Gottlieb Eisele House
716 Sabine Street

The historic house that formerly occupied the site at 22 Artesian Place, in a lonely corner of the Sixth Ward, was built by a German immigrant named Gottlieb Eisele circa 1872. At that time, the area was known as Fourth Ward North, but later re-named the Sixth Ward by a vote of the City Aldermen in 1895 which formally separated the area north of Buffalo Bayou from the area south of the bayou which continued to be known as Fourth Ward. During the late 19th and early 20th centuries, this area of the Sixth Ward was characterized by narrow residential streets lined with small wood framed cottages and the occasional two story house with double galleries. The now forgotten Tin Can Alley and Vinegar Hill were nearby during this time period.

Fast forward 138 years later, to December 2010, when the Gottlieb Eisele cottage was the sole survivor of the eastern section of the neighborhood. Even the streets have long since been covered over by the asphalt parking lots of the HPD traffic courts and Central Booking facility. When the Houston Police Department purchased the land around and including the Gottlieb Eisele House, all of the original houses, save for the little house at 22 Artesian Place, were demolished and the entire site was renamed 61 Riesner. The little cottage survived amid a sea of parking lots and nestled in the shadow of the Pierce Elevated freeway because of a commitment the City of Houston made to the Eisele descendants that it would not be demolished.

In recent years the house has been used by HPD for community based programs and most recently for storage. In December of 2010, the Houston Police Department, no longer having a use for the building, placed the building for sale by sealed bid on the City of Houston surplus property list. The sales agreement stipulated that the successful bidder would be required to move the historic house to a new site, either within an existing historic district or to a new location outside of an historic district and designate it as a City of Houston Protected Landmark, and then restore it.

In January 2011, the historic house was moved by the successful bidder to its new location at 716 Sabine Street in the Old Sixth Ward Historic District, which is the surviving portion of the original Sixth Ward and contains one of the largest concentrations of Victorian era homes in the city. The new site for the house is on one of the original narrow Sixth Ward streets, still paved in brick with stone curbs. The house will now begin the long journey towards a full exterior restoration, including rebuilding the original gable roof which was destroyed in a tornado during the early part of the 20th Century.

Ben Milam Hotel
1521 Texas Avenue

The Ben Milam Hotel, designed by prominent Houston architect Joseph Finger, was built on Texas Avenue in 1925. Its location across from Union Station (now Minute Maid Park) made it a popular destination for rail travelers. In 1932 Ben Milam became the first completely air-conditioned hotel in Houston. It was also the first hotel to place a television set in each of its 229 rooms. In 1951 the owners erected an addition that held a roof-top swimming pool and provided a parking garage. The building has been vacant for more than two decades as various plans for redevelopment have never materialized. The 1950s addition has been razed and the original structure is threatened with demolition, as well. This once popular destination, named for a Texas hero, may disappear from Texas Avenue as did its neighbor, the William Penn Hotel, in 2006.

Prudential Building
1100 Holcombe Blvd.

The end has come for the Prudential Insurance Co. Building, an iconic landmark constructed in 1952 as the first high-rise corporate office building outside downtown. Its owner, M. D. Anderson Hospital, chose to raze the structure and replace it with a new one.

Designed by Kenneth Franzheim, Houston’s foremost corporate architect of the 1950s, and sited across South Main Street from the Shamrock Hotel (also long gone), the Prudential Building exemplified the robust growth experienced in the city at mid-century. Constructed of Indiana limestone and natural Texas granite, the 18-story tower employed curving walls in the main lobby, a two-story rotunda in the center of the building, and the use of rare woods and chicaro marble throughout the interior. Not only was the structure an impressive one, but its site was the city’s first corporate campus. It provided such amenities for its employees as tennis courts, an outdoor swimming pool, and covered parking.

Houston’s prominent landscape architect, C. C. Pat Fleming, designed the twenty-seven acre site to contain lush plantings that could be viewed from windows in the elevator waiting areas. In a move unusual at the time in Houston, Franzheim included public art in the Prudential project. “The Family,” a bronze sculpture by internationally known Wheeler Williams, adorned a fountain in the center of an azalea-filled forecourt at the entrance to the building. Southwestern artist Peter Hurd created a gigantic mural, “The Future Belongs to Those Who Prepare for It,” to fill a curved wall in the building’s lobby. Hopefully, the sculptural piece will be retained in the site’s redevelopment. Hurd’s mural was offered to anyone who would remove it. When no one rescued it locally, the mural was sent to a West Texas party who has plans for it.

The loss of the Prudential Building is mourned not only for its architectural distinction, but also because it represented a new era in Houston’s march toward becoming a dominant city in both the United States and on the international stage.