"Secret School" in the Olmos Basin (San Antonio, Spring: apartment, lawyer)

Hah, wCat! I think it's funny.

Here's the thing to remember about San Antonio in particular, and all cities in general: once upon a time, there was no public transportation. So, unless you were rich enough to maintain your own transportation, you had to live close enough to work to walk there. When the horse-drawn omnibusses and the street trollies, the first forms of public transportation, hit cities, they were too expensive for the working class to use daily, but they were priced just right for the upper middle class, the people who were making good money but weren't at the level where they could maintain their own carriage. The trolleys allowed them to move out of the stinky, pestilent city (that's another topic altogether, but SA was absolutely infested with TB and other diseases until the 40s) into the clean, fresh surroundings of the new suburbs, like King William. It used to be only the very wealthy could afford to escape the city core, but now more and more people could. The availability of public transportation is what created King William and the other First Suburbs.

[wCat]

Ozzy.....here's a bit of current info on "the house". All of this is in public records at Bexar Appraisal Dist.

I was incorrect about it belonging to First Baptist...however FBC does own an old house across the street, and an adjacent lot to this property.

The current physical address is: 119 Taylor St.

It's in the middle of an irregular across the SW corner from Auditorium Circle.

It was built in 1910, and has three stories and a basement. Total square footage including the basement is 11,486 sq feet! It has a historical designation so the owner qualifies for "historical exemptions". At present, it is zoned for commercial use. (not sure for what!)

If you get downtown and want to look for it, go South on Broadway and turn right on 3rd. 3rd Street actually ends at the bend where it meets "Taylor St"....From there on, 3rd Street becomes "Martin".....so it's not actually on 3rd....but from Streiber's memory, it would appear to be close. It is, however surrounded by other commercial buildings that were built around 1950.

You can see it best from Auditorium Cir or Taylor Street.

Let us know if you get a chance to find it!

[OzzyRules]

Thanks. Actually, I drove past it today. I've driven past it hundreds of times because I used to work near there for a couple of years. Never took notice of it at the time. It's got a fenced in enclosure and I could even see the observatory thing on top. It really is big too.

[OzzyRules]

I am seriously thinking that Strieber made up 99% of his so-called "reality" stuff in these books. He describes an incident when he was a schoolboy and saw an image of a man floating in the wall above him. (His future self.) This scene and idea was directly stolen from another horror book by James Herbert (either Moon or the Magic Cottage) from the 80's. Strieber probably figured none of his readers had read such an obscure novel.

Personally I think that Strieber is a semi-talented pulp/horror-fiction writer who is just trying to create a "reality" around his monsters because he has run out of ideas.

[wCat]

You may be right Ozzy....but he certainly is an interesting study!

[spaceage007]

Thanks wCat for the location of that house. Every since Ive read that book, I wondered where it was at. I plan on going there soon and Ill take some pics. I happen to believe that Whit is telling the truth to the best of his abilities. I would never get into a heated debate over it because I think it would make me look crazy. I can totally understand how nobody would believe his stories, so many weird things have happen to him it makes me wonder how someone could lead this kind of strange life. Aside from the UFO stuff other strange things have happen that are just bizzare. On his podcast Dreamland he talks about a very strange meeting that took place at Lackland AFB that sounds like its right out of a spy movie. So I can see how if you have read enough of his books, a person may question some if not all of his stories. As for me I think he telling the truth.

[wCat]

Originally Posted by spaceage007

Thanks wCat for the location of that house. Every since Ive read that book, I wondered where it was at. I plan on going there soon and Ill take some pics. h.

Ironically, the other night I attended a meeting at the Radius Cafe which is next door to this house! Radius parking is actually in the back yard of the house. It appears to be used by a law firm......but one who's hay days are behind them. Or possibly don't like to stand on pretense? In other words, this grand house needs a lot of TLC and work to bring it up to it's former glory. In the back, there is an added elevator that is actually glass and brass and was added to the "exterior". It looks like a place that is open for business and very accessible from both sides. (no garden left....just surrounded by parking.) There is an old metal sign on the front that says "Carter and Steenberg".....apparently the original firm, or maybe still current. "Carter" is the current owner. I took pictures.....I'll have to see how they turned out when I get a chance to download them.

[Eily71]

I snapped a couple of pictures of the observatory house when I was in SA a few weeks ago. Advance apologies....I am not the best photographer...just lean a little to level the shot lol. Also the original images were HUGE so I played around with sizing and cropping.

I remember this house from when I worked downtown in the early Seventies. Seems there were a couple of other houses as well, but they are no longer there. I may have mistaken the Toltec Apartments next door as other houses. It was a long time ago and the area looks a bit different than it did back then. The trees and other foliage were way more overgrown than it is today and gave it a rather intriguing air. Or it could have been just my overactive imagination lol. I have to admit a house with an observatory was one of the last things I would have expected to come across in the middle of downtown San Antonio.

The first picture is actually the back of the house and was taken from the pay parking lot. I tried to get a front shot, but it didnt work out at all. In the second picture you can just make out the observatory at the top along with a section of the upper floor. I took this one from the parking lot of the Toltec Apartments next door to the house. As wCat said in her post, the house is now in use as a law firm, Carter and Van Steenberg. At least it hasnt been torn down. It still looks to be a neat old place...still intriguing.

Now to try and post the images...

[Bob_Oso]

Ok, I've just joined this thing in order to post comments. This has all been very interesting to me, because I have experience with the area Strieber writes about. The way I learned about him was because years and years ago I was describing a very vivid dream to a friend of mine, about an alien abduction, and then told her about seeing a UFO when I went to Incarnate Word College.

The year must have about 1976 and a very bright object appeared in the sky towards the Olmos Basin as seen from Marion Hall (my dorm). The object stayed in the sky the whole day and was even in the news; the news said it was a "weather balloon" even though it didn't move from that same spot all day and it was as bright as the sun, but smaller. Everyone on campus saw it too. So, this friend of mine told me about Strieber and his book Communion.

As I read his description of the place he went to, I knew exactly the place he was talking about, as I have been there hundreds of times. When I was single, one girlfriend even thought me weird for having such a fascination with the place. So anyway this is very strange for me because I hate sounding like a kook, but there's just way too many coincidences for me to explain. For example:

1. Same location as Streiber discribes.
2. UFO seen while attending IWC.
3. Vivid dreams about aliens and abductions.
4. Dreams of being in a "mystical school" of some sort.
5. Finally, a scar that's about one inch long next to my navel with no stitch marks and no reason for it to be there. In other words, no surgery, no wound, no nothing!

Alrighty then, there my weird confession and yes I know how it sounds, so let me have it. Tell me what any of you think about all this.

[AirForceDoc]

This all sort of reminds me of a group of hippies that used to live in the hills above Simi Valley in California, near where the Manson gang would hide out. They would run around in robes and no shoes. My dad and his friends used to go hiking and they'd hear rustling in the bushes and when they looked through the brush they could see these people walking away in the robes and such. Lots of weird stuff in the 60's I guess. Anyway, a bit off topic, but all the Olmos Basin comments brought this to mind.

So....to bring this whole thing together, how does the Taylor Street house connect to the blue hole and the long straight path in the woods? Are they in close proximity?