Rockport’s original Big Blue Crab began atop the Del Mar Grill on Austin Street, where Dorothy and Sal Silverman ran the restaurant in 1957 and Dorothy’s crab cakes were a specialty. Measuring 18 feet wide and 22 feet deep, the crab was made of rebar, chicken wire, and papier mache’. It survived hurricanes Carla in 1961 and Beulah in 1967. After the Grill closed in 1965, the Chamber of Commerce bought the crab for $200 to use as a photographic backdrop and parade attraction promoting Rockport. In October 1966, it was moved to Veterans Memorial Park by the harbor. In 1969, a winter Texan repainted it, turning it into a female by painting the tips of the pinchers red. Although it survived hurricane Celia in 1970, it had deteriorated and was finally taken down in 1976. From October 2011 to August 2012, local artist David Allgood built a new crab from aluminum rods and tubing, screen, resin, and matting, and it was larger than the original at 25 feet wide by 27 feet deep.