Since opening a quarter century ago, the Saxon Pubhas served as a launching point for some of Austin’s finest musicians, from legends like Steven Fromholzand Rusty Wierto current favorites Bob Schneider (pictured) and Hayes Carll, to name just a few. Yet the venue has outgrown its roots, says proprietor Joe Ables, who intends to open a second location in an industrial area south of Ben White Boulevard on South Congress Avenue in the next two years.
The move is like a flashback to the past: When the Saxon opened on June 8, 1990, it was situated amid vacant lots and helped establish the 78704 neighborhood as its own entertainment district. Today, Ables feels the squeeze of new construction, dicey parking and a lease that expires in 2020, so his plan is to construct a $4-$8 million two-story multi-user venue adjacent to the $120 million St. Elmo Marketdevelopment in an overlooked neighborhood near St. Elmo Street and South Congress. “It would be crazy of me if I don’t explore this fantastic chance to build a larger, better Saxon Pub for fans and our music family,” he says. (Ables plans to renew the lease on the South Lamar building and turn it into something else.)
While the large-scale St. Elmo complex will have a boutique hotel, condos, a 50,000-square-foot market and 200,000 square feet of creative office space, the new Saxon will feature a restaurant and theater for concerts and film screenings. Brandon Bolin, CEO of GroundFloor Development, the investors behind St. Elmo Market, describes the music venue as “the front door for the St. Elmo project.” Fans of Bob Schneider’s Monday night residency can rest easy—he’ll still have his regular weekly gig in the new space.
Moving forward is also a time for reflection. In that spirit, a yet-to-be-titled documentary about the venue will be released later this year, says Ables, who at 62 feels excited at the prospect of finally becoming a landowner. “It’s one of those things that I ask myself, ‘do I really want to do this at this age?,’” he says. “I do. I feel pretty young; I still feel good.”
Honky-Tonk Haven: 50 years of the iconic Broke Spoke
By Donna Marie Miller
When James White opened the Broken Spoke in 1964, it represented the last stop for civilization 1 mile south of what then served as Austin city limits. Fifty years later the dance hall, which Entertainment Weekly voted “The best country dance hall in the nation,” still stands on South Lamar Boulevard and endures as part of a legacy of a bygone time for the city that has boomed around it.
Broken Spoke proprietor James White sat in on stage with Weldon Henson on day one of the Broken Spoke’s 50th anniversary party Nov. 4, 2014.
James White at 25-years-old began construction on the Spoke Sept. 25, 1964—the same day he received his honorable discharge from the U.S. Army. “I built it to look like the ‘40s and the ‘50s,” he says. “My parents took me to honky-tonks like this, where I always had good times. That’s why I went into this business.”
James leased land from Jay Lynn Johnson Jr., the owner of a construction business, who also helped James work on the original 32-foot wide by 60-foot long building. Meanwhile, he thought about what to call his new venture. “I started thinking about the things that tie into westerns and country. My mind was always on a wagon wheel,” he says. “Then, like a light bulb that went off in my head, I remembered a Jimmy Stewart movie called Broken Arrow. I thought, I’ll just name it the Broken Spoke.” He and his wife, Annetta, officially opened the Broken Spoke a few months later on Nov. 10, 1964.
The place became popular from the day it opened. The then one-room bar and restaurant overflowed every night of the week. “I used to bartend 16 to 17 hours a day out here,” says White. “I learned to pop two beers in each hand, and I could pop beer as fast as I could sell it.”
But folks didn’t just come for the drinks; the Spoke became known as a place to hear great music and dance the night away. White paid his first band, D.G. Burrow and the Western Melodies, $32 to play. Dancers used to push back tables to shuffle, Texas Two Step, polka and Cotton-Eyed Joe. “Girls in their best dresses danced with the guys right out the front door into the dirt parking lot and then danced right back in,” says White.
In 1965, the Whites added an extension, a 90-foot dance hall with a 65-foot stage. Legendary fiddler Bob Wills performed there in 1966, 1967 and 1968 — each time filling the Spoke to capacity with 661 people. Wills wasn’t the only legend to play the Spoke. Over the years, Ernest Tubb, Ray Price, Buck Owens, Kitty Wells, Roy Acuff, Kris Kristofferson, Dolly Parton, George Strait, Willie Nelson and Jerry Jeff Walker have all graced its stage.
Hardship has not been a stranger to the Whites. Their roof leaked for 25 years until it was replaced in 1989. “Every time we had a good rain, we’d have to put out various containers to catch the water where it leaked,” says James. He began having heart trouble in 2000; Annetta survived breast cancer in 2005. Then on Oct. 2, 2005 a driver for the Geezinslaws Brothers band tour bus drove it through the back wall of the Broken Spoke; it took four days to remove it. Johnson, their landlord, died in 2001 and his children sold the land to Riverside Resources in 2010. Riverside in turn sold it in 2012 to Transwestern developers who began a two-year construction project surrounding the Broken Spoke that hurt its business. The Whites have endured, for the most part unscathed.
These days, folks still head to the Spoke for good music, good food and plenty of dancing. Ray Benson and Asleep at the Wheel, Dale Watson, Gary P. Nunn, Bruce Robison, Marsha Ball and Alvin Crow are just a few of the musicians who still perform regularly at the honky-tonk.
“It’s kind of like {Austin City Limits},” says Watson, who first sat on the stage in 1992. “It’s a place you aspire to play if you grew up in Texas and you want to play real dance halls in Austin—it’s the only one left.”
White, who just turned 75, still wears his standard uniform of Wrangler jeans, Swarovski crystal–studded Western shirts, a Gene Autry-era neckerchief, a Resistol Platinum silver belly hat and Lucchese ostrich skin boots. He greets visitors on weekends, just as he has for the past 50 years. The Whites remain in charge of all of the Broken Spoke operations, but their two daughters, Terri and Ginny, and son-in-law, Mike Peacock, help out. Terri teaches both private and group dance lessons five nights a week, while Ginny acts as the manager and her husband, Mike, tends bar and sometimes handles cover charges.
The Spoke’s iconic standing in the city has grown even more in the past few years, as two four-story, multi-use properties known as the 704 have been built around it. Now, when driving down South Lamar Boulevard, residents can literally see the juxtaposition of “new Austin” and “old Austin,” in the shadow that the buildings cast over the Spoke.
“I would have rather that everything stayed the same, but as it is I wish that I had a little more breathing room, a little more elbow room and I wish I had more parking, but I will weather the storm. We’ll teach the tenants of The 704 how to do the Texas Two Step,” he said. “We’ve already got in a lot of the people who live in The 704. They love the Broken Spoke and they come over here quite a bit already. We’ve got over 500 people to draw from, so I’m thinkin’ we’ll get a few more country music lovers and they’ll love the chicken fried steak, dancin’ the Texas Two Step and havin’ a good time.”
Still, despite the changing landscape of Austin, White says the spirit of the Broken Spoke remains the same. “We’re a place for good food, cold beer and whiskey and good lookin’ girls to dance with and that’s the way we want to keep it,” he says. “No hangin’ fern baskets, no Pierre water and no Grey Poupon. You’re gettin’ the real mustard out here, the real deal.”
Since opening a quarter century ago, the Saxon Pub has served as a launching point for some of Austin’s finest musicians, from legends like Steven Fromholz and Rusty Wier to current favorites Bob Schneider (pictured) and Hayes Carll, to name just a few. Yet the venue has outgrown its roots, says proprietor Joe Ables, who intends to open a second location in an industrial area south of Ben White Boulevard on South Congress Avenue in the next two years.
Donna Marie Miller 
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