“Social Center for Affluent GALVESTON Residents/Visitors”
May, 1956, marked the opening of a “new Galveston Seawall Resort, ‘ultramodern’ with all-weather air-conditioning and a private club.” I did not stay in it that year, for I was just 6 years old, but I did stay there more than once and through the years of visiting the island, beach, and “Strand,” saw the “jewel of the coast” lose, slowly-butsurely, its glitter and magnificence.
It was along the SEAWALL, and it did not just “house” visitors to the beach but also had a magnificent restaurant and a club and offered a very nice view of the ocean and beach—many windows and a dining area that was not the standard square or rectangle but more of a circle.
My family/friends, as I remember, never did use another “unique for the time” offering, but it seemed rather novel and upscale at the time—a “drive-through” window (like ordering at McDonald’s) so that visitors could just register outside and go directly to the rooms and parking lot without “dressing up” or walking back-and-forth to a lobby area. We always just drove up to the front and went in through the front doors when I was younger!
When it opened in 1956, advertising details offered an opportunity to stay in an “ultram odern resort with all-weather air-conditioning/heating.” This resort was owned by the Moody Family (Beach Corp) and reportedly cost upwards of 1 ½ million dollars! It was designed to be like a “crescent moon” that faced the Gulf of Mexico, with balconies, studio rooms, swimming pools, and even a small, multi-hole mini-golf course (putting area). The early place was definitely one for affluent folks, the main reason “my folks” did not stay there until later years—and we never were members of “the club.” In the late ‘50s, my family and relatives from Oklahoma did stay in a beach house close to the SEAHORSE that during the night had a little water under it—luckily, we were sleeping in the second level!
1973—Businessman, Sonny Martini, bought this property and buildings, and he was just the 1st of new owners. And, I have read that at one time the private club became a popular venture of the “new era,” a sports bar—and it was known as BIG DADDY’S! M y wife and I stayed on the beach during our hone ymoon in 1979, but in the “now gone” “Flag-ship.” We ate at Mario’s Flying Pizza but did not visit “Big Daddy’s!”
Landry’s Restaurants of Houston later purchased the property.
The Galveston County Daily News, 2005, had this to say: “Last month when workers began preparing the faded blue SEAHORSE MOTOR INN for demolition, the resounding sentiment was ‘good riddance.’”…..“where prostitutes and drug dealers plied their trades in worn and dreary rooms.”
BUT…..2005—The final remains of the once magnificent SEAHORSE INN were bulldozed, to the SADNESS of so many who had known it during its glory years!
Two past patrons said the following: “social center for some of the island’s most affluent residents…. part of the cerulean days of summer and their youth when none of them believed anything had to end!” And, from a “now attorney” who worked as a life-guard in the early ‘60s…..“It’s deteriorated to the point that I was saddened…..now that it’s being torn down, it’s generating a lot of memories!.”
Who knows? Sometime my Grandchildren may stay on the same “lot” in a new and even more luxurious SEAHORSE RESORT and say, Grandpa, did you ever wear your flannel shirt and jeans and baseball cap when you stayed here?
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