Bright and Early

I never knew there was a Bright and Early Coffee and Tea sign at the Bugscuffle crossroads in Rusk County, Texas, until recently when I drove past and could actually see it because the leaves had fallen from the trees in front of this old country store.  Bright and Early advertisements were once prevalent on the sides of barns and old stores throughout Texas and other areas of the South but today they're a rarity.  In fact, after doing a little research, it is believed that this particular ghost sign is the last remaining one in East Texas.  If you use your imagination you can see parts of the words "Coffee and Tea" underneath the yellow painted portion of the sign.  By the way, there are several communities in Texas called Bugscuffle.  This one is near the somewhat larger community of Reklaw (Walker spelled backwards).  I've photographed one other Bright and Earl sign in my travels around Texas.  That one was in Hico, Texas, a small Central Texas town, and it was posted on this blog this past summer.  If you're interested in comparing the two, you can see the previous one HERE.

The Famous Ben Wheeler Sign

Some of you who are everyday visitors to this blog may remember back in August I featured a portion of ghost sign which can be found in the tiny hamlet of Ben Wheeler, Texas.  I had made a special trip off the beaten path to see and photograph this sign for myself, only to find a large portion of the sign blocked by a local tinkering with his car.  On a recent trip back to that area with some friends, I cajoled them into detouring our planned route since we were in the vicinity of Ben Wheeler (unlike me, most people would rather travel interstate highways rather than the back roads) so I could have another chance.  This day I was luckier - only a rather inobtrustive motorcycle stood in the way of the complete sign.

Link to the original post

Hayden Flour Mill Part 2

Constructed in 1918, the current Hayden Flour Mill building 

is the oldest cast-in-place concrete building in Tempe, AZ.  

The original mill was constructed in 1874 on the banks of the Salt River 

but it was destroyed by fire and replaced in 1895.  

That building was also lost to fire and the current structure was designed to be fire-proof.  

Techniques developed after the great San Francisco earthquake and fire of 1906 

were incorporated into the design.  

(The silos were not constructed until the 1950s.)

The mill processed and marketed grain, cotton, fruit, vegetables, and dairy products.  

It purchased most of the grains grown in Central Arizona and milled many of Arizona's best known flours:  Sifted Snow, Arizona Rose, and Family Kitchen.

Milling operations were stopped in 1998.  

The vacant and decaying building was eventually purchased by the City of Tempe.  

It sits a mere two blocks north of the giant ASU campus.

A public event space has been created on the grounds of the mill 

and a grand opening was held in early October.  

A stage and concert lawn accommodating up to 250 people have been constructed 

and there is a small grove of trees providing a shady place for picnics

in a park-like atmosphere near the building.  

The City continues searching for a development partner to preserve the historic structure.  

A decision was made not to repaint the silos and the building 

because the iconic Family Kitchen sign would have been destroyed.

Tempe's most famous ghost sign.

Visitors are permitted to look through ground floor windows 

to see some of the mill's historic equipment and other artifacts.  

This old safe, probably used to stash the payroll, is easily visible from one of the open windows.

In this photograph you can see an old bulletin board, the slots for time cards, 

and perhaps what is a suggestion box.

Maybe this was the employee lounge.

Galveston Ghost Sign

I found this wonderful multitasking ghost sign on my trip to Galveston this past summer.  It has at least three advertisements painted on it, Coca-Cola (which appears to have been refreshed lately) the E. Dulitz Furniture Store, Spearmint Gum and perhaps even more.  This building predates the 1900 Galveston Hurricane which stands today as our nation's most deadly disaster with between six and twelve thousand lives lost.  Galveston has withstood several other major hurricanes in the intervening years, but this 129-year-old structure has served generations of Galvestonians as a downtown business establishment.  For over 100 years the building was an active furniture store.  It was heavily damaged in the 1900 storm but Mr. Dulitz was able to make repairs and moved his furniture business into the location in November of 1901, just 13 months after the hurricane.  I took this photograph in July and read the book entitled Isaac's Storm by Erik Larson just last week, gaining a new insight to the many historical structures which have withstood the test of tropical hurricanes along the Texas Gulf of Mexico coast.

Joining others who love fascinating signs at Signs, Signs

Ben Wheeler's Famous Sign

Ben Wheeler is a tiny unincorporated community in VanZandt County near Canton in East Texas.  This iconic sign has been published in many Texas magazines and is one of the more well-known ghost signs in the state.  The portion of the sign which is not visible advertises Moon Pies.  The day I went through Ben Wheeler, for the express purpose of finding this sign, some yo-yo had his car pulled up in front of the sign and was working on the car, hood up, radio blasting, the works, so I was unable to get a picture of the entire sign.  Maybe next time.

