Alamo drive in on Austin Highway:  is this a Wal-Mart now?  Lots of fun when we were kids.  We would arrive in our pajamas.  Bad news as a teenager.  Too many daiquiris consumed in the car while occasionally watching really BAD movies.  But who went to see the movies, anyway?

Frost Brothers:  my truly all time favorite place to shop.  The dressing rooms were like a four-star hotel.  Great sales, so that sometimes I could actually afford to buy something there.  Then they would box it up in that snazzy little box with bluebonnets.  Everyone would know you'd been to Frost Bros.!

Scrivener's:  So unique.  We bought hundreds of yards of fabric there to make clothes.  Beautiful crafts, china, housewares.  I still took my daughter there to the children's section before they leveled it.  My heart lurched when I saw that flat parking lot where it used to stand.

Joske's downtown:  In shell shock, I shopped the final sale (last summer?)  This was a regular Saturday morning destination for my mother and me.  We parked in the back before they dredged all that out to make the River Center.

Shoe Box:  that cute pink little store across from the Broadway Theatre.  Many pairs of shoes bought and worn out.  They gave out the best, sturdy little plastic bags which we reused to carry our freshly laundered and pressed gym suits to school on Monday morning(if that gym suit wasn't pressed and starched, did you catch it from Tankersley ...).

Terrell Plaza shopping center:  this is still there, but might as well not be.  It's really gone ghetto.  We banked at the American State Bank, shopped occasionally at Robinson's for fabulous but way overpriced clothing, ate all you could eat for $1 at the Wyatts Cafeteria, and bought almost everything we wore and used in our home at JC Penney.  Neisner's was a big old-fashioned five and dime where you could find anything and amuse yourself for hours just looking.  I loved visiting the parakeets.  Now we all go to Wal-Mart, with no atmophere at all.

And remember the motel on Austin Highway past Salado Creek with the Tee-pees?  What was the name?  They always had some poor guy dressed as an Indian sitting on a horse out on the highway.  He took a lot of abuse from the cars passing by.

J

I had completely forgotten about The Shoe Box.  Also right there was the Ize Box - super yum.  And yes, Terrell Plaza is still there - tho sans Dick's Hobby Shop and Silvey Music and Thom McAnn...  Long time ago, I guess...  CS, Co69

Hi Shirley....I enjoy your writting here. I just found it after Janice Graham was talking about it at our reunion meeting yesterday.

That place with the Tee Pees on Austin Highway was the Tee Pee Steak House. We grew up eating there with our folks. Back then.....you could order a really large sirloin steak and cut and serve a family of 5 from it. And after dinner we could go outside and play and see the indian on the horse.

I remember the Ize box too.....and going there in the summer time and getting big slices of ice cold watermellon and root beer floats.

And apparently.....no one else in the world except for people from San Antonio referred to a convenience store as the "ice house". When I moved to Austin and would say to someone that I was going to the ice house....they looked at me like I was crazy. Apparently it's a San Antonio colloquialism.

After reading some of your post here I did some googling and came up with this great web site. Talk about a blast from the past!

http://www.city-data.com/forum/san-antonio/27062-gone-but-not-forgotten-san-antonio.html

The original Earl Ables is gone and is now in the old Terrell Plaza shopping center. Frontier Drive in #1 on Broadway near Brackenridge Park is gone replaced by an office building. I was a carhop there all four years at Incarnate Word College..

Oh Jim I remember the Tee Pee also. What about the Big Orange across from Terrell Plaza. After high school many still hung out in the parking lot of Terrell Plaza on Friday nights. Shirley I remember the Alamo Drive in as well as the original Pan American Speedway which was right at Eisenhauer and Austin Highway, I couldnt remember if the drive in was where the HEB is or where Walmart is. I remember in high school going to the San Pedro drive in on Friday nights after football season and of course no one watched the movie it seemed everyone hung out drinking beer out of ice chests in car trunks and although we were not of legal age we got by with it unless Constable Hancock was around as unfortunately he recognized to many of us from Mac. Oh the good ole days when we didnt have to worry about gangs and drugs although I do remember the strong smell of pot at the drive in was so bad it smelled of burning rope now I look back and wonder why the adults didnt smell it or perhaps it was them smoking it. LOL

My first job was a car hop at the Bun N Barrell and it is still there.Surprisingly.

