"It was a whole scene. It was where the youth of Austin would all go and congregate, at that mall," Louis Tash, Doug Tash's brother, says later, standing in front of a sign that reads, "No Wal-Mart!

If you grew up in the ‘80s, the mall wasn’t just a place to buy stuff; it was where life happened. It was where you met friends, flirted awkwardly, and wasted hours flipping through cassette ...