This is a prominent older home on the A&M campus that doubtless many assume to be one of the 100 or so earlier faculty houses. Actually, it is not.

The home located at 100 Throckmorton Street on campus, across the street from Corps Dorm 12 and next door to the new president's home, it was built in 1938 for high ranking administrators for the college. The first occupants were the Gibb Gilchrist family when he was named to be the first Chancelor at A&M College.

The 4,000 square foot home has been the residence of several persons of high campus rank, up to the present Dean Bresciani, Vice President for Student Affairs.



To learn more about what in recent years has been referred to as the Vice Presidents House, click on the link below.

http://vpsa.tamu.edu/pages/residence.aspx

One correction to the list of occupants, I know that the Henderson Shuffler family resided in that house from about 1953 to 1956. Shuffler '29 was head of the Information and Publications Department for the college from 1947-1962.

[This message has been edited by fossil_ag (edited 6/15/2008 11:03p).]

A few weeks ago, I ran into an old map of the "Colonists and Emigrants' Route to Texas" that showed the original rail routes that ran through "College Station" back in 1878. The map was huge and it showed plenty of detail. I can't remember where I left it, but I'll keep looking and I'll try to post it here.

Here's the map. I have a higher resolution version (4404x2747px) of it, and could probably get it in super high resolution if anyone wants it. The dark black lines are I&GN Railroad lines as of 1878.





[This message has been edited by Angry Beaver (edited 6/16/2008 1:47a).]

Perhaps some of you have wondered what life was like in the older faculty homes on campus. The best answer I suppose is that it was similar to homes in all rural areas of the state at the time .... primitive in the earliest times and gradually improving as utilities bacame available.

The photo below made in 1914 was taken from the roof of the new Academic Building, looking south over Nagle Hall and down Throckmorton Street. A few of the houses on the right of Throckmorton St were relocated to make room for the Trigon in 1924 ... but one remained at the Trigon's back door for several years. Note an assortment of outbuildings for each home.



But let us consider life in those homes in 1914 and earlier. Know first that there was no electricity, no running water, wood burning fires in fireplaces or "pot bellied stoves" provided heat in winter, and kerosene (or coal oil as it was called then) fueled lamps for lighting and at some point fueled cookstoves for cooking. Also note, there were no driveways for automobiles.

The lack of electricity and running water was not solved until after 1915-1917 when the third power plant with the tall stacks was built. The new power plant could power larger water pumps to drive water to the top of the new water tower from the nearby well and thus provide enough pressure to distribute water about the campus.

Before electricity, as is other rural homes in Texas before 1948, household lighting was by coal oil lamps. Only hand manipulated kitchen gadgets were available to cooks. Even when electric power came to the homes, usually it consisted of a drop cord from the ceiling with no wall receptacles to power small appliances ... for several years.

Without central water distribution, each house had to harvest its own. Rain on roofs was collected by gutters and channeled into cisterns, either dug below ground or above-ground water tanks built of wood staves. It was drawn and distributed in the house by buckets. Water storage was limited so water usage was tightly controlled. Bathing was a luxury, not a necessity. If the water tank went dry, arrangements had to be made to haul water from the campus well located northeast of the Academic Building.

Without running water there were no indoor toilets. In rural areas, this meant going to outdoor privys located behind the house. In campus photos, traditional outdoor privies are not to be seen so I assume they were inside the good sized storeroom behind each house. A privy would have a dug pit for disposal of waste. For night calls, and for the use of females of dainty inclinations, a commode jar or pail would be used for the purpose, and a male member of the family would have the duty of emptying the container into the waste pit each morning and evening.

Firewood for heating and cooking would also probably be stored in the storeroom. The large community wood pile in those days was located in an open area between the now Old ag Building (now Glasscock History Building) and the Systems Admin Building. Arrangements would be made to replenish the family supply.

Another use for the storerooms located behind the houses was as a buggy shed. Most families in those days had buggies for transportation, available in various sizes and styles. Automobiles came along on campus as in other communities. The problem encountered with cars was that streets and roads had not progressed to the point of useability in rainy weather. The college seems to have been very proactive n providing sidewalks so street improvements were low on the list of priorities.

I visited with Mrs Sophie (Hutson) Rollins, Class of 1903, in 1975 and asked about social life on campus for teens and families. She reported that it was delightful. She said that someone in the neighborhood would host a party in their home almost every weekend. And that it was a common occurrance that one of the barns would be cleared out for an all school social ... barn dance if you will. The lovely lady lived to almost 100 so apparently life on the A&M College campus was not so harsh that survival was in question.

