Former Burger King (Tulsa, Oklahoma)

From Loopnet, archived here for posterity. I researched this odd restaurant at 2030 South Sheridan Road, Tulsa, Oklahoma a while back. On the surface, it appears to be a former Burger King...which it was, but there are other odd things about it that suggest there's more to the story. Digging through newspaper archives, this has been through many restaurants, some chain stores and some not. From what I can piece together this opened as Sambo's in 1977 until the early 1980s when the chain collapsed. By 1982 it was Barry's Deli (Jewish-style deli restaurant, open 24 hours) and in 1986 became Hardee's. In the early 1990s it closed and was replaced by Rex's Chicken (local restaurant chain), by 2000 it was closed and reopened as Burger King in 2001. It closed between 2019 and 2021 and was replaced by King Burrito (closed as of May 2025, and still closed now as of this writing). Unfortunately, when I typed all that out I didn't save the articles that supported that evidence, but they're there, and I could add it later. Until then...

MarketPlace Shopping Center (Temple, Texas)

I would say this does more business than Temple Mall next door.
I've been trying to think of what to do for this site. I bounced around ideas (soft reboot and focus on a more consistent topic, refocusing on stuff off of highways instead of anything, a Texas-exclusive focus) but in the end I thought what I had been doing, is doing posts on a very small selection of buildings, not large directories, meaning posts like this will have to be broken up or removed. Already I did stuff like spin off Big's Meat Market from a larger Buda/Kyle topic.

As part of this new revamp, the focus is on MarketPlace Shopping Center in Temple. I've uploaded a PDF of the shopping center as of 2025 here (archived from here and wanted to discuss a few of the major tenants in more detail, particularly H-E-B, Kohl's, and the restaurants out front. It recycles content from Carbon-izer.com as well, though the future posts will have more care taken for them.

The Kohl's (located at 3170 S. 31st Street) started out as a Woolco in 1980 (moving from an I-35 location), then after the entire Woolco chain folded, it became a Montgomery Ward in 1983 and operating to the end of the chain's life (early 2001) but remained with signage up a few years afterward. The Kohl's opened in September 2011 according to this article and should be noted that as Montgomery Ward, its address was 3002A S. 31st Street. H-E-B is the other major anchor (opened in 1980) and I've been to it at least once, and it's been renovated more than once. I believe it was last renovated in the mid-2010s (before that, carrying circa-2000 decor) though I don't know the details of the store's opening. Many of the older tenants carry the 3002 address like H-E-B but the modern ones like Kohl's no longer do.

The three restaurants out front are also of interest.

Photo from Showcase.
The Whataburger (1415 SW H K Dodgen Loop) is perhaps the most interesting. I remember stopping at this location sometime in late 2016 or early 2017 after a day of outside work at a ranch. While the cold drink and the protein of the hamburger revived my spirits, I was intrigued by the large, "Playplace" part of the building, as if it had a playground at one point. The room was closed to the public (it was used as employee offices/storage, apparently) and while the thought of Whataburger having a playground wasn't out of the question (I seem to recall a kid's meal mascot, for instance) it hadn't actually occurred to me that it was in fact not a Whataburger to begin with, having been a Burger King opened in 1999 but closed within a decade. It was seized by U.S. Marshals in November 2004 (it did not reopen) and in November 2007 was reopened as a Whataburger. Before Whataburger was built, a Pizza Hut was here from 1991 to 1997. Before that I'm not sure, if anything, what was there. Next to it is Starbucks (1313 SW H K Dodgen Loop), opened as Golden Fried Chicken (Golden Chick) in 1999 and became Starbucks around April 2004 (I believe Golden Chick closed late 2003). You can see another photo of the Starbucks at StarbucksEverywhere.net. Finally, Taco Bell, at 1201 SW H K Dodgen Loop is the oldest of the three, and had changed its store number store number (2308) and address (3002 South 31st Street, the number of the whole plaza) in 2014 to the Dodgen Loop address and a new store number (30125) without rebuilding. Despite looking nothing like the original 1983 store, BCAD indicates the building is original to 1983 (just expanded).

Burger King on Interstate 35 (Waco, Texas)

Unknown source—if it was Loopnet it's not there now. Located at 1500 N. Interstate 35, this restaurant was built and opened in 1991 as a Burger King and closed at YE 2019 or early 2020 based on my estimations. After renovations, it re-opened as the Waco original "Hawk's Hot Chicken" in early 2021 but it closed around fall 2022.

As Hawk's the building was modified but you can immediately see one of the problems of the new restaurant with Street View; construction of I-35 cut off their main access for a time.

Jakes Burgers opened a year after the demise of Hawk's, and as of January 2026, still operates. Sharing the block are two other restaurants. Schlotzsky's Deli, as the chain was known back then, opened at 1508 I-35 in 1996. Since then, it has has just had updates as corporate policy has dictated (to the "lotz better" prototype in the early 2010s, which dropped the "Deli" name, and immediately next to that is Fuego Tortilla Grill (1524 S. I-35). This taco shop was built on the site of Legends Cycle, which moved out in the early 2010s. Prior to that, it was Euro Shop, which was another motorcycle dealership until the partnership disintegrated and the business partners went separate ways (that was 2011), and back in the 1990s was Harley-Davidson of Waco before they moved in 2003 (see further down in this page). It had moved here from 928 North Valley Mills Drive. In late 2013, the building was torn down, and the new Fuego Tortilla Grill opened in August 27th 2015, the fourth location in the chain and second in Waco, though Fuego's dual-location presence in Waco only lasted a year.

(Adapted and expanded from Carbon-izer.com).

UPDATE 01-18-2025: Added Fuego and Schlotzsky's.

Pizza Inn at 1801 Mangum Road (Houston, Texas)

Street View from the early 2010s. By late 2014 they added updated logos to the signs. Note that they're Burger King sign-shaped. Over on the now-closed The Houston Files we had covered 1815 Mangum Road, now it's time to cover its more successful neighbor at 1801 Mangum.

Pizza Inn's most prominent feature is a very tall sign that was meant to be visible to Hempstead Road travelers in the mid-1970s when it was built as a Burger King back in 1974. (The sign is still there, but it's not quite as visible from Northwest Freeway). In 2004, the Burger King closed and was replaced with a Pizza Inn in 2005, now the only stand-alone Pizza Inn restaurant in the Houston area (and one of four Pizza Inn restaurants total).

This is an expanded version of what was previously posted on Carbon-izer.