Cafe Sauter from Preston
18 August 1913: 1. 901 Preston: Café Sauter, dining room, saloon and delicatessen, 2 floors; 2. 320 Main: Kiam’s clothing store, 5 stories, 1893; 3. 317 Main: The Fox Building [See also Main at Preston]; 4. 1013-1019 Preston: A fragment of the distinctive CocaCola logo (“…la”) is barely visible as advertising on the back side of the building holding John L. Lewis Restaurant and Randow & Weller Saloon; 5. 1220 Preston: Houston Drug Company, a wholesale druggists’ firm, 4 floors; 6. 403 Fannin: Stewart Title Building, 8 floors, 1906-1973; 7. 1018 Preston: Paul Building (Republic Building), 8 floors, 1907; 8. 1016 Preston: Settegast Building, 7 floors, 1908-1924; 9. 405 Main: Scanlan Building: 12 floors, 1909; “Café” on street level may be Oyster Bay Café at 1014 Preston, John N. Johnson, proprietor; 10. 402-404 Main: Hutchinson & Mitchell, clothing; 11. 914-916 Preston: William E. Hawkins, “hack line” [a licensed transportation provider for taxis, rental carriages for picnics or pleasure parties] and William H. Strebeck, barber; 12. 910-912 Preston: Simon Roos & Son [Simon Roos (1842-1912) and son Gustavo Simon Roos (1870-1945) as well as grandsons Philip (1887-1959), Louis (1889-1950), Leon (1891-1976), clothing and shoe merchants; The “Royal Hotel”, Jacob Botthoff, proprietor with his son (later Dr.) John Leslie Botthoff; 13. 902-906 Preston: Tenants included: “Acme Oyster Bar”, William M. McKinnon (1876-1940), proprietor; James L. Hambrick, saloonkeeper; Up-to-Date Laundry & Dye Works; a cigar stand, a pawn shop, furnished rooms, and an office for the Salvation Army. Pool Halls advertised at the corner were those of Bert H. Nichols and George N. Peter at 401 and 402 Travis. |
25 January 2016: 1. 911 Preston: Originally owned by the Scanlan sisters Stella and Lillian, daughters of Thomas Howe Scanlan (1832-1906, mayor of Houston 1870-1873), the cinema was first called the Ritz when it opened in 1926 as Houston’s first air-conditioned venue. In the 1940’s the cinema ran Spanish language films and in the 1970’s, blue movies under the name Majestic Metro, finally closing in 1984. After a renovation in 1990 the space became an event space; 2. 320 Main: Kiam Building, currently vacant, 5 stories, 1893; 3. 1001 Preston: Harris County Administration Building (Harris County Annex #43), 10 floors, 1978: 4. 1200 Congress Street: Harris County Juvenile Justice Center (Harris County Annex #60), 8 floors, renovated 2005: 5. 401 Crawford: The Retractable Dome for Minute Maid Park is housed in this structure at the intersection of Crawford and Preston; 6. 1018 Preston: Paul Building (Republic Building), 8 floors, 1907; 7. 405 Main: The Scanlan Building, built as a legacy for Thomas Howe Scanlan, mayor of Houston during Reconstruction, the project was spearheaded by Kate Scanlan, who hired one of America’s most prominent architects, Daniel H. Burnham of Chicago, 12 floors, 1909; 8. 900 Preston: Aris at Market Square, apartment building with retail on the first floor, several parking floors and an entry courtyard on Main Street near Preston, 32 floors, here under construction, completed 2017.
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Postmarked: Houston, Texas; Date: 18 August 1913
Stamp: 1c Green George Washington #405 To: Mrs. Annie Wray 2223 Bryan St. Dallas Texas. Message: Dear Annie How are you all this day? How did you all spend yesterday - I am fine and dandy. How is Baby Bill Is Mr Wray still with you all- Homer said the baby picture was awfully cute. Love to all – Write often. Etta Annie was Annie Belle Davis, daughter of Thomas Spartan Davis and Mary Ann “Mollie” Colbert. She was born 27 September 1880 in Trebloc, Chickasaw County, MS, so she was 33 years old when she received this postcard from Etta. The identity of Etta cannot be established with the singular evidence of the postcard, but she was most likely her sister, Etta Davis, 37 years old and at the time unmarried. What she was doing in Houston is unclear, but she implores, “Write often,” so she may have been testing out Houston as a place to live and work and planned to be there for a while. Etta Davis is not found on the city directories of either Dallas or Houston in 1913, but in any case within a few years she was back in Dallas.
