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CHAPTER 1
BUILDING FOR GENERATIONS
Houston represents many things to many people. This is where we live and work, where we are educated and entertained, where culture and community pride are stimulated and where we learn some lessons in living together with others.
Houston is a growth community. It has seen industries emerge and mature. It boasts generations of healthy families. It encompasses lifestyles, cultures and opportunity that no other world-class city can match.
Yet, when you look at Houston, it is a collection of neighborhoods, business districts and quality lifestyles. Houston embodies many growing communities, the confluence being an international hub for this nation. Creative partnerships account for Houston's documented growth.
As the city lives the 21st Century, we celebrate the historical, utilize state-of-the art technology and reflect changing social needs will always be at the forefront of the future. With a sense of pride, reflection and optimism for the future, Houston's business is dedicated to identifying, meeting and serving every need of our community.
Houston is a collection of neighborhoods, cultures and families. Communities which grow and prosper will analyze and serve the needs of present generations. While honoring the heritage, we carefully plan for the future. Whether in the global sense or on the blocks on which we live, layers of generations comprise our essence.
Every community is a collection of lifestyles, inspired through the structures in which they take place are centers of synergy.
Houston leaders are contributing to the quality of life and encompass the needs and activities of Houstonians.
Growing and Collaborating
The spirit of the early pioneers took shape in structures and lifestyles attributed to business. Stephen Fuller Austin was the first land developer to bring settlers to Texas. The initial group was 300 families.
Austin had complete civil and military authority over his colonists until 1828, subject to rather nominal supervision by the officials at San Antonio. He allowed them to elect militia officers and local officials, corresponding to justices of the peace in the United States. To assure the uniformity of court procedure, he drew up forms and a simple civil and criminal code. As lieutenant colonel of militia, he planned and sometimes led campaigns against Indians. To meet current costs, Austin's only resource was to assess fees against the colonists.
Austin wrote shortly before his death that his wealth was prospective, consisting of the uncertain value of land acquired as compensation for his services as impresario. Besides bringing the colonists to Texas, Austin strove to produce and maintain conditions conducive to their prosperous development.
Aware of the importance of external trade, Austin consistently urged the establishment of ports and the temporary legalization of coasting trade in foreign ships. He believed that coastal trade would establish ties of mutual interest between the colonists and Mexico and enable Mexico to balance imports from England by exporting Texas cotton. Congress legalized the port of Galveston after a survey of the pass by Austin in 1825. As a result, external trade was confined to the United States.
Austin began the Anglo-American colonization of Texas under conditions more difficult in some respects than those that confronted founders of the English colonies on the Atlantic coast. He saw the wilderness transformed into a relatively advanced and populous state, and fundamentally it was his unremitting labor, perseverance, and foresight. His aim was to promote and safeguard the welfare of Texas.
John R. Harris was a New York native who platted the town of Harrisburg, a maritime trading post, in 1824. He built a home and store and in 1829 began assembling a steam sawmill in partnership with others. He died of yellow fever, while in New Orleans on business, leaving his brothers to resolve the inheritance of the town. Houston absorbed Harrisburg in 1926,
Brothers Augustus Allen and John Kirby Allen came to the area in 1836, having entered Texas four years earlier. They were transplanted New Yorkers, with a surveyor named Gail Borden. In 1836, the Allen brothers tried to purchase the town but found that the price was too high. They found a suitable plot of land further up the coastal prairie at the intersection of White Oak Bayou and Buffalo Bayou. The city was founded and named after Texas hero Sam Houston. The city was incorporated in 1839.
By the time of the Civil War, the population was 6,000. By 1900, the population was 44,000. In 1940, Houston ranked as the nation's 27th largest city. By the late 1980's, it had become the fourth largest city.
Prior to 1900, Houston's development centered around cotton, railroads and timber. With cotton reigning as king, textile mills all over the world received and processed the commodity. Middlemen such as William Marsh Rice shipped the "white gold" to northeastern and British textile mills. Rice University, founded in 1912, was named for him.
By 1900, Galveston and Waco were the two largest cities in Texas because they were the dominant cotton producing centers. In 1900, a hurricane wiped out Galveston, killing 6,000 people. Houston's port, though 50 miles inland, picked up the shipping business. The cotton, timber and cattle shipping town evolved into a major port. The conversion of the marshy Buffalo Bayou into the Houston Ship Channel precipitated rapid industrial growth.
Paul Bremond was the primary lumber figure. He dreamed of linking Houston to the Piney Woods with a timber-hauling railroad. The line that he built was by 1890 part of a network that made transportation by the bayou important. Thus, the motto "Houston, Where 17 Railroads Meet the Sea." The early red brick Cotton Exchange building still stands at the corner of Travis at Franklin.
