San Antonio College Campus Tour

San Antonio College started in 1925 as a University of Texas-run junior college in a downtown building and settled on San Pedro Avenue in 1951. It grew into one of the largest community colleges in Texas and in 2021 won the Aspen Prize as the nation's top community college. This walk begins at the historic springs next door, where people have gathered for thousands of years, crosses the campus from its first 1950s hall to its space center and sustainability hub, and ends at a brewing magnate's mansion that served the college as a fine arts house for decades.

San Antonio College sits just north of downtown, and this walk shows how much history is packed into a campus whose buildings all date from 1951 or later. The college itself began in 1925 as a junior college in a downtown building, grew from about 500 students in 1950 to more than 9,000 by the mid-1960s, and in 2021 won the Aspen Prize as the nation's top community college.

Its neighbor is far older. San Pedro Springs, where people gathered for thousands of years, was recorded by Spanish missionary Isidro de Espinosa in 1709 and set aside as public land in 1729; the city made it a park in 1852, and it is widely described as the oldest park in Texas. It later served as an army camp and, briefly, a place to hold Union prisoners.

The space-age chapter is a highlight. SAC's planetarium opened in 1961 and was rededicated in 1994 to Dick Scobee, the Challenger commander who once took classes here; the expanded Scobee Education Center now includes a Challenger Learning Center with simulated space missions. And don't miss the Otto Koehler House, a 1901 mansion built for the president of Pearl Brewing, with a top-floor ballroom and a basement bowling alley. It served the college as a fine arts center for decades and is now privately owned, so admire it from the sidewalk.

It's a compact, surprising route that connects ancient springs, a celebrated civic college and one of San Antonio's grand brewing-era homes.