San Antonio Express-News

Goodbye, Downtown Macy's (Nee Foley's): Six Oddities You May Not Know, Featuring Massive Fallout Shelters, Ghosts & Spider-Man

It's a sad sight walking by the downtown Macy's these days -- a cheap-ass "Going Out Of Business" hangs from its walls, and if you go inside you'll find few floors open and everything -- even the fixtures -- on sale. It's an undignified ending for the old store, which opened as a Foley's in 1947. ... More >>

30 Essential Texas Restaurants

Eat here before you die.

Sarah Tressler: Congrats on New Reporting Gig in San Antonio!

Just when we thought we'd never read any more reporting from our favorite stripper-journalist-professor, Sarah Tressler has landed a job with the San Antonio Express-News. Editor Mike Leary told us in an e-mail that Tressler was tapped to be part of the paper's Go Team, which "covers breaking news, ... More >>

What Are the 30 Seminal Texas Restaurants?

After reading Chris Gray's recent feature ("The Texas 30") on the 30 best Texas albums of the last 30 years, the question of the 30 best Texas restaurants naturally arose at the Houston Press offices. But not just the best -- the most seminal. What are the restaurants that are most essential to the ... More >>

The 30 Best Texas Albums

Ranking the 30 best Texas albums of the past 30 years seemed like an impossible task. We did it anyway.

RIP Johnny Perez: Sir Douglas Quintet Drummer Dies at 69

Johnny Perez, drummer for legendary '60s Texas garage-rockers the Sir Douglas Quintet, has died. Perez passed away in a hospital near Los Angeles due to complications of cirrhosis of the liver, according to the San Antonio Express-News. He was 69. Perez was a Golden Gloves-level amateur boxer and ... More >>

50 Rad Things Now on the Sig's Lagoon Walls

Within the past month, the walls of Sig's Lagoon have been transformed into a sprawling pop-culture collage of posters, photos, newspaper clippings, magazine covers, picture discs and cardboard cutouts courtesy of former Sundance Records owner Bobby Barnard. Since the longtime San Marcos music stor ... More >>

Eating Up San Antonio: La Gloria, The Monterey and The Esquire

Until this past Tuesday, I didn't realize how easy a day trip to San Antonio could be. Thanks to the recently raised speed limit on I-10, you can speed to the Alamo in three easy hours (or less, if you set your cruise control just above the new 75-mile-per-hour speed limit...not that I'm advocating ... More >>

Cynthia Stewart: Sexts to Teen Send Former Elementary School Counselor to Prison

The verdict is in, and those of you who predicted a slap on the wrist for Cynthia "Cindy" Stewart will have to eat crow. The former elementary school guidance counselor from the San Antonio area has been sentenced to six years in prison after she was caught sending lurid photos and racy Facebook mes ... More >>

Chicago Bears WR Sam Hurd Has a Ring...a Drug Ring!

The Stringer Bell School of Entrepreneurship.​I remember former Houston Texans (and now Washington Redskins) wide receiver David Anderson telling me a couple years ago about a program that the NFL offered players in which they could travel to prestigious universities during the off season and ... More >>

Cynthia Stewart: School Counselor Sent 30 Nude Pics to 15-Year-Old Boy, Allegedly

A school counselor has been fired for sending sexually explicit texts and nude pictures of herself to a 15-year-old boy, the San Antonio Express-News reports. Cynthia Stewart, 43, was fired by the Judson school district, even though initial federal charges of online solicitation of a minor have bee ... More >>

Sampler Plate: This Week in Food Blogs

San Antonio Express-News: The big stink of the week still has to do with Top Chef: Texas, which -- so far -- is shaking out to be one of the worst decisions that Bravo has ever made with its successful franchise. The stinging insult of Houston being left off the list of Texas cities for the upcoming ... More >>

UH To The Big 12? Five Reasons It Would Be A Huge Boost

Home sweet home for the Coogs?​Everyone's reporting that Texas A&M has all but decided to leave the Big 12 for the SEC, and the San Antonio Express-News adds an Aggie official says the Big 12 told the school the University of Houston would be a viable replacement. UH had been talking/hoping/t ... More >>

Texas A&M Athletics: No Longer a Bridesmaid to UT?

