I don’t have any pictures to match this little tale. It’s about a small place, and I do have a frame of reference. There’s a site that, these days, is nothing more than a pointer and scraper. Points to yet another series of images, for its namesake and scrapes this blog off the web to publish it.
Named for the badge on an abandoned gas station alongside the north side of a south-bound freeway, not far from the post office I use. I just liked its shapes, colors, and textures. I’m not the only person to be captured and captivated by such a structure. I’m just the latest in a long list of folks interested in old gas stations that are less than a century old yet hold amazing historical-cultural-sociological data.
Back “in the day,” when Ross Avenue (Near East Dallas) was a “bad” place, there was – okay two place of note. One was a called “Gwad’s” (Gringo for Guadalajara’s) and that was a late night Mexican food place. Frequently, we’d be the only anglos in the place. Stop. This isn’t about that, this is about another place, same stretch of Ross Avenue, a place called the Texaco Lunch Box. I’m pretty sure it’s now gone, but for a dozen years or more, it was the source for some of the best egg rolls and Vietnamese food on this side of the planet.
Last time I cruised Ross Avenue, all I could find was the empty shell where the Texaco Lunch Box used to be.
The sad part about the Humble Oils station, all bricked up and sweating in the South Texas Sun? The station itself is probably too small to do anything with, as in, not enough square footage to be viable as a business. Be a great coffee shop, except too far off the eaten path.
The name “Texaco Lunch Box” and the notion that reusing an abandoned station as something other than an auto fuel stop brings up the next destination: The Filling Station, cafe and bar.
Me? I like it for espresso. Pizza is good, too.
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Late-night dining for this East Dallas boy was Dan’s on lowest Abrams — very long-gone. We fed many strippers their best meal of the day there. This was before strippers got $20 for standing 5 feet away from you, and a $6 full-on breakfast was a treat.
I remember the Texaco, but I would have sworn it was called Texaco Egg Roll. That could have been our illiteracy. I ate a bunch of them, anyway.
Filling Station : G’ville and…Walnut Hill? Meadow? Park??? Big burgers, lots of booze, fun joint in the early 80s.
There was a “Filling Station” at G’ville and Walnut or thereabouts, but that was TOO FAR NORTH for my tastes. There was another “Filling Station,” in Austin, just past Sandy’s on Barton Springs, but that’s all a parking lot now. Last time I ate at the Austin one, it was, didn’t live up to its billing.
Texaco Lunch Box, that’s the name that stuck in my head, like Texaco Egg Roll.
Dan’s was still there, when I was seeing that Virgo in East Dallas.
I’d love to roll into Dan’s again at 3am for a chicken-fried steak & egg breakfast with extra gravy, hashbrowns, not grits, large milk, and coffee now.
Except I’d have to set an alarm to wake up.
PS You’re right on Lunch Box:
http://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=860&dat=19791227&id=lSoQAAAAIBAJ&sjid=Zo8DAAAAIBAJ&pg=5898,6713181
I’d like to hit “Mi Tierra” at 3 AM, as I know the breakfast food there is stupendous and lives up to its billing, but, I’d have to set an alarm, too. Last time I hit Dan’s, though, it was, like, well after midnight. Which made me remember working at the Lakewood Yacht Club (bar-bar).