city did briefly have a professional World League of American Football team, the San Antonio Riders, in 1991–92, but after the organization withdrew from North America, the team collapsed and never had a chance to play in the new stadium. And, for better or worse, San Antonio has not been able to attract an NFL team. The Spurs, however, did actually play in the Alamodome for a decade, 1993–2002, but became disenchanted with it and cajoled Bexar County into constructing a new arena for them, now known as the AT&T Center and their current home. The Alamodome also has hosted many trade shows and events that include Monster Jam, Disney on Ice, and the annual Valero Alamo Bowl. Country music singer George Strait performed at the Alamodome in June of 2013 and set an all-time record for the largest concert ever played in San Antonio, with some 73,086 people in attendance.
Living beings are apparently not the only ones drawn to the Alamodome, and in the years since it opened, many spirits and episodes of supernatural activity have been reported there. A variety of factors may have contributed to this. These include skirmishes fought on this ground in the early years of the city’s history, it previously being the site of a blighted neighborhood where many people had been victimized over the years, and a number of people being killed in the Alamodome itself. Such back stories range from what sound very much like fairly universal urban legends to verifiable incidents of terrible and, in some cases, hideous deaths.
Paranormal phenomena people claim to have experienced at the stadium include inexplicable cold spots, the smell of lilacs, and the feeling of a presence in a particular section of the stadium seating; doors opening on their own and lights turning themselves on and off throughout the complex; loud pounding on one of the upper-floor windows; evidence of the presence of specific ghosts; and sightings of numerous apparitions.
In one such episode, a maintenance crew that was cleaning the windows on the ground floor reportedly saw the apparition of a distressed woman dressed in 19th-century frontier garb float toward the exterior of the front door and begin knocking on it. Other people claim to have seen the specter of a lost-looking woman wandering around the parking lot, and she has been associated with a woman who is believed to have been raped and murdered at the site years before the stadium was built. Another episode involves a construction worker who was reportedly walking on a high beam while the Alamodome was being built who misstepped and plunged to his death. People have reportedly seen his ghost gliding through the long halls of the stadium.
Wikimedia Commons/Greverod
“When I worked at the Alamodome … there were always strange things going on,” a former employee of the venue told John Delgado of San Antonio Ghost Hunters. “A man died in the elevator shaft and that same elevator would show floor numbers on its digital readout that the dome didn’t have!” She also mentioned an escalator that would stop and start on its own.
One of the verifiable and especially horrible deaths that occurred at the Alamodome also has been associated with paranormal phenomena, including footsteps, moaning, mumbling, and shadowy apparitions.
“A stunt driver was killed Saturday night when the top of his car was sheared off during a planned midair collision gone awry,” the Associated Press reported on November 15, 1993. “His wife and 3-year-old son watched from the audience. Randy Hill, 49, of Phoenix died instantly when his car was struck by another car driven by daredevil Spanky Spangler, who was not injured, organizers said. Hill retired from stunt driving eight years ago and only recently decided to do the stunt at the two-day San Antonio Thrill Show at the Alamodome. The two cars were supposed to meet head-on at 50 miles per hour. Organizers did not immediately know what went wrong. The rest of the show was canceled after the accident.”
The hapless Hill’s tragic death is not the only one at the Alamodome associated with ghostly activity. “On September 21, 2006, around 5 p.m., a roof collapsed and trapped two employees under the rubble,” attorney Beth Janicek wrote for The Legal Examiner. “The men were working on a structure for the Builders Showcase Expo that [was] set to open September 28, 2006. Most of the workers had finished for the day and only the two men were left on the structure.” Twenty-year-old Andres Duran was killed by falling pieces of timber and tile, and some people believe that his unquiet spirit is among those that continue to haunt the massive entertainment venue.
Not a week goes by where something is not happening at the Alamodome, and very few of the hundreds of thousands of people who attend events at it each year will experience anything of a paranormal nature. Even those who do might not realize it or acknowledge that they have. But if you go to the stadium, be sure to enjoy the game, or concert, trade show, or whatever else has brought you there—and stay alert for whatever unofficial but very real paranormal events might be going on around you.
CHAPTER 3
Alamo Quarry Market
NORTH CENTRAL SAN ANTONIO
ADMITTEDLY, I tend to be more than usually skeptical when I hear reports about shopping centers and the like being haunted and to give a hard look at whether there is, in fact, a credible reason why they would be. In the case of the Alamo Quarry Market, however, it does not take too much digging to reveal that, being located just a few miles from the headwaters of the San Antonio River, it has been continuously inhabited since time immemorial. More than 10,000 years ago, Paleo-Indians hunted and gathered throughout the abundant area, and every group of people who have followed them, from Apaches and Comanches to Spaniards, Mexicans, and Anglo-Americans, have availed themselves of its riches as well. Prior to being adapted for commercial use, in fact, it was the site of the sprawling Alamo Cement Company factory, and many elements of the old industrial complex have been retained and even incorporated into the shopping center. So, Alamo Quarry Market has more than enough history behind it to make a case for it being haunted.
In the late 19th century, Englishman William Loyd discovered what he believed to be a natural cement rock in what is now nearby Brackenridge Park and had chemist George H. Kalteyer confirm that its lime and clay could produce what is known as Portland cement. Loyd proceeded to organize a group of investors to form the Alamo Portland and Roman Cement Company in 1880 (a name shortened the following year to simply Alamo Cement Company). It was the first such cement plant west of the Mississippi and one of the earliest in the United States. Initially powered by steam engine, it ground 10 barrels of cement a day.
Alamo Cement Company quickly expanded and diversified its operations, burning lime, selling building stone, constructing sidewalks, and even obtaining from the original inventor the patent rights for segmented sidewalks that could better accommodate expansion and contraction caused by seasonal temperature changes. Its main product however, was Alamo-brand cement, which was used widely in building projects, large and small, throughout Texas, including the state capitol building and the Driskill Hotel, both in Austin.
After Kalteyer died in 1897, Charles Baumberger became president of the company and set about further expanding it. In 1908, it was reorganized under the name San Antonio Portland Cement Company. Eventually the cement material at the Brackenridge location was exhausted. The site was then abandoned and the plant relocated to an area some distance away that came to be known as “Cementville.” The original site became known as Baumberger Plaza in 1944 and was eventually placed on the National Register of Historic Places, while the quarry itself became the Japanese sunken gardens at Brackenridge Park.
Alamo Quarry Market, a snazzy outdoor shopping plaza dubbed a “lifestyle center” by its developers, is located in San Antonio’s Lincoln Heights neighborhood and near its Alamo Heights and Terrell Hills areas. It incorporates many elements from the old cement factory into its architecture, including the original kiln.
