was once a busy jewelry store; now it is storage - likely for the wig shop next door.  These ladies look as if they are missing the diamonds and pearls.

 

Lester's

1014 Broadway

Lubbock, Texas

body shop

 

This body shop is in need of some repair itself.  If it weren't for the lettering on the overhead door, the only other clues to the business would be the carcasses of car chassis strewn around.  The place doesn't seem to be in business -- just another vacant spot on the east side.

 

619 27th Street

Lubbock, Texas

new business, new paint

 

When SuperTech Automotive moved into this former service station a few years ago, the first change was bright yellow paint.  They're gone and now a new business will occupy the space.  The first change?  A coat of black paint (wonder if the accent color will be red to match the Red Raiders).  Good luck "Fourth Street Auto Depot."

 

2920 4th Street

Lubbock, Texas

through the window

 

The empty building on Texas Avenue still bears the sign "Grady Henly Decorating" although the business relocated years ago.  A peek through the dusty window revealed only windows on the far side and a trashcan.  GHD was established in 1968.  You know you've been around a long time when you knew Grady Henly!  GHD is now run by his son and grandsons.  Grady Henly was the postmaster in New Deal and when he started the decorating business, his wife took over as postmistress. 

 

607 Texas Avenue

Lubbock, Texas

parking in rear

 

Alas, the Ding How Chinese Restaurant is no more.  The overgrown parking lot in the rear is a vacant lot.  The large sign first attracted my attention blocks away but when I got closer I noticed it was painted all black-- but you can find some nice images of the original sign on-line.  The building was interesting but peeks through the door revealed a hoarder's paradise.  I wonder if the newer Golden Lotus that went up next door led to Ding How's demise.  The façade neon signs still offer chow mein and chop suey but no chow no more at Ding How.

 



 



 



Ding How Restaurant

2415 East Amarillo Boulevard (Route 66)

Amarillo, Texas

3.13.2015

 



park view

 

Lubbock's Cliff House Restaurant, not to be confused with San Francisco's Cliff House overlooking the Pacific Ocean, had a view of Mackenzie Park.  In the 1950s it was situated on busy Highway 62/82.  Travelers could dine, admire the view and stay over night in the nearby Park View Motel.  Today only a shell remains.  The place is popular with spray paint artists and photographers.  I had to wait until an urban portrait session was over before taking my turn.

 

Cliff House Restaurant

510 East Broadway

Lubbock, Texas

Fluvanna garage

 

If you are driving along FM 612 in Fluvanna and experience car trouble, don't bother with the Fluvanna Garage for assistance -- just call AAA and they should be there in 3 or 4 hours. Established by real estate promoters banking on the railroad, Fluvanna  boomed. By 1911 it had two real estate offices, a thirty-room hotel, a lumberyard, a cotton gin, and other businesses with its greatest population of 500 in 1915.  Then the railroad closed it station, major highways bypassed the community and today even the post office is shut down.  And the name Fluvanna? Named by the surveyor after his home county in Virginia (Fluvanna County, Virginia - population 25,691.  The area was once part of the original Virginia Colony and named Fluvanna which means "Anne's River" in honor of Queen Anne of England). 

 

Fluvanna, Texas

Scurry County

Farm Roads 612, 1267, and 2350,

2.20.2015






chromatics

 

Chromatics, or color science, includes the perception of color by the human eye and brain.  My brain knew that this corrugated tin building was drab gray but during the dusk of a bright, clear day it appears blue.  Supposedly clean air scatters more blue light than red wavelengths. The bullet holes just punctuate the picture!

 

Plainview, Texas

2.1.2015

 



the hotel 



In my opinion, the hotel is the most interesting building in Quitaque.  My online surfing turned up the same sentence on about 7 websites:  " In 1907 the Twilla Hotel, a local landmark, opened."  Nothing about when it closed or if Earl Twilla were the builder -- nothing!  The two-story building appears to have had 24 rooms, with a central bath on each hall (if you interpret the windows).  If you peek through the broken window to what may have been the reception room, you'll see the mailboxes and desk.

The Old Hotel
Quitaque, Texas
2.8.2015



ghost sign in a ghost "populated place"

 



Crume Gin is identified as a "populated place" in Floyd County but that may be misleading.  Crume Gin is about a mile north of Providence at the junction of Farm Roads 2301 and 788 but there's not much population in Providence either since the school closed decades ago and consolidated with Floydada.  The Crume Gin metroplex also had a café and grocery-- probably closed in the 1980s, although the faded gingham curtains still hang.  The only patrons of the business I saw were birds (and probably other unseen critters!).  If you need a snack on your journey, your best bet is to stop at an Allsups in Petersbrug or Lockney or Plainview.