Houston's building activity was brisk and reflected the spirit of early settlers, pioneers, business leaders and community participants. The early leaders of Houston set high standards of behavior that have been followed enthusiastically others over the years.
The earliest bankers included Thomas Bagby, T.W. House and Benjamin Shepherd, all names reflected on streets today.
The city was organized in response to specific needs. Its history is one of addressing and meeting other emerging needs and innovation. In 1900, a hurricane wiped out Galveston, killing 6,000 people. This removed Galveston as a rival to Houston. It spurred the construction of the Port of Houston, which opened in 1914.
Meanwhile, oil was discovered at the Spindletop field, near Beaumont, in 1901. More oil was discovered at Humble in 1904. With Houston becoming a boom town, abundant growth occurred. The limitless economic opportunity fueled the city as an energy provider to the nation. With the outbreak of war in 1917, the heightened need for fuel assured Houston's prosperity and continued expansion. By 1920, the population was 138,000, and Houston was known as "the Magnolia City."
The new Houston became home to industrial and commercial enterprises. Howard Hughes Sr. founded Hughes Tool Company. The Anderson Clayton Company, one of the nation's largest cotton firms, opened headquarters in "the Bayou City." Energy corporations formed in Houston, including Texaco in 1908, Gulf in 1916, Humble in 1917 and Sinclair in 1918.
New sources of wealth created elite business leaders, including lumberman and builder Jesse Jones, Humble co-founder Ross Sterling, lumberman and oilman John Henry Kirby and Texaco founder J.S. Cullinan.
Everywhere that you look in Houston, you see the fingerprints of business. This includes downtown, the Medical Center, the universities and colleges, the Galleria, NASA, Greenway Plaza, entertainment and sports facilities, airports, churches, and schools. As business and industry were challenged to perform at their highest standards, the entire community has benefited exponentially. In the minds of innovators and those who have followed, we care, we achieve, and we look for ways to get better at what we do.
As a result, Houston has experienced several eras of planned, sustained growth. We're more than a boom or a trend. When reading this history of Houston, you will find the legacy of business on almost every page. Orderly growth has been achieved by mastering technology, business standards and adapting to changing community dynamics. Entrepreneurs have embraced innovation, creativity, safety and commitment to quality.
The best indicator of progress made is to periodically reexamine our best work, celebrate the teamwork involved and then re-apply the winning ingredients toward the next phase of growth. Because our community has mastered the fine art of collaboration, we have many great successes to recognize and admire. Houston Legends are symbolic of the mission and actual practices of community leaders, bringing the best minds and resources into successful business partnerships.
Every facet of business plays a part in facilitating orderly community growth. As our communities prosper, so do our member firms. Collectively, we make artistic, technical, procedural and economic differences in the greater Houston area.
As our city progresses through the 21st Century, we celebrate the historical, utilize state-of-the-art technology and continually seek to improve the quality of life. Strategies which address and reflect changing social needs will always be at the forefront of the future.
Time Capsule
The year was 1923. Houston was nearing its century mark as a growth-oriented city, well into its fifth generation of residents.
Milk and ice were still being delivered to homes in wagons. Regular gasoline was pumped into model-T Fords at four cents per gallon. Windup Victrolas played jazz music for the Roaring 20's. It was an era of homemade bread, band concerts in outdoor gazebos and ice cream socials. Houston had two high schools and not yet enough traffic to warrant highways.
In 1923, the population of Houston was about 70,000. Calvin Coolidge was President, and Oscar Holcombe was Mayor. Downtown was primarily dominated by homes. There were some magnificent commercial structures, including the new Rice Hotel. Trolley cars took citizens out to the far edges of town, the recently annexed Heights and the brand new Medical Center, built on the site of a lumber mill across the country road from Rice University.
In 1923, tracts of land in the new River Oaks subdivision were selling for less than $2,000. A major building under construction was the Museum of Fine Arts ... a renovation to that same museum is one of tonight's Apex Award winners.
Around town, you still saw horse-drawn carriages and other vestiges of Houston's bygone days. Citizens were learning more about each other — through newspapers. Telephones hung on the wall and had to be cranked. Houston still had not yet had its first radio station sign onto the airwaves.
The industrial age was just beginning to spawn economic growth opportunities. Houston was ahead of the curve, usually has been and still is.
CHAPTER 2
REAL ESTATE, CONSTRUCTION AND BUILDING
Professional builders and contractors, rather than the owners themselves, constructed Houston's first houses. These houses, with glass window panes, wooden floors and brick chimneys were more tightly sealed and better insulated than the earlier cabins.
Housing types and size varied within the city, in contrast to the early settlers' basic requirements. Many years ago, it was common to have multiple generations in family dwellings. Some early residents augmented their incomes by taking in boarders. Many of the new immigrants and workers lived in the hotels.
