By Cheryl Lauersdorf Ross On the morning of April 16, 1947, the SS Grandcamp, surrounded by refineries and chemical plants near the Texas City docks, exploded with a force compared to the Nagasaki atomic bomb, taking the lives of nearly 600 people and injuring thousands more. When a catastrophe like this strikes, reports focus on […]
Archive | Business and Industry
The Day the Earth Shook: Crane Collapse
For author Laura Bernal, July 18, 2008 could have changed her life forever. Her father Martin Bernal was working at Lyondell-Basell when one of the world’s biggest cranes owned and operated by Deep South Crane & Rigging collapsed killing many of their workers. The article discusses what went wrong that day and the aftermath of […]
The Evolution of Houston Bookstores
By Aric Richardson An often overlooked and swiftly fading part of our regional culture is the Houston bookstore. In the 1860s early bookshops in Houston were not only purveyors of books, but were also the main source of printing, news delivery, and music. But what has happened to the bookselling industry between then and […]
15.1 Wrecks and Redemption Table of Contents
Download the full pdf. Vol. 15, No. 1 (Fall 2017) Letter from the Editor by Debbie Z. Harwell 2 Seeing Frost Town from the bottom up: Using Archeology and Archives to Reconstruct a Forgotten Houston Neighborhood By Jason W. Barrett, Douglas K. Boyd, and Louis F. Aulbach 8 The 1947 Texas City Disaster: Changing Lives […]
Pioneering Houston EMS: Answering the Call
Houston EMS personnel recall stories of an auto accident on a Houston roadway, most likely on Westheimer near its current intersection with Loop 610. Two ambulances arrived at the scene to find one person dead and another badly injured. The two men who worked for separate private companies, believed to be funeral homes, fought over […]
On Call by Choice: Life Stories of Houston EMS
The Houston Fire Department Emergency Medical Services (HFD EMS) has pioneered emergency medical protocols, leading the way for departments across the country, but behind the history are the individuals who stand ready every day of the year
Fighting Houston’s Fires
For 178 years, organized groups of firefighters have battled Houston fires, with the first volunteer bucket brigade established less than two years after the city’s founding in 1836. This photo essay offers a visual chronicle of the department’s history.
Texas Wines
By Maria R. D. Corsi George Fuermann, a columnist for the Houston Post, is perhaps best remembered as the man who helped bring fine wine appreciation to Houston. In his weekly column Wine Talk, which ran from 1984 to 1995, Fuermann educated Houstonians about wine history, traditions, and industry trends. A regular topic featured in […]
First Providence Then Prosperity
Past the easternmost boundaries of Houston lies the ancient Neches River, where various settlements formed along the banks long before our region’s towns, highways, and industries emerged. This “ideal place for a town” became Tevis Bluff…
Katy: West Houston Wonder
Long before the Katy Mills Mall bustled with customers, the Katy rice mills watched over the area. Earlier still, the Missouri-Kansas-Texas (MKT) railroad traversed the fertile prairie near Cane Island Creek.