Tag Archives: Duncan U. Fletcher

Spiritual Lighthouse Church

Posted on January 29, 2021 | 2 comments

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It was home, in the old days, to Southern preaching, bluegrass mandolin, and séances. Bluegrass gospel musicians Billie and Gordon Hamrick were staunch Southern Baptists, but Billie had “psychic visions.” The line of Spiritualist pastors here, almost all women, dates back to training by the famous psychic Edgar Cayce. In one of Jill Cook Richards’s first séances at the church, she says, her guardian angel came to her.

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Tagged Andrew Jackson High School, Anna Fletcher, Association for Research and Enlightenment, Atlantis, Billie and Gordon Hamrick, Billie Hamrick, Bob Gray, Chris Hansen, Cosmic Church of Truth, Crestwood Street, Duncan Fletcher, Duncan U. Fletcher, Edgar Cayce, Glidden, Glidden Chemical Company, Gordon Hamrick, Grace Brewer, Ida Pierce, Jacksonville Woman's Club, Jill Cook, Jill Cook Richards, Jimmy Cox, Katie Seltzer, Kirby Smith Junior High School, Lemuria, Marty Hamrick, Mary Ann Lindley, Mary Cox, Millennium Specialty Chemicals, Naomi Hansen, Norwood, Old Country Church TV show, Playtime Drive-In, Southern Gothic Jacksonville, Spiritual Lighthouse Church, Standard Turpentine Co., Symrise, Tim Gilmore, Tina McAlister, Trinity Baptist Church, William C. Hansen

The Armory

Posted on January 22, 2021 | Leave a comment

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Truly this story has it all. The old Armory has stories enough for a hundred cities. There’s no way to tease it adequately. Urban exploration. Thousands of concerts, from opera to Janis Joplin and the Allman Brothers. Political debates and politicians’ funerals and boxing bouts. Stories of integration (James Weldon Johnson, Duke Ellington, Marian Anderson) defiant against Jim Crow. And a call for a future.

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Tagged Abe Livert’s Records, Allman Brothers Band, Along This Way, Angie Rodeillat Smith, Armory Jacksonville, Bryant Bowles, Charley Johns, Clarence Darrow, Colonel Edward Henry, Confederate Ball, Dave Franklin Duke Ellington, Dennis Riggs, Doyle Carlton, Duncan Fletcher, Duncan U. Fletcher, Duval County Armory, Edge City, First Baptist Church Jacksonville, Florida Civil Rights, Florida history, Florida National Guard, Florida Times-Union, Floripatra, Garage Boutique, Gator Bowl, Great Fire of 1901, Haydon Burns, Hixon’s Surfboard Revolution, Hoyt’s High Fidelity, J.C. Coppedge, Jacksonville Armory, Jacksonville Coliseum, Jacksonville history, Jacksonville Sheriff's Office, James Weldon Johnson, Janis Joplin Jacksonville, jax psycho geo, John T. Alsop, Johnny Brewer, Johns Committee, KKK Jacksonville, Ku Klux Klan Jacksonville, Leo Kitchen Orchestra, Marian Anderson, Marian Anderson Jacksonville, Marvin Strickland, McCoys Creek, NAAWP, Nake Pear, National Association for the Advancement of White People, Paulus Music, Pickaninny Chorus, Prohibition Jacksonville, Riggs Promotion, Roosevelt Mall, Samuel Coleridge-Taylor, Samuel Coleridge-Taylor Song of Hiawatha, Senator Duncan Fletcher, Sidney Catts, Sidney Drachin, Tim Gilmore, Tim Gilmore Jax Psycho Geo, Tommy Torino, United Confederate Veterans, W.A. Hobbs, W.F. Bunch, Ye Mystic Krewe of Gasparilla, Ye Mystic Revelers

New Story: Thomas Porter House

Posted on October 10, 2019 | Leave a comment

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Last week’s JaxPsychoGeo story was about a crossroads once the most prestigious in the city. This week’s story centers on the one house that remains. Its future is uncertain. Half a century ago, Bess Porter Keely remembered what it was like, half a century before, to get married in her childhood home.

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Tagged Akel's, Baalbeck, Bess Porter Keely, Duncan Fletcher House, Duncan U. Fletcher, Florida history, Heliopolis, Henry John Klutho, Jacksonville, James Taliaferro House, Jessie-Lynne Kerr, KBJ Architects, Kentucky Home for Roomers, Landrum and Brown, Robert Broward, Sharon Gould, Thomas Porter, Thomas Porter House. T.V. Porter, Tim Gilmore, Virginia King, Walter Porter

The Crossroads: One House Still Stands

Posted on September 15, 2019 | Leave a comment

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It was the most prestigious crossroads in the city. Two senators lived here. Anna Fletcher said her house was haunted, that a grandfather clock had thrown itself upon a young woman. She wrote about it in her 1929 book Death Unveiled. Now only the Porter House remains. Click below for the full story.

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Tagged Anna Fletcher, Anna Louise Fletcher, Architects’ and Builders’ Magazine, Duncan Fletcher House, Duncan U. Fletcher, First Christian Church. H.J. Klutho, Henry John Klutho, Isaiah Hart, J.H.W. Hawkins, Jacksonville City Hall, Jacksonville history, James Taliaferro House, jaxpsychogeo, Napoleon Bonaparte Broward, Ossian Hart, Robert Broward, Spiritualism, Stephen Mallory II, Thomas Porter House, Tim Gilmore, W.S. Ware House, William James Bryant, William S. Ware

Anna Fletcher’s Final Home

Posted on September 5, 2017 | Leave a comment

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Photographs of ghosts, of ectoplasm. She died here, in her final home, on Riverside Avenue.

The wife of the Jacksonville mayor and longest-serving U.S. senator from Florida testified before Congress, against Houdini, on behalf of Spiritualism.

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Tagged Anna Fletcher, Anna Louise Fletcher, Arthur Conan Doyle, Cassadaga, Clara Louise Leslie, Death Unveiled, Duncan Fletcher, Duncan U. Fletcher, ectoplasm, Fletcher Mansion, H.P. Lovecraft, Harry Houdini, Hugo's Interiors, Jacksonville, jaxpsychogeo, Jennie Hugo, Riverside Avenue, Rosabelle Believe, seance, Sherlock Holmes, Spiritualism, Thomas Porter, Tim Gilmore, Yellow Fever