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Annie had married William Bolden Wray on 29 June 1910 when she was 26 and he was 35, so she had been married three years when the postcard arrived. Just six weeks earlier their daughter Mary Katherine was born on 4 June 1913, but Etta asks about “Baby Bill,” and seems to be under the impression that the child was a boy. She mentions Homer admiring the picture, but Homer’s identity is not clear. He was apparently not a relative, and may have been a boyfriend to whom she showed the baby picture. She asks if Mr Wray is still with the family, almost certainly meaning Annie’s father-in-law, who must have stayed on while his grandson adjusted to family life.
Belton, Bell County, TX was the home of her in-laws, William Boland Wray, Sr., and Kate D. Supple where they were proprietors of a small hotel in Belton. Annie and William lived at 2223 Bryan Way in 1913, at 1904 ½ Pearl Street in 1918-1920, both locations just east of downtown. After 1925 they moved to 700 Waverly Drive in the west side neighborhoods of Oak Cliff / Winnetka Heights, suburban enclaves that were beginning to be popular as motoring became a fact of life all across America. William worked as a railroad baggage agent throughout his entire working career, and Annie was a housewife. Their daughter married Oscar Beverly Suggs. About 1916 Etta married Jesse B. Jones, and by 1920 lived with her widowed sister, Bettie Wilds at 2010 Live Oak Street in the northeast Dallas neighborhood near Pearl and Bryan Streets where Annie had lived. Jesse made a living as a house painter and later an interior decorator while living by themselves in 1930 at 924 Marlborough Street, a quiet neighborhood in Oak Cliff once again near her sister. Before 1935 they moved to the Glendale and La Crescenta area Los Angeles, CA in a house on 3321 Honolulu St. William died in 1937 of a heart attack, and Annie lived a widow’s life for 16 years. Their daughter died in 1991, two years after her husband; they had no children. All are buried in Laural Land Cemetery in Dallas. Etta and Jesse were not listed in Glendale city directories after 1963, and their burials have not been located. |
The east side of the corner of Travis and Preston now is locally famous for a colorful street art piece by Gonzo247, a Houston artist (Mario Enrique Figueroa, Jr.) from Aerosol Warfare Gallery entitled “Houston Is…”. More than a century ago 907 Preston was occupied by one of the most familiar of eateries in Houston – Café Sauter. The owner was Gustav Frederick Sauter, an immigrant from Germany, and his wife, Dorothea Wilhelmina, daughter of Friedrich Lippstreu and Fredericke Schmock from Prussia.
Sauter Café was a family operation, G.F. and Mina ran the deli with the help of their son Fritz (Frederick Gustav), and daughter, Pauline. The delicatessen featured “fancy groceries,” imported liquors, as well as a “Kansas City” meat market, a “Gentlemen’s Restaurant and Bar,” and a “Ladies Dining Parlor” upstairs. Fritz married Helen, daughter of William Edward Kuss and Helena Pinn of Üxheim in Rhineland-Pfalz, so the entire family was deeply German in origin and culture. |
The Gustav Sauter family home at the turn of the 20th Century was on the south end of town where Main street ended at the San Antonio & Aransas Pass Railway, now where the US 59 overpass crosses Main and Blodgett south of the Sears Store. By 1910 they had moved to more prosperous quarters at 1620 Jackson between Leeland and Pease. Sauter Café, deli and saloon operated until about 1916 when the café and deli was bought out by Henry Henke and Camille G. Pillot and operated as Henke & Pillot Delicatessen for some years, while the saloon was bought out by Louis Sigel.
Fritz sold cigars out of 714 Texas until about 1920 when he operated The Sauter News Agency, wholesale news distributor and publisher of postcards, magazines and other printed matter at 1412 San Jacinto. Gustav (1857-1935) and Wilhelmina (1859-1936) are buried at Washington Cemetery (formerly German Society Cemetery), where the family plot is guarded over by the large obelisk of Friedrich (1823-1893) and Fredericke Lippstreu (1821-1903). Fritz (1884-1965) and Helen (1889-1976) are interred at Forest Park Cemetery, and Pauline (1889-1970) is buried in Valley Village Cemetery in Los Angeles County, CA. |
The image on the postcard was also used as a stereo pair card, designed to be fitted into a parlor apparatus popular at the turn of the 20th century used to simulate 3-D images.