Brewery History

The Houston Ice & Brewing Company founded by Hugh Hamilton in 1892 was one of Houston's largest companies at the turn of the century, and by 1910, encompassed more than twenty acres north and south of Buffalo Bayou.

Hugh Hamilton hired architect Eugene Heiner, an important Houston architect in the late nineteenth century to design and build a four-story main building for the brewery at the original site. In the spring of 1893, the new building was completed. By 1915, the company had expanded to more than ten buildings joined together physically and stylistically.

The Houston Ice & Brewing Company, dubbed the Magnolia Brewery, was well known for its beers, sold at five-cents a bottle.

In 1893, the brewery had top-of-the-line machinery, producing 100 tons of ice and 60,000 barrels of beer per year, all produced with artesian well water. By 1910, beer production had expanded to 200,000 barrels per year.

Magnolia Building, located at the corner of Franklin and Milam Avenues, was redesigned in 1912 by H.C. Cooke and Co. The building, which still stands, was constructed in the footprint of a former structure known as the Franklin Building. It is believed that around 1915, the brewery was at its largest.

With the onset of Prohibition in 1920, the brewery began its decline and was forced to place its sole dependence on the manufacture of ice when the brewery accounted for the majority of the company's profits. It was at this time the brewery changed its name to Houston Ice & Cold Storage and began leasing, or selling, its buildings. In 1922, Hugh Hamilton passed away before witnessing the full demise of the company. The Houston Ice & Brewing Co. struggled to survive, but was finally shut down in 1950.

Following the shut down, the building housed many different businesses before Bart Truxillo purchased it in 1968 from a bank trust. By this time, the building was in poor condition and was being occupied by homeless people. Truxillo immediately began the building's restoration.

Despite all of its dramatic history, the Magnolia Brewery Building survived and is now a small souvenir of the company that helped make Houston the historical and industrial center of Texas at one time.