Burton Chapman’s Telephone Road, Texas, a history and guide to Telephone Road and southeast Houston, is now available for purchase. This book is groundbreaking in being the first comprehensive history of the often overlooked southeast Houston area. The Baxter Press book features eleven chapters and numerous photos that present the story of some of southeast Houston’s most interesting and important places and people. Copies arrived from the printer on Friday, January 11, 2008. The book may be ordered for $15.95 plus tax and shipping and handling through http://www.telephoneroadtexas.com or by phone at (713) 822-3964.

Book highlights:

• Tracing the growth of Hobby Airport from a tiny private airfield to today’s modern airport serving over eight million passengers a year.
• The gigantic, nationally-known Christy Brothers Circus;s years of using South Houston for winter quarters in the 1920s and 30s.
• The Jimmie Menutis Club’s years of hosting performances by a who’s who of Rock and Roll Hall of Famers like Fats Domino, Chuck Berry, Jerry Lee Lewis, Bo Diddley, and Louis Armstrong.
• The Santa Rosa Theater’s rise and fall from a classy family-friendly movie theater to a decaying porno theater, to its closing, and demolition.
• The fast electric Interurban train’s years of zipping back and forth between Houston and Galveston.
• The famous Gold Star/Sugar Hill Recording Studio’s fifty years of recording nationally known artists like Lightnin’ Hopkins, George Jones, Freddy Fender, and the Big Bopper.
• Gulfgate Mall’s history is traced from being Houston’s first major regional shopping center to its decline, demolition, rebuilding, and renaissance today.
• The Ambox building at Telephone and Westover that was used as a Manned Spacecraft Center by NASA scientists and astronauts in the race to be the first to land a man on the moon. Details and photos are provided of the building’s visit by John F. Kennedy and Lyndon Johnson.
• The Sam Allen Ranch’s use of 15,000 acres in southeast Houston for a large cattle ranch. Details about Sam Allen’s neighbor, Governor Francis Lubbuck, and his ranch near where Telephone and Bellfort is today are also included. These ranches were later sold off to make up the majority of the neighborhoods that make up southeast Houston today.
• The last chapter called “Interesting Places” gives brief histories of a diverse list of unique places like The Orange Show, neighborhoods like Idylwood and Eastwood, churches like Queen of Peace and the Church of the Redeemer Episcopal, restaurants like the Tel-Wink Grill, and Loma Linda, and long-standing businesses like Paul’s Ice House, and Stubb’s Cycles.

ABOUT BURTON CHAPMAN: Mr. Chapman grew up about a mile off Telephone Road. He graduated from Mt. Carmel High School and University of Houston, both on the southeast side. He saw that through the years that there have been many books written on the city’s history, but none that focused exclusively on southeast Houston. He got the idea of writing a book about the southeast side while driving down Telephone Road in 2001, and has been researching and writing Telephone Road, Texas ever since. He currently is a teacher in the special education department with Pearland I.S.D., and working on a second local history book. For more information: Visit www.telephoneroadtexas.com or call Burton Chapman’s office at (713) 822-3964.