 Yes, the Bun & Barrel is still there.  Hope it's still as good as it once was.  We often picked up "take out" there for our family.  It will probably be there forever.

Chester:  thanks for the reminder about Dick's Hobby Shop, Patt's Drug Store and Silvey Music  at Terrell Plaza.   Dick's Hobby Shop was one of my brother's favorites.  There was also a huge department store called Whites.  You could buy furniture, lawn mowers, air conditioners ... and the big HEB at the east end of Terrell Plaza.  Is that where Earl Abel's is now located?

This is really going into the remote past, but I can remember before Thom McCann's in front of Penney's, there was a Red Goose Shoe Store.  It fascinated me because they had this giant red goose in the middle of the store that would lay a plastic golden egg for you when you bought a pair of shoes.  I can still sing the theme song for the store:  "Half the fun of having feet are Red Goose shoes ..."  Sometimes I worry about myself.

Jim:  thanks for clearing up the Tee Pee Steak House.  My family never ate there.  We were more of a hamburger joint family.  I have also spent more time than I should in the Gone but not forgotten site.  I learned quite a lot about the donkey lady on the south side.  A good use of my time!

Just as an aside, we were told by a San Antonio realtor that the entire Austin Highway "strip" was getting really seedy.  If so, that's sad because a lot of us spent a lot of time in that area.

This will only be of interest to a few, but on out a little way on the Highway was Jack Tolar's River Ranch Day Camp.  I was there every summer for a long time.  It was owned by Mandy Crowley's grandparents.  I believe Bill Cook's mother worked there too?  I don't remember Bill Cook going there, but he probably did.  Kathy Lott was there too I think.  Anyone else?

 So glad you reminded me, how many others might have memories of Jack Tolar's River Ranch Day Camp.  I practically lived there on summer mornings.  The only time I was allowed to stay all day, I was so excited, I couldn't settle down at naptime.  After I'd been tossing & turning awhile, and disturbing the kids around me, I'm sure, my grandpa swooped in, grabbed me & my cot up, and made me sleep away from everyone else.  Easily cried myself to sleep.  One of my first truly humiliating traumas!  I'm sure I'd really embarrassed him.  No wonder they hadn't let me stay all day before. :)

But all the rest of my memories of Camp are happy ones.  Swimming, riding the Pinto ponies, Flicka and Cloud, the big old sorrel, Sunny (the baby-sitter), and Prince, the beautiful spirited bay.  Hiking in the woods & up to Devil's Backbone, jumping on the trampolines, and arts & crafts, of course.  The few rainy summer days in the 1950's, we watched cartoons in the pavillion, or the Snake Man came from the San Antonio Zoo.  Does anyone remember those days?  He'd bring snakes in burlap bags, in a big metal trash can.  We'd sit on the cool cement floor, in a big circle, that always got bigger when he'd dump the first snake from it's confinement!  He had a pole with a hook to keep the snakes in mid-circle.  It was quite educational and very exciting.

Does anybody remember preschool, or Kindergarten there?  We rollerskated in the big pavillion, after it was too cold to swim.  Before we could skate on our own, they'd put us in a wood pyramid frame contraption on wheels, called a "Chicken Coop".  It had a cotton horse-girth sling, attached from front to back, to catch you when you lost your balance. An experienced skater would pull us around with the rope attached to the front, while someone who had just graduated from the Coop, would hang on to the back.  There has to be some old home movies of this circus, somewhere.

I remember a lot of those places on the old Austin Highway.  For a portion of my high school days I lived very close to the Highway.  I could walk a few blocks, down to a field and just up over the top of the hill was the back of the old Drive-Inn.  I spent a couple of summer nights out there watching movies from the back of the hill.  You could just barely hear the sound but it was all good.  There were several hotels/motels there close by also, and when the San Antonio Drag Raceway had competitions, the parking lots were full of dragsters & Funny Cars, and we would walked around for hours just looking at them all. The Jim's Frontier Drive in was the place we always seemed to meet before we ended up over at Steve & Sandy Harts house.  His parents were always great to us, as we invaded there house at "all" hours of the night.

