I am grinding my teeth as I write this. It looks as though the Tomato is out on Fry Street. I’ve passed an hour or two there over the years, when lunch was a slice of pizza and a small draft (well, when I was younger than I am now). We never called it The Flying Tomato that I recall; it was always just The Tomato. I’m not ready for this; I still miss the Green Derby that was, at the corner of Avenue A and Mulberry. The English Department used to gather there on Friday afternoons for beer and free food. The Derby has been gone at least fifteen years, it seems to me, and Jim’s Diner almost that long.
Jim’s went the way that many establishments have gone on Fry Street–somebody got tired of keeping it going. What’s happening now is that a predatory developer is working in the area to drive out small business establishments. In going after The Tomato, United Equities is going after one of the anchors of the street as it has been.
Apropos of things as they used to be, Dale Cannon has sent me a link to some pages about St. Louis neighborhood history. Looks like fun! At the end of a nostalgic ramble through the neighborhood of his childhood, Dale philosophizes:
Progress changes all things, I guess. To travel through that neighborhood now, one has a hard time even visualizing an ethnically diverse neighborhood where stores thrived, let alone a rural area. On the northwest corner of nineteenth and Salisbury, across from Hyde Park, Paul Antle once ran a pharmacy–which today is a vacant lot. A Dairy Queen now stands where once I saw the movies Return of the Fly and the Alligator People at the Tower Theater. Further north, fully half of many of the blocks–maybe more–are vacant lots. In the City–in the County–farms are replaced by homes–homes are levelled–hotels and parking lots and garages rise where homes once stood–what is built deteriorates–the winds of change blow various directions–and we are generally powerless to stop them–we are just observers.
Check out Dale’s page. I don’t know whether he is still maintaining it, but it looks to have been fun and interesting and topical just a little while ago. The vignettes are rich and good to read. You’ll find them under Dale Cannon’s St. Louis.
Stumbled upon your post as a result of a Google search for the Green Derby of all things. Reading your stuff on “old Denton” brings back some good memories. I know you posted this a couple months ago, but I’d love to comment by throwing out some of my reminiscinces of Fry St.
First of all, like you, I miss the Green Derby. My buddies and I frequented it quite a bit when we were students (’82-’87), and even for a while after we graduated.
I have a lot of fond memories of the Derby — open mic nights on Friday and Saturday with guys like Linc Chalon, the late Scott Starkel, Danny Dollinger, and many others. I also performed there a few times. I remember that it was a hang-out for some of the faculty; I particularly remember that chemistry profs would congregate there on Friday evenings for beer and free sandwiches (you might remember some of them — Rob Conlin, Gerry Dobson?). It was sort of a dive, and the owner’s cigar really stunk up the place. But it was my favorite hang-out. Everybody needs a “Cheers,” a place to go where everyone knows you. The Green Derby was my “Cheers.”
There were other places on Fry St./Hickory St./Ave A — and most of them are gone, either through attrition or, now, as a result of the renovation project. Jim’s Diner, of course. No place like it ever again. The Library, which was THE place to catch the best live bands in Denton (I think the actual building that housed The Library is now part of Cool Beans). The State Club, which I frequented sporadically, was always a stand-by if nothing was happening anywhere else. And, of course, the Flying Tomato.
Is it normal to miss a pizza joint? LOL. Well, the Tomato was a lot more than that. A few years ago, I went back to Denton. An old college buddy and I decided to go to the Tomato for pizza and beer, for old times’ sake. It hadn’t changed much at all. It was early on a Saturday evening, and the place was relatively empty of students. And there we were — two successful guys in our mid-30s, sitting at the same carved-upon table where we sat when we were young and had the whole world before us. I saw some familiar initials etched in the table and the engraving “Class of 87.” My class.
For a few seconds, it was 1987. I was sitting with my group of friends again. It was more than a memory — it was as though I had never left 1987, my friends, my college, Denton, or Texas. It was a fleeting thing, but real.
Such is the power of place to break down the compartments that separate the past from the present. Now, that place is being leveled to make room for a Walgreen’s.
I left Denton 15 years ago and now live 1500 miles away. I still have family in the area, so I make it back on occasion. Last year, my wife and I, along with our young daughter, went back to spend Christmas with my mother. Knowing that Fry St. was about to be “renovated,” I decided to go back one last time.
It was a Sunday morning and the streets were empty. I strolled around Fry, Hickory and Ave. A. I thought about this place and the friends I made there, and how those experiences helped make me who I am today.
My life is good. I have a wonderful wife and daughter, and I’ve had an interesting and successful career — the path to which I decided upon in college. And yeah, I’ll always have the memories and some of the friendships I made then, but the place — the tangible brick and mortar link to some of the best days of my life — will soon be gone. And for that, I’m a little sad.
Hi, GBarksdale. Thanks so much for this. I’m going to post a note about it
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