From the outside, nothing about Eddie Wilson's near-north Austin bungalow would indicate that a prime architect of the city's mystique lives inside. Once through the door, though, and the whole fantastic story becomes plain as a giant javelina sucking on a six-story jug of tequila.
Over the fireplace, in the living room where Wilson jokes that prior to remarrying his ex-wife he spent five divorced years cavorting as Austin's "fat Hugh Hefner," there hangs a painting of the Armadillo World Headquarters, the venue and "beer garden of Eden" he opened in 1969 and sold to... More >>>
John Anderson
Author Joe Nick Patoski holds a relic from the tail end of Austin's glory days: The Soap Creek Saloon was the soul of Austin's scene while the Armadillo was the heart. Today, Patoski believes that Austin has the same big-city problems of Houston and Dallas, while the two larger cities have both gotten less suffocating.