Footloose in Houston in the early-1980s (TX 01)

Blog note

Dear Readers, this will be the start of a series on Houston and south Texas. I have hundreds of negatives from my previous life when I lived in Houston but will never have time to scan them all. Two months in Houston in late 2022 gave me a chance to explore the city again. There is so much to see!

I photographed in the Texas Panhandle in the past as part of my Route 66 project, at the Rio Grande border and Big Bend, and in Galveston. If interested, please type "Texas" in the search box. I will start numbering this new series to keep track of these SE Texas posts. Texas is endlessly fascinating. Enjoy the ride! 

Introduction

In the early-1980s, I worked in the oil industry and lived in West University Place, a quiet enclave within Houston, Texas. Having moved from the suburbs of Boston, Massachusetts, Houston was a culture shock for us (more so than Athens, Seattle, Providence, and other cities where we had lived). Houston was a new, noisy, vibrant, flashy, and disorganized city, so different from staid and traditional 350-year-old Boston or 3000-year-old Athens. West University Place was perfect, an established neighborhood with mature trees and handsome mid-century cottages within walking distance to restaurants, stores, and Rice University.

Our comfortable little home in West University Place, still extant but different paint. It had genuine wood floors and plaster walls. (Kodachrome 25 slide)

Downtown Houston

When I was in town (meaning not offshore), I explored and took pictures. Having a "real" job, I bought a Rolleiflex 3.5E camera at Southside Camera Center (long gone) and updated my 35mm equipment. I also took two full-semester photography classes at University of Houston from Dr. Suzanne Bloom. Here are a few examples from my early explorations.

The Houston skyline in 1980 from Glenwood Cemetery (Nikon 105mm ƒ/2.5 lens, Panatomic-X film)

Glenwood Cemetery is still a peaceful green relief from the highways and noise of the city. Today, many more skyscrapers fill the sky. I will show a recent picture from the same location later. 

In 1982, downtown Houston still had the look of "old American city," with grungy discount shops, loan stores, old-line clothing shops, and mature companies dating back before WWII.

Main Street view north (Panatomic-X film, Rollei 35S with ƒ/2.8 Sonnar lens)

Waiting for the bus? Or just hangin' around?

Elegant professional ladies with Samsonite briefcases. Wearing stockings? 

Cheerful gents

Main Street was boisterous and busy during the day. But after about 6 pm, Houston rolled down the shutters and the inner city became quiet. Few people lived downtown then, and office workers drove off to the suburbs. Today (2022), the downtown has apartments and restaurants, and the warehouse district just east of downtown is being redeveloped with very nice townhouses.

Abruptly, in typical Houston style, a furious rain storm engulfed us. What fun.

I took these 1982 photographs on Kodak Panatomic-X film with my Rollei 35S compact camera. I bought it in September of 1981 for $141 at Southwestern Camera, 1416 Main Street (now a parking lot). Rollei had just gone through bankruptcy and reorganization, and Southwestern was selling off their stock of Rollei products. This little camera, with its excellent 40mm ƒ/2.8 Sonnar lens, served me well for many years, especially when I was traveling. I convinced two coworkers to also buy Rolleis. 

In 1982, you could still buy a brand new twin-lens reflex Rolleiflex 2.8F or 3.5F from the New York vendors. Why didn't I jump on the opportunity?

You will see more Houston photographs in the future. 

Rollei 35S with 40mm ƒ/2.8 Sonnar lens, body made in Singapore (from Wikipedia). It used 30.5mm filters, which were hard to find.

Vicksburg with a Hasselblad 100mm ƒ/3.5 CSi Lens and Fuji Pro 160 NS Film (Abandoned Films 10)

After successfully completing some medical treatments, I was overcome with a serious bout of GAS. That is Gear Acquisition Syndrome, although the other gas was also present. 