The first capitol building for the Republic of Texas was built in 1837 on what later became the 900 block of Texas Avenue. After serving as the state capitol for two years, the building became a series of hotels until it was demolished in 1881. It was replaced by the Capitol Hotel, which was razed to make room for the Rice Hotel. The Rice opened in 1913 and closed in the 1970's. In 1998, the building was renovated into luxury lofts.
The city was divided into wards, geographic boundaries that were common in the early 19th Century. Houston had six wards, each electing two aldermen to the Houston City Council. The election of the Mayor of Houston was citywide. The wards came together at the intersection of Congress and Main streets.
The first ward housed the city's market house and produce industry facilities. The second ward included the courthouse and warehouses, where lawyers and merchants resided. The third was southeast, where businesspeople, craftsmen and professionals resided. The fourth ward was the central portion of the city. Freed slaves developed Freedmen's Town in the fourth ward. The fifth ward was added in the 1860's and the sixth ward in the 1870's to accommodate the city's growth.
The ward system was abolished in the early 1904. The city changed to a commission form of government. Residents still identify certain communities, especially those part of the city since incorporation, as being "wards" of the city.
The Houston Club, established in 1894, was the oldest social club in Houston, with a 118-year history. In 1954, the Houston Club moved to the 811 Rusk building in Downtown Houston. Members included business leaders, cultural leaders, consuls general, doctors, entrepreneurs, governors, mayors and presidents.
The original Binz Building was Houston's first skyscraper in 1898. It had six stories. For citizens, riding up and down its elevator was a fun pastime. The building was named for Jacob S. Binz, one of many industrious German immigrants in the business scene. A new Binz Building was constructed in 1951, followed by the current structure in 1982. In the 19th Century, homes in Houston were centered in and near the downtown era. After 1900, two fine home areas emerged: Westmoreland Place and Courtlandt Place. The forerunners of River Oaks, they housed the rich and powerful.
Westmoreland Place was built in Victorian times, created in 1902. According to the National Register nomination, the Westmoreland Historic District encompasses Houston's first planned, elite residential neighborhood. Westmoreland Place was developed by the South End Land Company as a "private place" neighborhood. It contained an eclectic mixture of Late Victorian and early 20th Century house types of both large and moderate size.
A major characteristic of Westmoreland houses is glass front doors with transom and sidelights. Many houses had large entrance halls, frequently off center, containing a staircase with Colonial or Craftsman motif balustrades. Many early Westmoreland house had stables or garages with staff quarters above on the rear property line. These sometimes emulated the architecture, materials and detailing of the main house.
Courtlandt Place was one of Houston's earliest elite residential subdivisions. The residential enclave began in 1906, when the Courtlandt Improvement Company purchased the land and laid out the subdivision on the southern edge of the city. The first houses were built in 1909. Gateways at the end of the central boulevard limited access to residents only, while deed restrictions stipulated land use, minimum cost and house size. Courtlandt Place served as a model for Montrose in 1910. Early residents were the old elite of Houston. The district was admitted to the National Register of Historic Places in 1979 and received a Texas historical marker in 1989.
The Warwick Hotel was opened in 1926 as an upscale apartment building. In the 1960's it was purchased by oilman John Mecom. It was upgraded by furnishings, including wall panels owned by Napoleon's sister. When it was re-launched as a hotel, guests reveled to the gold-plated Rolls Royce on the ballroom dance floor, filled with presents for the guests. The Mecom fountain, facing the Warwick, is an icon along Main Street.
Legends Who Built the City
AmREIT Inc. headquartered in Houston, Texas is a full service, vertically integrated and self-administered real estate investment trust, founded in 1993 by H. Kerr Taylor. It owns, operates, acquires and selectively develops and redevelops neighborhood and community shopping centers located in high-traffic, densely populated, affluent areas with significant barriers to entry. AmREIT's portfolio consists of 29 retail properties in Houston, Dallas, San Antonio, Austin and Atlanta. In addition, AmREIT manages and has varying minority ownership interests in eight advised funds, which operate 18 properties.
George Rufus Brown, businessman, civil engineer and philanthropist, was born in Belton, Texas, on May 12, 1898. He joined the U.S. Marines in the final months of World War I and later worked briefly as a mining engineer in Butte, Montana. After being injured in a mining accident, he returned to Texas to join a small construction firm founded by his brother, Herman Brown. The firm later became Brown and Root, Incorporated, after Herman's brother-in-law, Dan Root, a prosperous cotton farmer, made an investment in the firm.
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Excerpted from "Houston Legends"
by .
Copyright © 2015 Hank Moore.
Excerpted by permission of Morgan James Publishing.
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