Our Little Historic Theater

If you were a San Antonio native or from up North, Floresville would look like a little nowhere town in South Texas...at least, that's what people would think up until recently. Before, however, Floresville was a small farming community with spread out plots of land for ranches, homesteads, and small businesses. There wasn't really a whole lot goin on, still isn't that much goin on, but it's picked up a bit. So it was and always has been a pretty small community that has a pretty steady population and expanding business, so why would anybody film a movie there?



In the middle of the down town district of Floresville directly across from the courthouse is the small but popular Arcadia Theater. Now, I've had the privilege to actually work at this historic theater, which is cool because I learned a lot about it's past. I learned of the theater's role in the early years of segregation in the 1920's and about it's historic re-opening in the late 90's, but there is one role that not many theaters can lay claim to: A big-screen appearance.

It's a pretty farfetched idea, but some time ago there was a major motion picture filmed in the main screen room of our little theater! The movie was called "The Big Brawl" and it starred one of Hollywood's premiere action stars, Jackie Chan. The movie was partly filmed in Floresville, mainly in the theater, in 1980 and was directed by Robert Clouse, who also filmed "Enter The Dragon." A neat fact about the theater and the movie is that there's a scene where a knife is forced into the wooden stage area right in front of the screen, and that knife mark is still there to this day!

Besides having this small piece of pop culture history in our little theater, it's not the first. In 1974, Steven Spielberg (yes! Spielberg was in my town!) directed the movie "The Sugarland Express" in Floresville. The movie starred one of the biggest stars of the time, Goldie Hawn. It was pretty exciting to see that Floresville was picked as a location for a movie, but a commercial? That happened a few years back. Whataburger had a commercial a while back that was filmed in front of the same theater that "The Big Brawl" was filmed! This was kind of weird, though, because we didn't even get a Whataburger until last month!

A Glimpse Into the Life of an Artist

On Monday, November 9th, my Humanites 1301 class was treated to a special visit by one of San Antonio's premiere artists, Joan Fabian. During her visit, Joan share with us some of her works and her interpretations of those works. She even gave us some insight as to how she prepares for a work and where she draws her inspriration. For her, inspiration and ideas come from meditation and reflecting and points out that it may be different for other people, that is just her method.

Joan's artwork has a very unique look and her methods of creating it are pretty interesting. The art really stands out, and she always makes it a point to contrast her colors and patterns to exaggerate whe she feels is the main message or feeling of her work. She uses her shapes in such a way that anybody who is viewing the piece can connect with it in one way or another and that is really important to her. She intends to convey a certain message, but she also leaves the viewer to interpret it on their own, which is the very essence of art.

While speaking to us, Joan also told us of the trip that she had taken to Pakistan. This was seven years ago and she was visiting for a total of 6 months, which I'm sure was a hard thing to do. She was even married at this time, and her husband came to visit her for a month, but I'm sure that was a still a very difficult thing to do. Not many of us can say we visited another far away country, and for so long too. She shared with us her experiences with the natives, the students at the school she taught at, and every person she came in contact with. She even tried to assimilate herself in their society by wearing their clothes and behaving like them, but they always were aware that she was an American. Her experience was truly unique and inspiring. Needless to say, this influenced her greatly as an artist.

I am grateful for the time that Joan Fabian took to speak to us because it was very interesting and insightful. As a musician, I feel like I am an artist to, so her speech was really important to me. I can associate with many of the things that she was telling us, such as where the ideas come from, how the piece makes you feel, and how the piece makes others feel. These are things I take into consideration myself, so to hear it from her was a nice feeling.

Wildlife at Mitchell Lake

For a field assignment in my Humanities 1301 class, we were required to take a trip to Mitchell Lake located here in San Antonio, Texas. Mitchell Lake is located off of 410 and Moursund. I took the trip to the lake on November 8 or so, although this blog was due on November 1st. I just wasn't able to make it out there any sooner, so here it is now. Mitchell Lake is a historic area here in San Antonio. It is now a natural habitat of sorts, although it was previously used as a dump for raw sewage when the city had no underground sewer system.

The city discontinued use of the lake as a waste dump in 1987 and has since become protected and cleaned. The lake is owned by SAWS, or San Antonio Water Systems. Instead of being a sewage site, the Lake is now a habitat for many sorts of birds. There are literally hundreds, maybe thousands of species of birds that occupy these wetlands during different times of the year. The variety is currently very slim, as most birds have migrated during this time of the year, but there are still some avian life to be observed.

Since the lake is located right off of Interstate 410, it is very accessible to tourists, natives, and anybody who loves nature or birdwatching. It is good to see that people really take an interest in this 1200 acre wetland because it means that the effort that the city and SAWS has put in to cleaning up the site has paid off.