Texas Theatre
175 E. Houston Street,
San Antonio,
TX
78201
175 E. Houston Street,
San Antonio,
TX
78201
5 people
favorited this theater
Showing 26 - 33 of 33 comments
TC: Great photos!
Nice recent photos:
View link
View link
Yeah, I read that the San Antonio Conservation Society tried to save the theatre, but at the time, a company out of Dallas, Texas bought the property and wanted to totally demolish the theatre. After several attempts from the SACS, the company declined any compromise, except only keeping the facade at the front. This is what they ended up with today. What’s also funny is that the Dallas co. that purchased the land and built in the first place doesn’t occupy the building anymore. Talk about not caring about something totally historical in this city.
One note though to update; I went by the old area and noticed that there was some construction being made to the old marquee a few months ago. When I returned a few days ago, the Texas label above the marquee was gone and they repainted it to look more modern. As of now, I don’t know where the section that was removed is now located or was placed, but I thought this was sad of SBC to do if they were involved. Maybe they are restoring it to hopefully put it back? Does anyone have any information on where it might have gone?
Also interesting to read about the Southwestern Bell connection. If you read about the Fox in Atlanta you will read about the BellSouth connection and consequently a happy ending as the Fox was saved and BellSouth decided to build their tall office skyscraper BEHIND the Fox!! Amen!! So sad though that the Texas was razed about the time interest in saving historical buildings was growing, but at least the special terra-cotta facade was salvaged!! Amen!!
Melissa in San Antonio: Interesting to read that where the Texas Theater once stood stands the restored ticket booth! Too bad San Antonio didn’t decide to restore the theater along with the booth!! :–(
I saw the outside of this theatre in 1981. It was closed. What impressed me at the time was that not only were both original marquees (there were two—one over the main entrance and one over a side entrance)intact, as well as the vertical sign, but the changeable letters on the marquee were the original milk glass and sheet metal kind. The milk glass was white, and the sheetmetal “background” surface was dark green, as was the background of all the signage.
I recently went downtown to visit the SBC building where the Texas Theater once stood and saw that the ticketbooth was also restored and stands right in front of the entrance to the building. SBC took part in also restoring it along with the facade.
The Texas Theatre seated 2752 people.