Taste of Texas’ Nina Hendee to Share Texas History in Fayetteville
On Sunday Sept. 20, at 3 p.m. the Fayetteville Community Center & Performance Theatre will host a presentation by Nina Hendee, owner of Taste of Texas restaurant in Houston. This award winning restaurant is much more than a steakhouse. Alongside the aged steaks, Texas hospitality and famously generous portions is a remarkable collection of artifacts, documents and memorabilia that tells the story of Texas. Nina Hendee is the heart of that collection. She and her husband, Edd, have spent 40+ years turning their restaurant into an unlikely museum—and a classroom for young Texans.
Nina’s greatest passion may be sharing those treasures rather than simply owning them.
She personally leads Texas- history tours for fourthgrade students, combining a look behind the scenes at a working restaurant with stories about the people who shaped Texas. The program is offered at no cost to schools. Between 15,000 and 20,000 students each year are treated to lunch as part of the experience. The restaurant says Nina’s tours have become a tradition for thousands of students, some of whom now return with children of their own.
Among all the treasures in the collection, few have generated more excitement than a pair of doors from the Alamo Chapel.
In 2022, Nina learned that the interior sacristy doors of the Alamo Chapel were coming up for auction. The Spanish- colonial doors, believed to date to about 1750, had been removed from the Alamo in the 1950s and had remained in private hands for decades. Nina immediately began researching their history and explaining to the sellers how prominently the doors would be displayed and used in the educational program at Taste of Texas.
On Dec. 16, 2022, Nina and Edd learned that they had won the auction. On March 6, 2023—the 187th anniversary of the Battle of the Alamo— the historic doors went on permanent display in the restaurant’s lobby.
The significance of the doors is not lost on Nina. They are not merely antique objects; they are physical connections to the people and events students are learning about. As generations of Texans walk through the restaurant, the doors offer something a textbook cannot: the opportunity to stand in front of an object that was part of the Alamo itself.
That philosophy seems to define Nina Hendee’s approach to history. She believes that history becomes meaningful when people can see it, touch it and hear the stories behind it. Her collection gives those stories a home, while her tours give them an audience.
The Alamo doors may be among the collection’s most extraordinary treasures. But perhaps Nina Hendee’s greatest achievement is making sure that the history they represent remains alive for the next generation.
Fayetteville Community Center Speakers Series is in part funded by a generous grant from Second Chance Emporium. Admission is free. Refreshments will be served.