Hasselblad 501CM with 100mm ƒ/3.5 Planar CSi lens and correct hood

For over five years, I used an 80mm Planar lens on my Hasselblad. But sometimes, I wanted just a bit more reach. With 35mm cameras, I liked the 55mm ƒ/1.8 Super-Takumar lens on the Pentax Spotmatic. This was just marginally longer than the more common 50mm. Hasselblad's 100mm Planar lens would provide a diagonal coverage on 6×6 approximately equal to 55mm on 35mm, so I started looking at online vendors in USA. Soon, this gorgeous 100mm ƒ/3.5 Planar CSi lens came in a big padded box from Camera West. This is a 6-element Planar design and is reputed to be the highest resolution Hasselblad lens for distant subjects.

On a foggy and drizzly January day (my favorite light), I loaded a roll of Fuji Pro 160 NS film in the holder and headed out. This is a neutral color balanced film designed for wedding, fashion, and commercial product photography. Fuji did not distribute 160NS in the USA and discontinued it in the Japan market in October 2021.  

I posted these frames at 2400 pixels wide, so click any picture to see the details. Most were tripod-mounted.

Polk Street view east, January 7, 2023, 1/15 ƒ/11

Monroe Street looking south from China Street. The former Junius Ward YMCA is to the right.

Pearl Street near Fairground Street, 1/15 ƒ/16

2521 Pearl Street, still occupied (taken from railroad tracks)

501-509 Fairground Street (taken from railroad bridge), 1/15 ƒ/16

Floodwall and Bunge Corporation, Levee Street, view south (hand-held)

1109 Mulberry Street, view east, 1/30 ƒ/11

LD's Restaurant is in a building that formerly housed a club/bar (closed several times because of shootings) and a liquor store.

Railroad yard from Levee Street - 250mm ƒ/5.6 Sonnar lens, 1/4 ƒ/22

2427 Washington Street - 80mm ƒ/2.8 Planar-CB lens

I added two frames that I took with my 80mm and 250mm lenses. Hasselblad's 100mm lens is considered to be their "sharpest" (whatever that means in internet fantasy-land), but all the Zeiss lenses are superb performers. My Planar-CB is a 6-element design, in contrast to the more common 7-element models. My 250mm Sonnar is a 1960s silver barrel model with single coating, but it is just fine.

I found a very handy padded bag to hold my camera on the car seat next to me or on the floor. The rest of the kit stays in a larger camera bag. This is a Ruggard Onyx 35, only $17.95 from B&H. $17.95? That is the cost of a roll of film now. The original idea came from a WalMart lunch box that my wife suggested, but this Onyx is well-sewn and protective. Highly recommended.

Thank you all for joining me on this semi-random tour of Vicksburg.

Wandering around Upper Clay Street, Vicksburg, Mississippi

Clay Street view west (Panatomic-X film, Hasselblad 250mm Sonnar lens, 1/15 ƒ/8.0½)

Clay Street is the major east-west road through Vicksburg. Before Interstate 20 (I-20) was completed in the early 1970s, US 80 came into town on Clay Street. A driver heading west would drive on Clay to downtown, turn left on Washington Street, and drive south to the old Mississippi River bridge.

I label the part of Clay Street just west of the Vicksburg National Military Park as upper Clay, while the area downtown near the Yazoo Canal is lower Clay. Here we will look at some scenes in upper Clay. Decades ago, private homes lined the street, but now it is strip America of the ugliest sort. You car, tire, and muffler repair shops, check-cashing and title-loan places, a few real estate offices, abandoned buildings, a dead A&P super market, derelict historic homes, and fast food emporiums. Empty lots show where houses once stood. A former resident labeled this "the ugliest street in America." Well, maybe not the ugliest, but certainly a contender. 

The Eastview Apartments, situated between Clay Street and Baldwin Ferry Road, are low income housing subsidized by the federal government via HUD (Housing and Urban Development). They are unusual construction, being suspended between telephone poles that were driven into the ground on the steep hillside. It was a practical solution compared to grading flat terraces and pouring concrete slabs. 

Eastview Apartments with Stouts Bayou in foreground (Panatomic-X film, Hasselblad, 50mm ƒ/4 Distagon lens, green filter)

Stouts Bayou flows under Clay Street through some form of culvert or tunnel because it emerges out of the hillside below the Eastview Apartments. This is kudzu jungle. It needs a cleanup by goats.