I did not grow up as a kid on the NE side of town so I did not know of Jack Tolar's Camp, but through some strange situation knowing Mandy so well, and her folks, I applied for a life guard spot out there one summer, and to my surprise I got the job.  I spent it teaching little kids how to swim that summer, and ended up with a great tan to boot .  The only problem was that I was not life guard certified, and I think you had to be, to teach swimming.  So, don't ask me how I got away with it, I just kept my mouth shut and did what I was told to do.  But I had a great summer there.

My first job was at the "Peggly Wiggly" on Nacadochese road just north of 410.  That was an experience all in itself.  I think I was making like $2.50-$2.75 an hour.  Working with the old style registers, and you had to know how to make change for some one, and not have the computer tell you how much to give back.  Ha!    All great memories!!!!

 I'd forgotten about you working there, Robert!  

My first paid job was at The Desk there by the pool at camp.  I think it was sometime late in high school.  The idea was to keep from having a Group of my own. I really didn't want the responsibility of being a full camp counselor.  I'd been a junior counselor for years.  My grandmother needed relief at The Desk, so that job seemed like a perfect fit. It invoved answering the phone, making change for the drink machine, fixing minor glitches in the drink machine, putting out-of-order signs on the drink machine, and calling the repair service. :)  I was also asked to find jars for, and keep an eye on the critters the boys would catch in the woods. (Small snakes, lizards, frogs, & horned toads.)  The "problem kids" were sent to The Desk for a time-out.  Seems like one of my cousins was the most frequent visitor.  My duties included minor first-aid, and refilling the little glass bottles with rubbing alcohol, to prevent swimmer's ear.  There was a lost & found behind the desk, too. 

That was before summer seemed so hot.  At least it was in the shade, and I think I do remember a fan.

Mandy, your grandfather's camp had the most extraordinary swimming program.  We lived to get in that pool twice a day.  On rainy days when we could not swim, your grandfather would set up a projector and screen and show home movies of your uncles diving.  To keep us entertained, he would then run the films backwards and make your Uncle Roger (?) fly up out of the pool and sprint backwards on the board.  We shrieked with laughter.

It was a great place for a kid in summer.  Activities and entertainment all day long, and we never got tired of anything.

I also worked there as a kid wrangler after my first year of college at UT.  This would have been in the summer of 1972.  I too got the most extraordinary tan, and with no effort whatsoever.  My brother worked there for many summers both as a kid wrangler, and a lifeguard.

We must have come after you and Robert.  The only other person from Mac who was there with me in 72 was Bill Cook.

This is really a dim memory, but very early on, my mother would drop us off at your grandparents' home.  Was it somewhere in Alamo Heights?  Then someone (your grandfather or uncle) would load us up in his van and drive us on to the camp.

Back to the Austin Highway, does anyone remember the slot car place near Walzem Road?  Was there also a slot car place in Wonderland?  Does anyone go to Wonderland anymore?  Or are you likely to get stabbed ...?

Oh!  And more more thing.  Harry Lott used to work down at the stables all day taking care of Prince, Cloud, Chickadee, and Pedro and all the others.

We called him Horseapple Harry.  I am sure he loved us for that.

 My grandparents lived at 427 Elmhurst.  It was near Ft. Sam.  It was close enough to the San Antonio Zoo, that we could hear the lions at sunset.  Granny used to say it was feeding time.  Lot of great memories made in that house.  My mom & I lived there with them, and my Uncle George, for about 3 years after my father died and we moved away from Galveston.  I was 2yrs when we moved in, and almost 5yrs when she remarried.  Mom & Dad are still in the house we moved to, 407 Laramie Dr.  And yes, they still have a trampoline in the backyard.  

 Thanks for remembering the other horses names! 

