Crystal Springs Dance Pavillion

not sure if this has been covered here before but...can anyone here tell me excatly where the original Crystal Springs Dance Hall was? According to "Handbook of Texas Online", the address was 5653 White Settlement Road; judging from the piece of land currently at that address on "Historic Aerials", I don't think it's the same location. Also, "HOTO" lists the building remaining until a fire in 1966 destroyed it; there is no building at that location in the 1963 image at "HA"...any help would be appreciated (hoping djold1 has a map...)

The site of old Crystal Springs Ballroom is overgrown now, but the old rusty sign on North Side of White Settlement Road is still there . Trees make it hard to find. That was the entrance driveway to the building. I was there last in 1957. The building was is sad shape and roof leaked during heavy rains. It is little East of the Trinity River bridge.

hankjr, is this the old rusty sign?

Old Rusty Sign on North Side of White Settlement Road

I attempted to find out exactly where the club was located awhile back and, based on everything I was able to piece together, that old sign is located at the site where the club was. Until a few years ago, there was a Crystal Springs Mobile Home Park located on the land and a dirt road went in there past a bunch of rather old looking single wide trailers. At the time I went through there were only a few trailers still left. The next time I went past the trailers were gone.

There was also a small spring fed lake on the site and I have seen old photos with a sign on the building advertising "dancing and swimming." I have not been able to figure out from looking at google photos or my drive through the site any evidence of the lake.

Crystal Springs was most famous as the place where Milton Brown, known as the father of Western swing, regularly performed until he died as a result of injuries sustained in a single car accident on Jacksboro Highway in April 1936 after the car he was driving hit a telephone pole. Many believe that Brown suffered from narcolepsy. A 16 year old girl who slipped away from her house without her parents' knowledge to go to Crystal Springs with friends was killed in the crash. Brown had agreed to give the girl a ride home. Brown was taken to Methodist hospital where his injuries were initially believed to not be life threatening. However, one of his broken ribs had punctured a lung and pneumonia set in and he died a few days later. The site of the crash was in the southbound lane of Jacksboro Highway directly across the street from the Avalon Motel which is still there. After the crash, the headlights from Brown's car beamed directly into the motel's office window. Here is a view of the hotel from the approximate location of the crash.

I am looking at the site on Historic Aerials for 1956 right now. The trailer park is not yet there; instead I see a building that might be big enough to be the one in question and above it a dark space that might just be a lake. Now, looking at 1963 I see the building still there with the addition of trailers and what appears to be the outline of the lake but looking as though it might have been drained. Looking at 1970 I see that the building is gone and there are more trailers and it looks as though the lake may be full again. In 1979 it looks as though the lake has been divided into thirds but it is gone without a trace by 1990.

Is there still a spring on the site ?
Is this the same spring that feeds Burger's Lake ?

Is there still a spring on the site ?
Is this the same spring that feeds Burger's Lake ?

 

A few months ago I took a long walk along the Trinity Trails and ended up in close proximity to the Crystal Springs site.  As Ghost Writer mentions, the spring fed lake was filled in a long time ago.  I saw no sign any sort of water, flowing or otherwise.  The only thing I could see that might possibly have been associated with the old dance hall was a very old pole sign - but it is possible that the pole sign was used to advertise the Crystal Springs trailer park that was on the site in the final years of the dance hall and for a number of years afterwards.   I saw some random debris that was obviously from some sort of buildings.  But it also looked like the addition of  fill dirt and other sorts of dumping had also taken place on the property.  In short, other than the pole sign, I saw nothing there that I found to be at all interesting.  Of course, it is possible I did not know where to look.

 

It would not have been the same spring that feeds Burger's lake which is some distance upstream along the Trinity of where Crystal Springs' lake was.