Warfield's ServiceCenter, at 2910½ Clay Street, has served customers for over 30 years. Good people.

 

One of the nondescript street running into Clay Street from the north is Hope Street. The proprietor at A & V Discount Tobacco & Beer generously let me take a photograph.

The long-unused Parkview Regional Medical Center building looms over the area north of Clay Street. It has been vacant since 2002, except for homeless who occasionally find ways to enter.

Mercy Hospital, Grove St. (Kodak Super-XX film, Tachihara 4×5" camera, 90mm ƒ/6.8 Angulon lens)

The Sisters of Mercy, who have a long history of care in this town, originally built Mercy Hospital in 1957. The present owners have tried to sell it but with no results. Who wants an obsolete hospital building considering the cost to renovate and upgrade electricity, exits, stairwells, and utilities? Externally, it looks intact, but I do not have information on the roof or the interior. 

When I took photographs in the parking lot in the rear, the neighbors came by and said they watch for vagrants. The police come, clear away the homeless, and then they return later.

Further west is a short segment of Crawford Street. This is not the main Crawford Street downtown but a short detached section running directly next to Stouts Bayou. The houses are on the south side of the road and have access via wood bridges. I photographed more of the Crawford Street region during my tour of neglected Vicksburg houses (Nov. 16, 2020 article).

1517 Main Street (Panatomic-X film, Hasselblad 501CM camera, 80mm lens, 1/8 sec. ƒ/8.0½)

Main Street is one of Vicksburg's historic streets. It is still lined with old houses, but one by one, they have been condemned and demolished. This house at 1517 looks pretty good, and I do not know its issues.

This ends our short tour of upper Clay Street. Standby for more Vicksburg photographs soon. Thank you all for riding along.

On the Dixie Overland Highway, Historic US 80 - west Jackson, Mississippi (MS-03)

Hideaway Club, 200 Oklahoma Street (Hasselblad 501CM camera, 80mm ƒ/2.8 Planar lens, Kodak Panatomic-X film)

Introduction

Dear Readers, I have written about US 80, formerly known as the Dixie Overland Highway, before. I covered it in three chunks: east Mississippi, west Mississippi, and east Louisiana. This time I will cover west Jackson between State Street and I-220.

In the post-war era, the Dixie passed south of downtown Jackson and served as a urban industrial and commercial zone. General Electric and other companies built factories there. Preservation Mississippi wrote about the Jackson Lamp and Glass Works in a 2016 article. On a recent MPB (Mississippi Public Broadcast) talk show, some reporters remembered how during the 1980s, 80 was the place to go for good restaurants and other activities. I recall a restaurant called the Green Derby.

What Happened?

Today, US 80 in west Jackson is horrifying. Hotels and motels are closed or cater to a rough clientele. Stores are shuttered. Factories are empty shells. Trashy cars crash over potholes and gaping expansion joints in the crumbling pavement. Payday loan stores occupy storefronts in seedy strip malls. Former filling stations have been converted into various functions or abandoned entirely.

Former gasoline station (possibly Pan Am or Amoco), Gallatin at Oklahoma (at US 80), Jackson (Moto G5 digital file)

Example of Pan Am gasoline station, location unknown (from 1961 MSU yearbook, provided by Thomas Rossell)

Over the years, a coworker and I both lamented the decline of Jackson. He experienced it personally, having lived in west Jackson in the 1970s and early 1980s. A pertinent article from City Journal by Aaron M. Renn, titled, "The Lifeblood of Cities," describes the decline of so-called middle neighborhoods.

"The media tend to portray urban neighborhoods as either booming gentrified districts or zones of impoverishment. Neighborhoods in between get overlooked. But these older urban and inner-suburban “middle neighborhoods” may be where the next generation of urban problems—or solutions—will be found. Cities once held vast tracts of such neighborhoods, populated by workers in manufacturing or the civil service. With what analysts call a “barbell” economy dividing increasingly into rich and poor, it’s no surprise that urban middle-class neighborhoods are feeling squeezed."

