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August 9, 2022
Growing Up In Bandera
By Glenn Clark
The Bandera Prophet
I look around at the life I'm living now here in Bandera and I must say that things are certainly different that what they used to be. A lot of the things we had as kids are still around but it just isn't the same. There are numerous places around town where you can get a hamburger but most of my friends from back in the day will say they don't compare to what we could get from Zeke's. An OST swiss/mushroom burger is still my personal favorite.
Zeke's was the go to fast food place for a long time in Bandera. When I was coaching Little League baseball with Kenneth Snow we always took our team to Zeke's for treats after a game. Win or lose the reward was always the same.
My brother-in-law Curly "The Toad" D'Spain spent more time there than anyone else that I can recall. If you were looking for him regarding work at his garage you knew to check Zeke's before checking the garage. You would likely find him there trying to fit a cup of sugar into his cup of coffee one spoonful at a time.
We had other truly unique places around Bandera in earlier times. As some disappeared they were never replaced by similar businesses. The Bantex Theater and The Red Goose Pool Hall immediately come to mind. Bandera will never again have a place like the old Bandera Ice House.
In the earliest of my recollections as a kid going to the ice house with my dad I can still visualize the big ice crusher on the dock being used to grind big blocks of ice into large heavy duty paper bags. If you can picture a young skinny kid with a purple upper lip from drinking a Grapette soda watching the action that would be me back in the day. Later on the clatter of shuffling dominoes and breaking pool balls would fill the air.
My dad was an avid domino player along wth others like Taylor Wooten, Vince Anderwald, Buddy Tyron and Harmon Smith. I never was a fan of dominoes but if they needed a fourth player I would get volunteered and it seemed I always was paired with Taylor Wooten. He would get really irritated when I made a bad play. Seems like those older players knew every domino in your hand after your first play. I never knew or cared to learn how to "shoot the moon" because that was a more serious game.
Most of those domino players at the ice house were holdovers from the back room of the Smith Wright owned Red Goose Pool Hall over on Main Street. While I was Growing Up In Bandera I was aware of the private poker games being held in remote places around the county but I knew better than to get involved in them. Those were serious games where it was rumored that businesses would sometimes change hands.
GLENN CLARK #340
Zeke's was the go to fast food place for a long time in Bandera. When I was coaching Little League baseball with Kenneth Snow we always took our team to Zeke's for treats after a game. Win or lose the reward was always the same.
My brother-in-law Curly "The Toad" D'Spain spent more time there than anyone else that I can recall. If you were looking for him regarding work at his garage you knew to check Zeke's before checking the garage. You would likely find him there trying to fit a cup of sugar into his cup of coffee one spoonful at a time.
We had other truly unique places around Bandera in earlier times. As some disappeared they were never replaced by similar businesses. The Bantex Theater and The Red Goose Pool Hall immediately come to mind. Bandera will never again have a place like the old Bandera Ice House.
In the earliest of my recollections as a kid going to the ice house with my dad I can still visualize the big ice crusher on the dock being used to grind big blocks of ice into large heavy duty paper bags. If you can picture a young skinny kid with a purple upper lip from drinking a Grapette soda watching the action that would be me back in the day. Later on the clatter of shuffling dominoes and breaking pool balls would fill the air.
My dad was an avid domino player along wth others like Taylor Wooten, Vince Anderwald, Buddy Tyron and Harmon Smith. I never was a fan of dominoes but if they needed a fourth player I would get volunteered and it seemed I always was paired with Taylor Wooten. He would get really irritated when I made a bad play. Seems like those older players knew every domino in your hand after your first play. I never knew or cared to learn how to "shoot the moon" because that was a more serious game.
Most of those domino players at the ice house were holdovers from the back room of the Smith Wright owned Red Goose Pool Hall over on Main Street. While I was Growing Up In Bandera I was aware of the private poker games being held in remote places around the county but I knew better than to get involved in them. Those were serious games where it was rumored that businesses would sometimes change hands.
GLENN CLARK #340