Tag Archives: coquina gates

New Story: Casa Marina Hotel at Jacksonville Beach

Posted on August 31, 2020 | Leave a comment

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The other beach hotels all burned. Whichever presidents stayed here, and whether or not Jean Harlow and Al Capone did, the history of the Casa Marina at Jacksonville Beach includes an organ grinder and monkey, a vanished penthouse octagon bedroom, Victorian lace blouses and kolinsky furs. Here, Rachel and Dan shared wedding vows with their six year old son, a thousand ambitious business plans expanded and deflated, and the old building’s savior had his ashes spread into the ocean by surfboard.

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Tagged Allan Brown, Atlantic Beach Hotel, Atlantic Hotel, Barbara Mattison, Beaches Foundation, Bill Foley, Burdside Hotel, Butch Shadwell, Candace L. Preston, Casa Marina, Casa Marina Hotel, Casa Marina Hotel Jacksonville Beach, Casa Marina Hotel Jax Beach, Casa Marina Jacksonville Beach, Casa Marina Jax Beach, Casa Marina Motel Apartments, Casablanca Bar Casa Marina, Continental Hotel Atlantic Beach, coquina gates, Cynthia Parks, David Krest, David Krest Neptune Beach, Florida Land Boom, George Brandt, Greg Mattison, Gypsy Players by the Sea, Harlow's Tea Room, Hionides Jacksonville Beach, Hurricane Dora, Hurricane Dora Jacksonville Beach, Jacksonville Beach, Jacksonville Beach boardwalk, Jacksonville Beach Ferris Wheel, Jacksonville Beach Pier, Jacksonville Beach Pier Dance Pavilion, Jacobethan Revival, Jimmy Trotter, John Jorgensen, Karen Brune, Kevin Hogencamp, Marcy Appelbaum, Mary Lou Brown, Maxine Freeman, Mayflower Hotel Jacksonville, Mediterranean Revival, Miami Beach Casino Jazz Orchestra, Murray Hall, Norma Brizzi Players by the Sea, Ocean Life Natural Foods Jacksonville Beach, Osbert Lancaster, Otto Flemming, Pablo Beach, Rachel Kitzman, Renae Mattison, Sandpiper Hotel, Sean Mattison, Sean Mattison surfing, Tea Room Casa Marina, Tim Gilmore, Tim Gilmore Jaxpsychogeo, Wini Rider, Winter City in Summer Land

The Beerbower House: Prehistoric Avondale

Posted on April 5, 2019 | 1 comment

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The house will ever be imbued with the story of its strange genesis. Casper and Ida ferried coquina to the woods where Riverside ended. When the president called Elsie “predestined to be a star and kissed [her] on the brow,” she told her mother, “You kiss me too. I may never be kissed in the White House again.” Then Tilly had occasion to chat with Lynn Beerbower, to find out “how small boys used to earn their pleasures.”

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Tagged "Break the News to Mother, 1776 Challen, Al Jolson, American Expeditionary Forces, Anti-Ragtime Girl, Avondale, Axel Hendrickson, Beerbower House, Behind the Lines, Bette Davis, Casper Beerbower, Challen Avenue, coquina, coquina gates, Dark Victory, Edgewood Association, Edgewood Avenue, Elias Jaudon, Elsie Janis, Florrie was a Flapper, George Buker, Ginger Harris, Gloria Swanson, Hollywood Walk of Fame, Ida B., Ida Beerbower, James Randall Challen, jax psycho geo, jim russell, John Talbott, Leah Powell, leatherleaf fern, Lynn Beerbower, Magnolia Plantation, Mary Hendrickson, Napoleon Bonaparte Broward, Riverside Avondale, Spanish American War, St. Augustine, Talbot Avenue, Telfair Stockton, Tell Tilly, The Jazz Singer, The Three Friends, The Trespasser, Tilly Teller, Tim Gilmore, Vaudeville, Virginia Harris, Washington Oaks, water hyacinths, William McKinley

Stories 4 and 5 of Coquina Gates: Last Chance and The Gates

Posted on April 3, 2017 | 1 comment

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For Coquina Gates story no. 4: First House, Last Chance–

Anna died just shy of her 94th birthday, on April Fools’ Day. 2009.

Andrea’s is the original house and the only one the Russells never named. Andrea moved into Anna’s first house while Anna lived in her last house.

For Coquina Gates story no. 5: The Gates–

Barbara knew Jim only at the end of his life. He was frustrated, depressed.

“This is the miraculous site,” Barbara says, “of Jim Russell’s artistry and Anna Russell’s love and care for that vision.”

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Tagged Andrea Maybury, anna russell, Bachee, Barbara Mattison, Bartram, Bill Mattison, coquina, coquina gates, Greg Mattison, Jacksonville, James Russell, jaxpsychogeo, jim russell, Kristen Martini, Last Chance, The Gates, Tim Gilmore, William "Greg" Mattison, William Mattison

Coquina Gates, Part 3: Riots of the Fall and Nor’east

Posted on March 26, 2017 | Leave a comment

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“I remember Coquina Gates as a place filled always with music,” she says. Riots of the Fall was a folk festival Jim and Anna Russell held at Coquina Gates for three years in the mid-1960s.

“And my dad was very tender. He’d go out there in the mornings and find these little frogs had drowned in the pool. So he got up earlier. And every morning he was out there trying to get the frogs and all the insects that had landed in the pool, because he didn’t want any of them to drown.”

Inside the house called Nor’east, the legendary door, which I’ve heard is cypress and I’ve heard is oak, which I’ve heard weighs 300 pounds and I’ve heard weighs 700 pounds, once opened to the breeze.

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Tagged anna russell, Austin Pool, Charlotte Daniels and Patt Web, coquina, coquina gates, Cousin Thelma, Debbie Russell, Florida Folk Festival, Hootenanny, James Russell, jaxpsychogeo, jim russell, Kevin Lewis, Kon Tiki Lounge, Nor'east, pecky cypress, Riots of the Fall, Seahorse, Tim Gilmore, Wild Cherry

Coquina Gates, Part 2: Redemption at Chinquapin

Posted on March 19, 2017 | Leave a comment

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The house doesn’t just welcome you. It harbors you. It’s there for you. It’s the earth formed up from itself for the sole purpose of taking care of you.

Destructive forces so often tempered and made stronger the softer forms of the forest.

No creator creates the creation. Humility and awe were materials as integral as wood and stone.

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Tagged anna russell, Arlington, Chinquapin, coquina, coquina gates, fibonacci, Jacksonville, James Russell, jaxpsychogeo, jim russell, Kristen Martini, Tim Gilmore, Wild Cherry

Coquina Gates, Part 1: Death at Wild Cherry

Posted on March 11, 2017 | Leave a comment

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“Coquina brings you close to the sea,” Jim said. It also resists the summers and provides a stone sponge texture for the humidity and the clinging of hysterical Floridian lushness. Jacksonville is sea and swamp. So is Coquina Gates.

Anna immediately began to take her clothes off and said, “What’s the point of living in the country if you can’t take your clothes off outside?”

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Tagged anna russell, Arlington, bob campbell, coquina, coquina gates, jim russell, Tim Gilmore