Tag Archives: Herschel Shepard

Because of Poor Planning, Parking Storage is Hollowing Out Downtown Jax

Posted on July 3, 2022 | Leave a comment

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Call them “parking craters” or “dead zones” or osteoporosis. Mammoth parking garages are eating Downtown alive. When the flâneuX sees only parking storage on either side, they guess Downtown is the “parking district.” Jane Jacobs titled a famous essay “Downtown is for People.” Jax authorities sometimes seem to think otherwise.

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Tagged "Parking Craters: A Downtown Vibrancy Killer", Aaron Zahn, Bill Delaney, Bob Wolverton, Brooklyn Jacksonville, Downtown Development Review Board Jacksonville, Downtown Investment Authority Jacksonville, downtown Jacksonville parking, Fidelity Information Services Building, Fire Station No. 5 Jacksonville, Gensler, Herb Coons, Herschel Shepard, Jacksonville Central Park, Jacksonville Electric Authority, