Great Pix of 1930 to 1960 Jax-San Marco-Kings Rd/Philips Hwy-Beaches-Bayard, etc

[stjr]

Check out the great photos of Jax, San Marco, Phillips Highway, Southside, etc. from about 1930's to early 1960's from this great site put together by the Landon High School Class of 1956:
http://www.landonhighschool1956.com/MemoryLane.html

Here are some samples from among dozens of photos:

The Krystal Drive-In on  Atlantic Blvd. - 1955 :


Lobster House and Jacksonville Skyline:


San Marco Square - 1940:


San Marco Gulf Station (now Balis Park in the center of the Square):


Green Turtle Restaurant, Phillips Highway near Emerson:


Riverside Chevrolet (now Nimnicht) when on Riverside Avenue (location now the Florida Times Union I believe) [Ock and Lake, note the streetcar tracks!]:

[JaxNole]

I sure hope this suburban strip mall development trend goes away permanently and ushers in a new wave of innovate design.  In the meantime, can we at least get brick strip malls please?  And I don't mean the token 10 bricks to compensate for all the stucco painted in blah-blah-blah beige or adobe orange.

[urbanlibertarian]

STJR,
Thanks for the link.

[JeffreyS]

Cool link

[David]

Looks like Bonos has been taking visa & mastercard for quite some time. That site claims this pic was took in 1949!

[JeffreyS]

I wondered about that myself and great color for 1949.

[thelakelander]

The original Bono's, at 4907 Beach  Blvd, opened in 1949.  Its still open today.

Bono's: Still smokin' at 60
http://www.jacksonville.com/business/2009-02-01/story/bonos_still_smokin_at_60

[Springfielder]

Very cool photos...thanks for sharing

[Jason]

Wow, that is a great picture.  San Marco square sure has changed.

I just wish the crappy bank right in the middle was never built.  Hopefully someone will come along and impolde that thing and add something to the historic walkable fiber.

[Shwaz]

http://www.landonhighschool1956.com/MEMORY%20LANE/Robert-Meyer.jpg

This building maybe the biggest eye sore of downtown. Such a waste.





Was Mt Vernon alway "adults only" / rent by the hour? 

[KenFSU]

Jacksonville Beach looks like it used to be so much cooler 50 years ago.

[stjr]

Before I-95, US 1 was the only way south.  All those motels were built in those early days.  When I-95 was built (early to mid-60's as I recall), these motels all made a gradual move downhill due to the loss of road traffic to the interstate.  The "adults only" came along in the 70's or later after nothing else worked for them.

Too bad.  Many of these were quaint little mom and pops that predated the Howard Johnson's. Holiday Inns and all the chains that followed.  If you drive many of the US highways, you can still see the ruins of these buildings, their conversions to other uses, or their mostly "flea bag" existence today.  I was recently on a stretch of US 301 in north Georgia into South Carolina and many of these motels are just burned out or decaying shells along that stretch.

By the way, Howard Johnson's on Philips Highway near Emerson hung in for a long time.  I remember visiting regularly at their restaurant for a club sandwich and one of their 28 flavors of ice cream "under the orange roof"!

Jacksonville-South, Florida-- 3007 Kings Hwy (Note: Now Philips Highway)

This was Jacksonville's first Motor Lodge/Restaurant complex, and it opened for business sometime in 1959 with its modified Nims type Gate Lodge. The "X" on the above postcard marked the spot where a lucky guest stayed the night back in 1959!

After opening, a two-story section was added to the site to meet the large demand for rooms. Apparently it had quite a choice spot since potential patrons were deposited nearly at its main drive-way from the then incomplete I-95. But the boon created by I-95's terminus eventually turned into bust for the old Howard Johnson's. After the Interstate was completed, the HoJo's was largely cut off and portions of its sprawling grounds were seized for the new roadways. Eventually the entire site was razed and no trace remains.

Jacksonville - South postcard:



For more on Howard Johnson's history in Jacksonville including at Ramona, Jax Beach, and Golfair, see: http://www.highwayhost.org/Florida/Jacksonville/jacksonville1.htm#South

and: http://www.highwayhost.org/Stategateways/florida.html

[stjr]

Here is an interesting footnote:  the Howard Johnson's design was based on a railroad station!  Take note of that Ock and Lake! 

The original design for Howard Johnson's restaurant was based on the design of the old Norfolk Downs Railroad Station on the Old Colony Rail Line in Quincy, Massachusetts. Howard wanted his restaurants to have the same "welcoming and warm feeling of a local community's train station."

And, I don't know that the drawing below was on Philips Highway here, but it looks an awful lot like it and matches well the drawing posted previously:



See more at a railroader's guide to Howard Johnson's (no joke!): http://www.slamtrak.com/hojo2003/

[civil42806]

Here is an interesting footnote:  the Howard Johnson's design was based on a railroad station!  Take note of that Ock and Lake! 

The original design for Howard Johnson's restaurant was based on the design of the old Norfolk Downs Railroad Station on the Old Colony Rail Line in Quincy, Massachusetts. Howard wanted his restaurants to have the same "welcoming and warm feeling of a local community's train station."

And, I don't know that the drawing below was on Philips Highway here, but it looks an awful lot like it and matches well the drawing posted previously:



See more at a railroader's guide to Howard Johnson's (no joke!): http://www.slamtrak.com/hojo2003/

Can we work rail into evey thread. YES WE CAN!!