Even President Ross had to endure muddy streets. The photo below is dated 1893 and illustrates the method of heavy conveyance of the period. Just consider all of the loads of materials hauled from the tracks at West Gate in front of his house in the building of A&M College.

The photo below shows more detail of the "back side" of the faculty houses and a larger array of outbuildings. The photo is undated so I estimate the period as in the 1920 because of the size and quality of the houses.... and the presence of what appears to be electric poles.



Prominent at the rear of the house is what appears to be a small house for servants. I figure this would not be uncommon considering the social structure on campus. Without modern conveniences such as electrical appliances I can see that extra help would be a necessity in a house that large.

Note also, the wooden stave water cistern at the back porch. That is probably not the only cistern for that house, considering the number of persons that could be housed in the structure. (It could accommodate a dozen kids who in those days slept three or four to a bedroom.)

Perhaps some of you marvel at the apparent good insulation in the attic that prevents the snow from melting from heat loss. You are mistaken. The reason the snow has not melted is because the temperature inside the houses are not much different than the outside air temperature. I grew up in a house of that period and heated by a woodstove or kerosene heater. We were comfortably warm within a small radius of the heat source ... and outside that radius, those houses were COLD.

[This message has been edited by fossil_ag (edited 6/16/2008 6:39p).]

Fossil, how about some history on Northgate...not only the business establishments on the northside, but also the housing

97TexAg ... About the best thing I can do for you on photos and history of College Station to get you going is to refer you to The Guide to Historic Brazos County as linked below:

http://www.brazosheritage.org/pdfs/historicbrazosbrochure.pdf

This brochure in PDF format has a couple of sections on College Station (Pages 18-19 and 21-24) with good history and several photos. Since it is in PDF, I am unable to copy and paste photos from there to here.

TAMU Archives has a nice collection of early photos of Bryan but no section devoted to College Station. Out of the 8700+ photos in the Archives that I have access to, less than half dozen give a partial view of North Gate and other areas off campus.

Review the Historical Guide and I will search out the few off campus scenes.

This is the earliest photo I can find in an Archives search of Northgate. The photo is undated but I would guess it was taken in the early 1920s. It appears to me that the North Gate (and possibly Houston Street on campus) was relocated a bit later on to more closely align with College Main street at NG. (Really now, those businesses were no longer there when I was a student.) Edit: Other photos that show that heavy snow are dated around 1927 so that may be a closer guess on the date.)



The photo below is undated but judging by the automobile models on the street I estimate early 1950s. The photo was taken at the intersection with Houston Street and the street going to the left just ahead is College Main. I will let you folks identify the businesses shown. I dealt with each one of them.



I will let you lurkers identify this street and date the photo. I do not know when Holick's building was constructed but I can testify that I bought a pair of pointy toed cowboy boots from him in 1952 and that building looked just as dilapidated then as it does in this photo ... and the day Holick's moved out a couple of years ago.



And last for the evening is a photo of the first business located in what would become about 40 years later, College Station. The building was known as Boyett's Store and it was located at about the location where Campus Theater would later be built, at the intersection of University Drive and Boyett Street. The photo is undated but I estimate the date as the early 1890s.



[This message has been edited by fossil_ag (edited 6/16/2008 11:50p).]

Test:

Given:
1. This is an aerial view of the A&M/College Station vicinity.

2. The date was sometime in the 1931-40 timeframe.(Edit: That timeframe was the Archive's estimate. I question that and suggest the time is more on the order of 1947-50.)

Question: Where are we? What are we seeing?





[This message has been edited by fossil_ag (edited 6/17/2008 9:03a).]

Looks like University Drive, College Ave intersection with married student housing barracks. up to the north is Hensel park and brookside neighborhood.

But, but, but ... how can that be? Your University Drive (Boulevard?) ends at Texas Avenue? And what is that circle thingy?

Edit: Rufus is correct.

[This message has been edited by fossil_ag (edited 6/17/2008 9:53a).]

I know I know Mr. Fossil -- pick me, pick me......


That's a Roundabout or in the Northeast also known as a Rotary. There will be one in the new Bryan Towne Center as well. Not sure everyone will know how to get around one though.

Timeline for development of the "Historic" East Side (East Gate) of the College Station community.

In 1931, A&M College deeded 7.9 acres of land along the east boundary of its campus to TxDOT for right of way for a new State Highway 6.

In 1932, construction began on the Systems Administration Building. The building was designed to face to the east, the first building on campus to ever do so. Work continued to 1934.

]In 1936, State Highway 6 was completed on the east side of A&M College and it connected Bryan with Navasota.

