Almeda Mall opened in 1968, the same year as Dobie High School.
So it's fitting that these two staples of South Belt intersect so often in the first two decades of each other's lives.
Need your group or club's photo for the yearbook? What better place? It must've been easier to get 20 people to agree to meet at the mall than pretty much anywhere else in the vicinity.
Need a job for after school and weekends? More Dobie students likely had first jobs at a store in Almeda Mall than anywhere else.
And at the start, you could stand in Dobie's parking lot and see J.C. Penneys just a mile away.
So it is, particularly in the first decade, a very common backdrop. The yearbooks have been the primary resource of mall photos in my searches.
1969
Center court
Battlesteins
Palais Royale
Picadilly
Foley's
El Chico
1970
Doktor's Pet Center
More El Chico
1971
Center Atrium
Foley's
1972
Center
More than half of this year's Trailblazers did their photos among the home furnishings section of Foleys:
as well as the class officers
1973
this is just down from the atrium, in front of Sampieri's and where the Christmas train and Easter bunny were stationed each year. The fencing appears to be the Easter decorations.
1974
this fencing appears to be festooned with peppermint, so we're at Christmas here
also Christmas, see poinsettia "tree" around the fountain, far right
1975
better shot of Christmas poinsettia "tree" the following year
1976
Farrell's candy shop
1978
1979
1
the play area in front of Doktor's was remodeled, removing the monkey bars and installing low-to-the-floor animals to climb on, instead.
Pipe Pub
There was not a single photo of the mall included in 1980.
In 1981, only the businesses around the mall got any love:
And nothing in the 1982 book.
1983
1984
1985
1986 didn't have a single photo, and Almeda was only briefly mentioned as behind Baybrook as a popular place to hang out"
The final photo from the mall during our time frame is from 1987,
which preserved the Pineapple fountain in its entirety
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