​Maybe, just maybe, Texas A&M is about to stop being the University of Texas-Austin's bitch. On Thursday, the Texas A&M Board of Regents will meet in a closed-door, informational confab, according to a San Antonio Express-News report, to discuss the Longhorn Network, a 24-hour-a-day channel ... More >>

Valerie June Out, Krayolas In At Leon's, Volcano

Craig HlavatyValerie June at SXSW​Win some, lose some. Pete Mitchell, owner of Under the Volcano and the recently reopened Leon's Lounge, just called to bemoan the fact that rising star Valerie June had cancelled her July 26 solo date at Leon's. "She's doing a record with Dan Auerbach [Black ... More >>

Why Did Every Mexican's Great-Grandfather Fight Under Pancho Villa?

And why don't Mexicans spay or neuter their pets?

Hearst & H-E-B: A Beautiful Friendship

How Hearst approaches stories about H-E-B​A San Antonio blog has broken an interesting piece of news about the San Antonio Express-News, the sister paper to the Houston Chronicle (a relationship that gets closer and closer as budget cuts force consolidation). The Plaza de Armas story is behin ... More >>

Wilber Adalid Rodriguez: Homeless Man Murders Another Over National "Honor"

Some things are better left unargued​You'd hope that San Antonio residents Wilber Adalid Rodriguez and Jose Antonio Rodriguez would find a way to get along. As the old blues song goes, they were both poor boys a long ways from home: the 24-year-old Wilber hails from El Salvador, while Jose, 28 ... More >>

San Antonio Kidnapping Turns Out to Be Inception-Like Non-Event

Is this the real life? Is this just fantasy?​All San Antonio was aghast this morning at what looked like a dreadful crime: 28-year-old Adam Richardson told police that three to five armed intruders had broken into his apartment overnight and dragged his dad and sister off. He told police the ... More >>

Chron's Rick Casey To Host Political TV Show -- In San Antonio

Rick Casey will be needing his traveling shoes​Rick Casey is the Houston Chronicle's star columnist, the news-side city columnist every good paper tries to have. He came over from San Antonio in 2003, the high-profile hire by then-new editor Jeff Cohen. His initial efforts seemed a little San ... More >>

Falcon Lake: An Austin-Based National Defense Think Tank Chimes In

They've got a theory​STRATFOR, an Austin-based think tank specializing in the Drug War and other national security measures, claims to have information shedding light on the disappearance and possible death of jet-skier David Hartley. Here's the scenario they unveiled in a press release yesterday ... More >>

Raymond Garcia: I Wouldn't Have Abused That Kid If It Was A Girl

Photo from Bexar County SORaymond Garcia: You'll never crack me, copper​There are ways to respond to police when you're being questioned about possibly sexually abusing a kid. Defense lawyers would probably not suggest using Raymond Garcia's template.Garcia, 24, was identified in a police lineup b ... More >>

Larry Kaiser of UT-Health Science Center: Still Getting That Sweet Commuting Money?

Photo courtesy UTTwo years' worth of weekly Pennsylvania-Houston commutes​We first told you in November about Larry Kaiser, the head of the UT-Health Science Center here in Houston, and his seeming sweetheart deal on living and moving expenses.Kaiser claimed he couldn't sell his Pennsylvania home ... More >>

More Consolidation For Chronicle And San Antonio

The Chron-Express News​Hearst's unending efforts to make the Houston Chronicle and the San Antonio Express-News one and the same continue apace.The latest memo appoints several editors to oversee matters at both papers, and offers tips on how the two can share coverage.Chron editors Laura Goldberg ... More >>

The Chronicle Does Some Editing In Piece Questioning UT-Health Science Center President

Photo courtesy UTThe peripatetic Larry Kaiser​Last year we told you about the relatively new president of the UT-Health Science Center and the generous contract terms he was getting to have homes here and in Pennsylvania.The situation is still ongoing, and the Hearst newspapers have taken notice.G ... More >>

Alamo Heights

San Antonio's the Krayolas steam into their second act.