In the post-war period, especially the 1950s and 1960s, Jackson was a bustling and thriving industrial and commerce city. (So were Greenville, Meridian, and other Mississippi cities). Thousands of modest homes were occupied by traditional middle class families, where dad was the main breadwinner and mom was at home or working part-time. Former middle neighborhoods, neither slum not wealthy, went downhill when the demographics changed as a result of loss of jobs, crime, drugs, deteriorating schools, and changing social conditions.

The author noted how today, there are an increasing number of single women households, and those families are often low income. The houses are not maintained and deteriorate. Soon, the entire neighborhood looks degraded. Therefore, people with means move to the suburbs, which, in USA, means white flight to government-subsidized suburban developments (i.e., socialism for developers). The older neighborhoods are left behind with diminished tax base, crumbling infrastructure, and crime.

This is a complex topic with numerous factors at play, such as tax policy, zoning codes, subsidy of developers, political corruption, and cheap land in the far suburbs. Regardless of the reasons, we have grossly mismanaged urban and suburban growth in the United States. Many American cities look more shoddy, dirty, and dilapidated than cities I have visited in the Third World, let alone anywhere in Europe.

Former Gipson Discount grocery store, 1420 Hwy US 80 (Panatomic-X film, 80 mm Planar lens, yellow filter)

BelAir shopping plaza, 1999 US 80 (Rolleiflex 3.5E Xenotar camera, Panatomic-X film)

This sign for Bel Air has a 1960s moderne appearance. The shopping plaza is pretty seedy, and some of the stores suffered a fire in 2011. The "Land of Sleep" has been gone for decades. However, the Patel Brothers store has an excellent selection of Indian and Pakistani groceries and spices.

Jackson Southwest Hotel, 2649 US 80 (Panatomic-X film, Hasselblad 501CM camera, 50mm F/4 Distagon lens, 1 sec. exposure at ƒ/5.6)

I saw a rutted driveway that went up a hill just west of Ellis Avenue. At the top, an urban decay treasure: the former Jackson Southwest Hotel at 2649 US 80. It was horrifying. The window frames and wiring had been looted by metal scavengers. I did not venture too far into the building by myself, but the lobby was worth capturing. (Click any photograph to see the gruesome details enlarged.)

An article from WLBT Channel 3 on May 31, 2013, stated:

JACKSON, MS (Mississippi News Now) - The former Holiday Inn and Jackson Southwest hotel on Highway 80 in Jackson was once a popular spot for dinners, meetings and social functions -- now it's a dilapidated eyesore. 

"It makes everything around it look like Beirut. Does this not look like somebody bombed it. People leave their properties and go somewhere else and we allow them to do this," said Nina Holbrook of the Metro Area Coalition. Many windows on the building are broken, and the 14-acre property is overgrown. Recently someone broke through the gates and thieves have been rummaging for metal and copper. 

Holbrook says the building was sold at auction to P & N Properties in Hattiesburg for about $50,000, and the owner was hoping to flip it for a huge profit, which never happened -- and now probably never will due to it's condition.

The Pearl Street AME Church purchased the wreck around 2015, but all plans for renovation have been thwarted by vandals and homeless occupants.

Former Green Derby Restaurant, at the corner of US 80 and Ellis Ave., built in 1955 in a very post-war modern architecture. Post card courtesy of Preservation Mississippi.

Best Western Metro Inn, 1520 Ellis Ave., Jackson (Panatomic-X film, 250mm Sonnar lens, yellow filter)

On the way back to I-20 via Ellis Ave, I saw another decay treasure, the former Best Western Metro Inn. The sign proudly proclaims "Gorgeous Atrium and Indoor Pool." Oops, what happened to the windows? This dump closed in 2015. WLBT Channel 3 reported on April 26, 2018:

JACKSON, MS (Mississippi News Now) - Properties along Highway 80 in Jackson continue to be targeted by metal thieves. The abandoned Metro Inn on Ellis Avenue and Highway 80 is the latest property to be hit. 

Metal thieves have ripped the entire front off the rooms, including windows and doors, just to get to the metal frames. 

Thursday, people were seen loading their haul into a truck and taking it to the nearby Can Man where it appeared they received cash for the stolen metal. 

Jackson - on its race to the very bottom....