I Missed the Peach Festival!

Darn it, I'll bet the Peach Festival is a whooping good time, but I was a month too late!  I think it's wonderful that some talented artist was commissioned to paint a tribute to the Peach Festival on the outside wall of a Weatherford, Texas, restaurant.  It shows a lot of civic pride in the town's activities.  I also like how the banner encircles a picture of the Parker County Courthouse, which was just across the street from this sign.

The Ghost Signs of Hico

This sign featuring a monkey hanging from a bar advertises Hooper's Tetteremedy, an anti-itch powder.

This building's north wall is long enough for two ghost signs.

Coca-Cola must hold the record for early-day ghost signs.

But Dr. Pepper is also VERY BIG in Texas.

Hico (pronounced HIGH-koe), Texas, boasts several great ghost signs which are kept in tip-top shape by the town of 1,400 residents 100 miles southwest of Dallas.  It also claims to be the "retirement home" of Billy the Kid, who local folklore claims survived the gunfight with Pat Garrett in New Mexico and isn't really buried there.  In these parts people believe that the Kid escaped to Hico and lived here in the early 1900s under the name of  Brushy Bill Roberts.  But more about Billy the Kid, aka Brushy Bill, on another day.  The town has a chocolate store, a cafe which is well-known for chicken fried steak and coconut cream pie (I was through Hico about 8 a.m. so I didn't have the opportunity to indulge) and is a favorite riding destination for motorcycle enthusiasts.  In fact, before arriving in Hico, I had stopped in another little town called Meridian to get gas and ice, and four motorcyclists had stopped at the same station/convenience store.  One of them yelled a "Good Morning" to me and I returned the greeting and asked where their ride was taking them this fine morning.  A resounding "Hico!"  I chimed, "Me too!  See ya there!"

More Coca-Cola Brickart

What I call brickart is more correctly termed ghost signs, advertising which is painted on walls.  An art form starting in the 1890s, these signs are found throughout the world with the United States, Canada, the UK and France having the greatest number of survivors.  This one I photographed in the small town of Center, Texas, about 15 miles from where I currently live and where I was born back in the dark ages (when they were still painting these signs on walls, as a matter of fact!).  It is truly a ghost, being very faded and portions of it hard to read.  Only by increasing the saturation are you able to see it as well as it shows up in this photograph.  I am constantly on the lookout for these gems.

I had mentioned in my last post that I was planning to attend a Renaissance Festival over the weekend.  Two friends and I left before 7 a.m. Saturday morning and headed into a rainstorm.  We drove almost 150 miles south where the weather was supposed to clear up.  We stopped in a suburb of Houston and put in a couple hours of shopping and finally a little after noon, when it was still pouring rain, we decided to head back home.  We drove 300 miles to have lunch and go to Pier 1!  Maybe next year.  This was the last weekend for the festival.

Babbitt's ~ Flagstaff, AZ

I ran across a couple of these ghost signs, or brickart, while on my recent trip to Arizona where I visited  Flagstaff, my old hometown.  This one seemed to be advertising both Babbitt's Department Store and Babbitt's Drug Store.  The Babbitt brothers were prominent in business in Northern Arizona in the 1800s, involved in trading posts on the reservations, ranching, and the mercantile business.   They were one of the pioneer families in this area and Bruce Babbitt, a native of Flagstaff, served a Secretary of the Interior in the Clinton administration.  Babbitts have been known for their public service through several generations, most recently including Bruce Babbitt, Secretary of the Interior in the Clinton administration. 

Texas State Railroad

The Texas State Railroad is depicted by a painting on the side of a building in Rusk, Texas.  Established in 1881, it is now part of the American Heritage Railways and offers pleasure trips through the Piney Woods of East Texas.  One of the trips even features a visit by the Lone Ranger who protects passengers from a gang of robbers. 

Road Trip Finale (Red River and Cass County Courthouses - Nos. 14 and 15)

In Clarksville I found the Red River County Courthouse, which recently underwent a renovation which included the rebuilding of the courthouse clock, nicknamed Old Red.