My grandparents used to have a big old yellow school bus, they'd park in the lot next to their house.  That might have been what you remember riding in to camp.  But there was one of the first VW vans around there, too.

Jack Tolar's?  Jack taught me how to swim in the summer of 1957 or maybe 58.  Swimming after that bamboo pole that was always just out of reach into ever deeper water made the knee dives off the edge of the pool seem so boring and trivial.  The biggest challenge in life was to see who could hold his breath under water the longest.

I also went there to kindergarden and summer camp for years.  Roller skating in that open air pavilion, chasing snakes in the woods, weaving brightly colored lanyards for my parents that they'd never use and playing in the algae slime at the concrete horse trough are fond memories.  I hated nap time; there were too many things that needed doing.

I learned my first word in Spanish from Jack Tolar.  "Mañana, mañana," was a phrase we always heard him say whenever we had some crisis we thought he should know about.  The only time I recall him not responding that way was one time when the horses got out.  He loaded us up into the back of an old pickup and headed down Austin Highway to Ira Lee.  As we approached the old caliche pits there was Sonny.  He took off at a full gallop back toward Salado Creek, with a few other horses joining him from the brush.  I remember being shocked because I'd never seen him move at more than a very slow amble.  Even Betsy was galloping away.

I'm sitting here grinning at all the memories.  Thanks.

 So glad someone remembers kindergarten there, too! Don't remember much about the kindergarten classroom. I think we'd sing our ABC's, and say the pledge, and sing America the Beautiful, besides Old MacDonald & other nursery songs. (I had certainly not learned the alphabet, though, before I started 1st grade.)  We had a different Ms. Tankersly there.  She wore her long hair in a sleek bun (chignon) that looked like a big donut with a tiny hole in the center.  I remember always wishing I could play with her hair. :)  

You know, escaping was a grand adventure for those horses.  Seems it happened regularly.  We'd get a call that they were out on the Austin Hwy., and Grampa needed help herding them back.  I think they were usually mostly back by the time Mom rounded us kids up & drove out there. : J

Thanks for enhancing the memories, Larry.

 Did LaNeal Tankersly really work there?  Or another Miss Tankersly?  If anyone wants to read good LaNeal stories, go to the class of '70.  They have an extensive set of stories on her.

I certainly never knew the horses would escape.  Sounds like quite an adventure.

Places like Jack Tolar's just can't exist anymore.  We had unbelievable freedoms.  Can you imagine kids today roaming through the brush unsupervised like we did, catching snakes and jumping on those open pit trampolines?  It would have been a liability nightmare, but no one gave it a second thought back then.

At 9:00 a.m. every morning we hit the pool.  Kicking on the sides, kicking on our stomachs while holding onto the sides, then ten laps freestyle, and ten laps backstroke.  Then you could dive off the board all you wanted.  After a swimming program like that, most of us could probably have tackled the English channel and succeeded.  After swimming we would head for one of those old, old houses and do arts and crafts.  We were convinced they were haunted.  Lots of painting of plaster molds and making little white balls out of that gummy white stuff, putting a toothpick through it until they dried and then painting them and stringing them into necklaces.  Then the horses!  Oh, the horses!  We loved them so.  If you were daring, you would turn the last bend at a full gallop.  There was an older boy named Roy who handled the horses at the horse pen.  We thought he was so cute!!  Horseapple Harry stayed in the stables.  Then lunch and the obligatory nap.   We hated the nap and never slept.  Our counselors yelled at us to keep us quiet.  Then back on with the swimsuits and back into the pool until it was almost time to go home.  It was a wonderful way to spend the summer.  Very few fat kids back then.

We loved sneaking down the hill to the trampolines from the swimming pool, getting our wet feet and legs covered in dirt, jumping a few times, then running back up the hill and jumping feet first back in the pool.  Dirt everywhere!!  Jack would quickly catch us after one trip and stop that nonsense!

I can see from Google earth that the property is still there, and pretty much intact.  It would probably never be possible to reopen a facility like that.  The liability insurance alone would be crushing.