UPDATE, April 26 2021: The Metro Inn is being crunched up and demolished!  WLBT Channel 3 wrote on April 20, 2021:

JACKSON, Miss. (WLBT) - It’s been the scene of numerous crimes and an eyesore for years, but this week the old Metro Inn is being torn down. 

It’s a sight many locals were happy to see this week. The demolition of Metro Inn on Ellis Avenue is in full swing. 

The property, which went into foreclosure in 2015, has been the sight of numerous crimes since then. Vagrants moved in tearing off scrap metal.

To see earlier articles, please type "Jackson" in the search box.

The square photographs are from Kodak Panatomic-X or Tri-X 400 film, exposed in Rolleiflex 3.5E or Hasselblad 501CM cameras. Praus Productions in Rochester, NY, developed the film. I scanned it with a Minolta Scan Multi medium format film scanner controlled by SilverFast Ai software.

Virus in Vicksburg - a Quick Overview (B&W film)

Introduction

Dear readers, I will take a short interruption from my Route 66 series to write about the Virus in Vicksburg. The coronavirus has caused almost unprecedented disruptions to commercial activity around the world. I wrote "almost unprecedented" because the great flu influenza of 1917 caused similar confusion and disruption to the World War I generation. Worldwide, the 1918-1919 influenza may have killed between 50 and 100 million people (from Dr. Fauci in a CNN Special). 

Read The Great Influenza: The Story of the Deadliest Pandemic in History by John M. Barry to see how the world coped at that time. We Americans were much tougher and less selfish and self-obsessed back then. But even then, we had political appointees who underplayed the danger of the flu for commercial reasons, which led to thousands of excess deaths. And then we had idiots who did the "masks impose on my rights" nonsense. Especially sobering to read are details of the second wave of influenza in late 1918. This second wave may have accounted for the majority of deaths around the world, many in poor regions like India. In total, about 675,000 Americans died. Will we see a second wave of COVID this time? (Update: Yes!)

A New Jersey friend asked if I had been taking virus pictures around Vicksburg. I wondered, how could I show what was different than normal? A hundred photo web pages recommend lame virus exercises such as "How to photograph an egg in creative light" or "Get closer to your pet or your broccoli for the most impactful portraits." OK, maybe if you are totally confined indoors and are totally bored. But here in Vicksburg, Mississippi, we arre not confined indoors, and I thought of some topics.

Quieter streets

Photographers around the world have shown pictures of their normally mobbed streets being completely empty. The Weather Channel had an article documenting penguins, lions, bears, bison, and other critters reclaiming now-empty city streets. Vicksburg has also been quiet, but it does not look drastically different from normal, and we do not have bison or penguins. The streets here have traffic but usually not bumper-to-bumper. As a bicyclist, the quiet streets are very welcome. Night-time is gloriously quiet. The mayor wisely enacted a curfew from 11:00 pm to 05:00 am, and for once we do not hear crapped-out jalopy cars clunking down the street at all hours of the night, rap music thumping. Now, we can hear tree frogs or an occasional tug on the Mississippi River. It would be so nice if this curfew stayed in effect indefinitely.

The Vicksburg from the corner of Monroe and China Streets (Kodak Panatomic-X film, Rolleiflex 3.5E with 75mm ƒ/3.5 Xenotar lens) 

Spring Street view north, Vicksburg, Mississippi, USA (Panatomic-X film, Hasselblad 501CM, 250mm ƒ5.6 Sonnar lens)

Polk Street view east, Vicksburg, Mississippi (4×5" Tri-X film, 135mm ƒ/4.5 Schneider Xenar lens)

Speed Street view west, Vicksburg, Mississippi (Rolleiflex 3.5E Xenotar, Tri-X 400 film)

On this last picture, I caught a car in motion. Normally, Speed Street is much busier

Casinos

They are are closed! Normally, they are open 24 hours. The casinos are situated along the banks of the Mississippi River. Here are two examples.