In 1936, A&M College completed work on a street that it would name New Main Drive to connect the new Systems Building to Highway 6. The former Main Drive that connected the Academic Building with Wellborn Road and the railroad tracks was renamed Old Main Drive.

In about 1936, TxDOT extended Highway 60 that ran along the north side of the campus to the newly completed Highway 6. This extension permitted A&M to begin development of the area that would become Married Student Housing area and Hensel Park in later years.

In 1938, the City of College Station was incorporated. By that time, housing development was occurring on the Southside and just beginning on the east side. Some commercial development had occurred at Northgate. A US Post Office was built at Northgate and the new City of College Station established its City Hall in a house at Northgate that is now Cafe Eccel.

In 1946, A&M College acquired more than 60 WWII surplus GI barracks and moved them to campus. About 50 were converted to apartment buildings to house married students, mostly WWII veterans. These barracks were placed north of University Drive connecting to the future Hensel Park. About 10 of the barracks were converted for classroom use and located on Ireland Street and University Drive.

Up until the early 1950s there were no paved streets in College Station except in the vicinity of businesses and churches at Northgate. Up until the early 1950s the only buildings of consequence built in College Station along Highway 6 (Texas Avenue) were the Sands Motel and the Dr. T.O. Walton, Jr. Clinic built at East Gate.

short1 ... And in the field immediately to the northeast of the "roundabout," not long after this photo was taken, was the location of the Circle Drive-in Movie Theater. In later years that corner would house the Skaggs-Albertson Shopping Center and on its west side produce the infamous "mud lot."

As you suggest, the roundabout or rotary was too complicated for the run of the mill Aggie and it was removed in the 1960s or early 70s when Zachry Engineering Center brought new traffic to the area.

Test:

Given: The photo below is an aerial view of the College Station vicinity.

Question: Where are we? What are we seeing? and What is the approximate timeframe of the photo?

To me it looks like Northgate in the upper right hand corner. College Main where Holicks, etc. is. Looks like it was taken in the late forties on a Sunday. But I could be wrong.

Is that the St. Mary's Church at Northgate?

Ah, wait! It's the A&M United Methodist Church!!!

Hmmm. You have identified College Main correctly and Church Street goes between the two larger churches. I am going to go out on a limb here but if I recall correctly from the early 50s, the church with the steeple was the A&M Church of Christ and the Methodist Church was the white building shaped like a cross. If I am not mistaken, in the 70s when the Church of Christ congregation moved out near Consolidate high School they sold their old sanctuary to the Methodists who later sold it to someone else when they built a new church just to the east. I am not betting money on the sequence but there was a bit of church real estate swapping during that period.

St Marys faced on University Drive in earlier times. I rarely venture into that area now days.

Someone help us out!

[This message has been edited by fossil_ag (edited 6/17/2008 12:40p).]

The "T" might be First Baptist Church, College Station, because that was the future site of it. The current building on the site was built by by A&M United Methodist, but the Baptist church building that stood until the early 90's came after the "T" shown in the picture. I wonder if the basement/bomb shelter was kept the same, otherwise the Methodists would have had to do some major demo underground.

The A&M Church of Christ was purchased by FBC-CS and used for various functions, even roller skating, then I assume it was purchased by A&M UMC, and is now a parking lot.

Thanks Scotch ... While you are at it, can you identify the frame house sitting alone west of the churches? Is that house now occupied by Cafe Eccell?

Cafe Eccell has a current address of 101 Church Street. Houses built in earlier times were pier and beam foundations so were no problem to relocate or spin around. If so, that house became the City Hall when the city was incorporated in 1938.

I have no idea about the C.S. City Hall/ Cafe Eccell building. About my only knowledge of the place is from eating there, and with all the porches currently on the building I couldn't begin to pick out an old picture of it.

Thanks Scotch, Angry Beaver and Rufus ... Perhaps someone else will jump in and fill in other details.

This conversation began when 97TexAg asked for info on Northgate businesses and housing a couple of days ago. Businesses are a real problem because they come and go quite often, changing locations and names. Housing was slow to develop in the Northgate area.

Below is an aerial view of College Station dated by the Archives as 1931-1940, but the appearance of the Dulie Bell building at the northwest corner of the campus built in 1942 indicates to me the date is at least 1942.



University Drive, Boyett Street and College Main are easily recognizable. Shadows make identification of buildings on campus very difficult.

Northgate commercial activity was fairly robust but all of the businesses were small mom and pop operations. Houses in the Northgate area at that time were occupied mainly by those moms and pops who operated the businesses. Housing construction north of Northgate did not begin to boom until after WWII/1946. A&M even built a fairly good sized housing of small "ranch style" houses east of Northgate and north of the Circle Drive In. If you were in the area during the times of the Skaggs Shopping Center you will recall the rows of ticky-tacky homes that were common in the post-war times. Those homes were demolished 10-15 years ago.