Built in 1885, the courthouse boasts turrets and buttresses of  yellow stone cut from a nearby quarry.  Because its architecture is part Victorian, part Gothic, and part Italian Renaissance, someone once described it as Late 19th Century Debatable. The courthouse clock ticked from 2:30 p.m. on May 27, 1885, until it developed troubles and was electrified in 1961. This saved the janitor 30 minutes of hard winding once a week, but four months later, at 4:35 a.m. on a June morning, Old Red started striking and struck her bells 120 times before someone pulled the plug.  Someone described it as “the night that got later than it ever has been."

The Cass County Courthouse in Linden is the oldest continually operating courthouse in Texas.  Construction began in 1859 and it opened in 1861, but it wasn’t actually completed until 1865 because of the disruption of the Civil War. It was a two-story, Italianate style building made of locally fired brick with a hipped roof and a central, square drum with a small cupola on top. It retained this appearance until 1900 when an addition was built onto the building’s east side. The front and rear entrances received two-story, pedimented porticoes with gabled roofs and two pairs of Doric columns sometime afterwards. In 1908, a tornado  destroyed the building’s cupola. The courthouse was repaired and the cupola restored the following year and other repairs were eventually completed by 1918.

In 1933, a fire damaged the upper floors and the courtroom in the center of the building. Repairs were completed the next year, but the cupola was not restored and a third story was added. The building’s brick was later covered with stucco and painted white with tan trim.

In January of 2008, Cass County was awarded a grant from the Texas Historical Commission for $4.4 million towards the restoration of the historic courthouse. Along with the addition of updated electrical and plumbing systems, the interior and exterior will be returned to their 1934 appearance, restoring the original colors, ceiling molding, cornices and other architectural details and removing the dropped ceilings. Structural changes to the building since its construction make it impossible to return the building to its 1860s appearance.

Linden is not too far from where I live so maybe in a few months I'll return for a picture of the new and improved Cass County Courthouse.

The last stop on my return home was in the historic town of Jefferson.  Even though under 3,000 population it is a tourist mecca, filled with historic homes turned into bread and breakfast establishments, antique shops, artsy boutiques, and plenty of things to see, including its fair share of biker visitors.

 

Brickart in Jefferson

Thanks for coming along with me on my road trip to Arizona and back.  It was a great one and I hope you've enjoyed the pictures I've shared.  I went through such famous places that you've all heard of (but maybe never realized they were in Texas) such as Concord, Palestine, Beverly Hills, Memphis, Chillicothe, Paris, Reno, Detroit, Clarksville, Malta, New Boston, Boston, Old Boston, and Carthage.  And then there were those memorable place names of Reklaw (Walker spelled backwards), Early, Bangs, Goodnight, Oklaunion, Magnolia, Electra, Belcherville, Blossom, and Maud.  I photographed ten courthouses and ooh'd and aah'd over each of them, drove 3,131 miles and savored every single one of them.  I hope to do it again, maybe to some other state next time, or maybe just back to Arizona.  Texas is a big enough state that I could go a different route several times.  In the meantime, I'll share with you my day trips as they come up  because there's lots of Texas to cover.  So wishing you good travels in all your days to come.

Nacogdoches Brickart

This insurance company advertisement is found on the alley side of a brick building in Nacogdoches.  It seems to be a more modern art form than some of the other paintings on brick I have found in this area.  I have absolutely nothing to base my estimate on that it was painted in the 1950s.  The architecture of the buildings just seems to be a bit more modern than the typical 1930s/1940s brickart that I've seen.  I oversaturated the photograph in order to be able to see the details.  In its natural state, the sign is quite faded.

Coca-Cola Brickart

This Coca-Cola ad on a brick wall was recently rediscovered a few months ago as construction crews tore down a wall while remodeling an old building in Lufkin, Texas.  I haven't as yet had an opportunity to return to find out what is being done to keep the artwork, although it is my understanding that citizens have expressed wishes that it be preserved.  Notice also the intricate (probably tin ceiling) that was also exposed.  Click on the picture for an enlarged view.

Ghost Sign ~ Timpson, Texas

In my travels through the old towns of East Texas I often encounter brick art but more often I just see signs.  Most of them have either faded or someone has attempted to remove the lettering for a "paint-over."  Sometimes by oversaturing the exposure of the photograph the lettering becomes more apparent, but nothing I do makes the first line of this sign legible.  As you can see, there are several other "ghosts" on the back side of this brick building.