WaterView Casino closed for virus (4×5" Tri-X Prof. film, 180mm ƒ/5.6 Caltar IIN lens)

Ameristar Casino closed for virus, Vicksburg, Mississippi, USA (4×5" Tri-X film, 90mm ƒ/6.8 Angulon lens)

No more tour boats

Up through February (2020), three or four river tour boats per week moored at the Vicksburg waterfront. The river cruise business was devastated by the 2007-2008 recession but had nicely recovered. The tourists took busses to the Vicksburg National Military Park, to museums, and to some of the churches. I am not sure if they spent all that much in town, but it was nice to see visitors. This is a photograph of the "America" moored at the waterfront during happier times in 2019. We also saw many visitors from Europe, especially music lovers who drove Route US 61, the "Blues Highway," but they, too, are not here now.

Paddlewheeler "America," Levee Street, Vicksburg, Mississippi (Fuji Acros film, Voigtlander Vito BL camera, 50mm ƒ/3.5 Color-Scopar lens, Leitz polarizer)

Industrial activity

The Port of Vicksburg is still operating, but traffic is definitely less. 18-wheeler trucks still rumble by with timber, lime, cement, or petroleum products, but there are fewer private cars and pickup trucks. The tank cars in the photograph below have been sitting on the siding for months. Possibly they are being used to store refined petroleum, but I am not sure.

Haining Road view east, Vicksburg, Mississippi (4×5" Tri-X film, 180mm ƒ/5.6 Caltar IIN lens)

Haining Road view west, Vicksburg, Mississippi (4×5" Tri-X film, 180mm ƒ/5.6 Caltar IIN lens)

Lesser changes

Even the gas stations are a bit quieter some of the time. But some places in town look about the same as ever. Clay Street has a lot of traffic. The dudes of a certain demographic still hang around the gas station convenience stores and the car wash places, as if they did not read the warnings about not gathering in groups. And almost none of them wear masks. They think they are immune?

Top Five, 1108 Bowmar Avenue, Vicksburg, Mississippi (Leica IIIC, 50mm ƒ/1.4 Canon lens)

Closing comments

The virus restrictions have been more relaxed here than in many big cities, where people had to stay indoors for weeks. I live in a big old southern house and have plenty of chores and repairs to do. My wife and I can go out and take photographs, walk, or ride bikes. We have coped with no issues at all. We did not consume or ingest any disinfectant or malaria medicine as per the "medical" recommendations from the White House.

We were fortunate that Vicksburg's mayor was proactive about closing businesses where people gather. And, at least initially, the Governor of Mississippi was more cautious and medical-directed than many other southern governors. The State Health Officer has served the citizens of Mississippi diligently. Compare and contrast with the political hacks in Georgia (Kemp), Florida (DeSantis), South Dakota (Noem), and Texas (Greg Abbott). But Mississippi's opening the economy still proved deadly for health outcomes. And the autumn school schedule turned into a shitstorm (a wildly chaotic and unmanageable situation, controversy, or sequence of events) when the Governor mandated that schools open on schedule in his attempt to suck-up up to President Trump and/or Senator Hyde-Smith.

One benefit of having a bit more spare time was reviving my 4×5 inch Tachihara camera. I was embarrassed that I had not used it since 2012. The equipment to xpose big pieces of film and take real photographs sitting in a closet, year after year? I retrieved the kit from the closet, checked the lenses and shutters, and loaded some film holders in a dark closet. At first, I was awkward, but the technique came back quickly. The Tachihara is a wooden field camera and must be used on a tripod. Press photographers in the 1940s successfully hand-held 4×5" Speed Graphics (you have seen them in movies accompanied with big flash bulb reflectors), but mine does not have any sort of rangefinder. I even bought a 1960s Schneider 90mm ƒ/6.8 Angulon lens, a tiny optic that is easy to carry.

Here in town, I found a handy advantage to the reduced traffic: I can set up a tripod in a street and not have any issues. If I wear my orange National Park Service vest, some drivers stop, thinking that I am a surveyor or city employee.

We will get through this. So will you Urban Decay readers. Be well, be careful, don't go stupid with this "reopening the economy" propaganda and go to bars, casinos, Republican political rallies, motorcycle rallies, or parties. And don't forget to photograph your world, explore, and leave a film legacy for your descendants.