It may be of interest to know that between about 1913 and the construction of Easterwood Airfield in 1941, that the open area in the vicinity of Boyett Street was the unofficial landing field for early day aviators visiting the campus.

Recall that the Bryan City Limits line is parallel with University Driver and less than 1/4th mile north.

In the last picture posted you can see a new building has replaced the "T" from the first picture of the College Main/Church Ave. area. I have a picture somewhere of the First Baptist building from 1998(already under the ownership of A&M UMC), it must have been demolished and a new building built around 2000?
I'll hunt that pic down and post it if and when I find it.

Back to the "historic district" topic, someone mentioned that real estate agents should know better than to call the Southside area a "district", but two of the homes mentioned are listed as being part of the "College Station Historic Distict" on two different real estate companies web pages.

You are correct Fossil. I started this divergence onto Northgate. Sorry, for the delayed response, I have been at work all day, and chasing kids around the house this evening. Great photos of Northgate. Thanks for the history lesson. I need a little help with the photo of Church and College Main….I assume Church is the street running diagonally across the page (lower left to upper right). What is that major thoroughfare in the upper right hand corner? Am I confused…is that College Main running diagonally across the page (lower left to upper right), with University in the Upper right hand corner?

Question Fossil: If most of the housing development started on the south side, and later the east side, why were most of the Churches in town built in Northgate?

College Main is the street the church faces in the first pic in this discussion, Church was probably not named that as a number of the churches- St. Mary's, A&M UMC and probably the Presbyterian church(site of The Tradition at Northgate) were not there yet.

What would become University Dr. is in the upper right of the picture.

The thoroughfare in the upper right corner is University Drive. The street parallel to that that runs between the white T-shaped church and the one with the steeple is Church Street. The street that runs from upper right to lower left is College Main.

You are only partly correct regarding housing development on the South side. By 1942 the majority of houses on the south side were moved from campus with a lessor number built on site. It was not as densely packed as it is today.

Churchgoers pre-1942 were a mix of students and faculty who lived on campus. Students walked to church and residents of on-campus homes either walked or drove ... at most a distance of a mile. It took a few more years before a combination of factors such as housing development on east side, in-fill development on south side and congestion on campus got church leaders to considering relocating to more central areas for their growing congregations.

The A&M United Methodist Church remained doggedly near its original location and even today its membership includes old time faculty members going back to the 1930s era along with students.

A friend and I used to walk each Sunday from the south side Corps dorms to the A&M Church of Christ and back ... a walk that was not an unusual distance from what we did during weekdays going to and from classes. Remember that 50-60 years ago that there were half as many buildings on campus and one could pick a trail approximating as-the-crow-flies.

Also, if I am not mistaken, up through the 40s and 50s College Station did not have its own water distribution system and had to rely on the Bryan system. This limited availability of municipal water in College Station had a great impact on housing development within the city. Northgate was the closest part of town to Bryan water.

Bear in mind also the population growth of College Station. (Since it was not incorporated until 1938, no population figures are available for the 30s and earlier.)

1940......2,184
1950......7,925
1960.....11,396
1970.....17,676
1980.....37,272


[This message has been edited by fossil_ag (edited 6/17/2008 10:29p).]

Fossil, do you happen to own a small surveying and Civil Engineering firm in town?

No.

The old First Baptist Church building in 1998, at the southeast corner of College Main and Church Ave.

The old A&M Church of Christ building was basically on the northeast corner of the intersection, but was already demolished at the time of this picture, iirc.

fossil,

Fuzzy recollection: I think CS at one time chilled the municipal water supply before putting it in the distribution pipelines. Is this true? And how did they do that & where? When was the practice begun & stopped? Why?

Fossil - Do you still attend the A&M Church of Christ?

AC ... I have no direct knowledge about how CoCS processes its water from their pump farm although I recall from several years ago conversations about the city having to "chill" its water before putting it into the distribution system. As I recall, when water is first pumped from the aquifer it uses at their wells near Lake Bryan, that the temperature of the water is well over 100 degrees. As a result cooling towers were built into the system to reduce the temperature before placing it into distribution lines. IIRC, the cooling towers are located at the wells/pumps farm. Your best source of information on that would probably be a poster known as waterworks who frequents this forum.

chrisfield .... When I returned to the CS area in the mid-1970s I did not resume my membership in the A&M C of C. I did, however, mail to the pastor in 2005 a church bulletin published in 1955 as a token of their history. (I am a packrat of that sort of thing.)