Continuing on the Journey ~ Mansfield, Louisiana

Continuing on from Logansport, I headed 20 miles northeast to Mansfield, the parish seat of DeSoto Parish.  Mansfield is best known as the site of the Battle of Mansfield, a heated Civil War encounter on April 8, 1864.  I'm not big into battle reenactments, but I came to learn that just the day previous to my visit was the annual reenactment of this famous battle just on the outskirts of town.  That's me, a day late and a dollar short!  The battle was a decisive Confederate victory even though the 7,000 Confederate troops were outnumbered nearly two to one by Union forces.

Even though it was the largest city I visited in Louisiana (5,500) this day, I took the fewest pictures in this little town.  I had a map locating some historic properties but for some reason I found myself having a hard time negotiating and making the map match with what I was seeing in reality.  While I was in the downtown area I stopped to take a photo of an old building and happened to notice this Coca-Cola brickart through a wrought iron gate next to the building.  I couldn't get over there fast enough, but, alas, the gate was locked.  It appears that a restaurant courtyard faces this fabulous piece of nostalgia and, darn it, it was closed for the day.  So the angle of my picture is not good but I think you can tell that this is an outstanding piece of artwork that was probably done sometime in the 1930s or 1940s.  It has obviously been refurbished because the color was the best I've seen.  Since it's less than 50 miles from my home to Mansfield, I'm hoping I'll be able to make a trip back someday soon during the week to get a better look at this beauty!  Everything else I saw in Mansfield paled to this treasure, so I soon was headed north in search of Grand Cane.

Brickart in Tenaha, Texas

Since posting my first "Ads on Brick" photo back on February 18 I have learned that this art form is more correctly called brickart.  The artists were known as walldogs (I love that word!).  This piece of brickart looks like a Chamber of Commerce ad for Tenaha (pronounced Tennie-HAW by locals), Texas.  I've never known of anyone who referred to Tenaha as "The Garden Spot of East Texas" but hometown pride still runs rampart in small town America.  Tenaha is near the boyhood home of country music and cowboy movie star Tex Ritter.  Ritter had a popular song during his career called "Tenaha, Timpson, Bobo and Blair."  And what does that mean, you ask?

Tenaha, Timpson, Bobo, and Blair are communities in Shelby County whose names were appropriated for a plea by crapshooters for good luck when seeking to roll double fives. But how did these communities become involved with dice and popular music?  Some believe that stringing the town names together began during World War I when soldiers in a National Guard unit composed of men from Shelby County discarded the familiar cadence of "hup, two, three, four" for "Tenaha, Timpson, Bobo, and Blair," their home towns. Dice players took up the chant, according to advocates of this explanation.

Others argue that the popularity of the saying began from a porter in Houston announcing the departure of a train on the Houston East and West Texas line. The porter called out the various destinations along the way to Shreveport, and the alliteration of "Tenaha, Timpson, Bobo, and Blair" made it a favorite of passengers.

Here are some of the lyrics to Ritter's popular song:

On the HE&WT line,
Old East Texas sure looks fine
Drop me off just anywhere (near)
Tenaha, Timpson, Bobo, and Blair

Here those drivers pound the rails,
Takin' me back to Texas trails,
Bought my ticket, paid my fair,
Tenaha, Timpson, Bobo, and Blair

Whooooo, waiting for the whistle,
Whooooo, when you hear the whistle,
It means that the station's not so far,
From where we are,

Let'er highball, engineer,
Pull that throttle, track is clear,
There's a gal just waitin' there,
Tenaha, Timpson, Bobo, and Blair.

Ads on Brick ~ Coca-Cola

Nacogdoches, Texas

I have discovered that I am fascinated by ads painted on brick walls in the little towns of East Texas, although this art form is certainly not limited to this region.  I haven't done any research on why or when this practice started, but now I'm on a quest to find MORE.  I've photographed a few already and I'll post them in due course, but now I'm anxious to go back to those little towns and look down all the side streets I may have missed the first time through.  Actually this building just happens to appear in the current issue of Texas Highways, and I have to say that photographer's picture is maybe a little better than mine.  I believe they probably had a wide-angle lens and set up the scene by placing the camera on a tripod and using a longer exposure because there is a somewhat fuzzy pedestrian walking by.  This particular piece of art is in better shape than most of the ones I've seen thus far (with the exception of another one I took in Rusk, Texas, on my road trip a couple of weeks ago, and I promise to post that one in a few days).  Also I had  been wanting to get a picture of the red brick streets in Naconowhere (as I fondly like to call it) and I think this picture is a good representation.