Crume Gin
Floyd County, Texas

the light on the cross

 

On the corner is 8th and Beech is yet another abandoned church building.  The congregation of The Pentecostal Church moved south a few blocks to newer digs.  Peeling paint, faded letters, boarded windows-- wonder if the spirit moved too?

 

The former Pentecostal Church

8th and Beech

Plainview, Texas

2.1.2015

railroad crossing

 

The town sprang up in 1909 along the tracks of the Southern Railroad.  Between 1940 and 1970 the population tripled to over 500.  First known as Monroe, the name was changed to New Deal after application for a post office revealed that a Monroe already existed.  The first school was built in 1917.  The district was named New Deal in 1936 after county consolidation of schools.  During the mid-1900s New Deal was a town with cafes, grocery stores, churches, lumber yards, gas stations and gins -- rather than the primarily residential community that exists today. When I-27 went west around town, businesses died.  Today one can only buy gas at the truck stop on the interstate. What was once the Owens gas station stands overgrown with weeds, peeling paint and a forlorn air.  Reflected in the window is the railroad crossing sign - a reminder of what once brought about prosperity.  Also reflected is a house across the train tracks -- once the home of the gin manager of the Fortenberry Gin.

 

New Deal, Texas

the bank of soash

 

Since today was to be the last nice day of the year, I checked my list (tunes on radio, gas in tank, tissue packet in case I needed to water the wildflowers,  my "back roads of Texas" maps,  and camera) and  headed south and the ghost town of Soash.  Established in 1909 by land prompter William P. Soash, the town was to be the focus of  200,000 acres acquired from the XIT Ranch to be sold to farmers.  Soash named the place after himself, built a bank, hotel, an electrical plant and an automobile garage.  Trains carrying potential investors arrived in Big Spring and rode by automobile on 25 miles of rough road.  July 4, 1909 some 2500 people celebrated with baseball, barbeque and vaudeville under electric lights.  Unfortunately Soash's railroad was pre-empted by the Santa Fe which ran six miles to the west bypassing Soash.  That blow plus years of drought finished the town. The post office closed, people moved their belongings and buildings to Lamesa and the Soash Land Company declared bankruptcy in 1916.  Today, at the corner of a cotton field, only the hulk of the Bank of Soash remains.  Any ghosts have been recently disturbed by the installation of distribution lines for the nearby wind turbine farms.  About a mile away, at the intersection of FM 1584 and Soash Road, stands the historic marker.

 



 

Soash, Texas

Howard County

chain links

 

At first the texture of the tin windows and peeling paint appealed to me.  Then I saw the shadows of the mystery chains hanging from the roof.

 

South I-27 Frontage Road

Lubbock, Texas

ivied columns

 

The classic beauty of this once-elegant 1940s residence has faded.  Its grace is marred by boarded windows, broken transom, weeds and no trespassing signs.  It also has the misfortune of being on 13th Street, which is the wrong side of Broadway for regentrification.  The decline was not sudden; I think I went to a Sigma Chi trash party there (or maybe it was next door) back in the day.

 

1810 13th Street

Lubbock, Texas

through these door

 

These interior doors once led to the Ancient Free & Accepted Masons Of Texas Lodge #1023.  Now the location of the Mason Temple is an empty shell of the brick building built in 1929 which housed the Freemasons .   In March 1835 the first Masonic meeting held in Texas for the purpose of establishing a lodge in Texas was under an oak tree near the town of Brazoria.  Since then many notable and ornate edifices  around the world have been constructed by the fraternity for their meetings. The Spur 1929 lodge was probably fancy for its time; the new Mason Hall, constructed down the street in 1997, is a steel building with a plain brick façade--hardly befitting of the stonemasons who crafted King Solomon's Temple.

 

Spur, Texas

8.16.2014

for sale

This cute building at the end of the main drag in Spur is for sale.  It may have had many lives, but probably started out as a gas station.  I spent time looking for what "brand" it might have been.  Many of the early filling stations were built according to a company blueprint.  I just learned that the building on the road out of town that I didn't photograph was a Phillips 66 gas station cottage. (Note to self:  If you see it and it interests you, shoot it!).   If you have a clue about this building, let me know -- even my buddy Steve didn't have any information.  For more than you ever wanted to know about gas stations, visit Roadside Architecture.

Burlington Avenue
Spur, Texas

beauty is only paint deep

 

This business on Avenue Q sports a bright coat of red paint on the front, or street side.  The secondary side with garage bays facing 22nd Street has faded, peeling paint.  And the alley side?  Missed the red paint as the business changed hands.

 

1923 Avenue Q

Lubbock, Texas