The Recruit

Places all over Houston want Trevor Falk and pitch the wonders of community life. He is 24 and has Down syndrome, which makes him a hot commodity for private group homes.

Houston Is The Villain In Nasty Newspaper Fight In Albany

Houston Chronicle editor Jeff Cohen came to town from Albany, where he was the editor of the Times-Union, another Hearst paper.He brought some people with him, and still runs movie reviews by Amy Biancolli, who still works in upstate New York.The Times-Union is, like many Hearst papers (and papers e ... More >>

Chronicle's Robison To Work For Democrat

Cue the outrage from right-wingy Chronicle hatahs -- former Austin bureau chief Clay Robison has got a new job working for a Democrat."Why not? He's been working for the Democrats all along," will be the refrain.In journalism's defense, any left-leaning tendencies in Robison's weekly columns were hi ... More >>

Further Breakdown Of The Chron Cuts

Photo by Lori GreigIt might seem like we're harping on the recent round of layoffs at the Houston Chronicle just because we're journalists too ("Hey, how come you don't do ten posts about the layoffs at Schlumberger!!"), but -- as we've said before -- we perhaps naively hold to the thought th ... More >>

"100 Days Of Change" Coming To The Houston Chronicle

Hearst is the privately owned company that owns a ton of magazines, TV stations and newspapers, including our very own Houston Chronicle.The longtime head of Hearst's newspaper division recently retired; the guy who replaced him has sent out a long memo to employees full of doom and gloom and re-inv ... More >>

Thanksgivings of Yesteryear

On Thanksgiving Day, November 28, 1908, a classified ad appeared in the San Antonio Express for The Uneeda Dairy Lunch on Houston Street offering: Special Thanksgiving Dinner, 20 cents--Menu: Oyster soup, queen olives, celery, cole slaw, roast turkey with oyster dressing and cranberry sauce, creame ... More >>

The Houston/San Antonio Chronicle-Express Takes Another Step Forward

Hey, copy editors and page designers at the San Antonio Express!!Like your jobs? Then you better hope you like Houston.A memo to staff from Express editor Robert Rivard offers more details on the coming consolidation of operations between the Express and the Houston Chronicle, both Hearst newspapers ... More >>

Texas Woman Fights Abuse at the State's Schools for the Mentally Retarded

Her son was beaten up by an angry caregiver at Denton State School

County Attorney Candidate Vince Ryan Sues Linebarger Goggan

Saying he deserves a bigger piece of the pie, the former city councilman serves up cherry information to his current political opponent

He Won't Back Down

The mayor was threatened -- or maybe he wasn't

Blues Lucifers

San Antonio's Boxcar Satan rumbles in from the west with its punk-roots noise

Hard Sale

A flood of lawsuits has turned Dillard's into a master of defense

Best Chronicle Columnist

Rick Casey

Burying the Past

A farewell slap to a Chronicle columnist

Pimpin' Ain't Easy

Tension mounts at the Chronicle

Lineup Change

A new writer should shake things up at 801 Texas

Low Fidel-ity

There's more than just the Gulf of Mexico between musicians in Cuba and those from Cuba

Hitting the Charts

Better read the fine print when the Chronicle does a chart

Money Talks

Mattress Mac's bowl was a joke everywhere but Houston

Pigskin Parade

A nonevent gets blanket coverage

Acting Out

Hilarious Anton in Show Business sics the three furies on the theater world

Letters

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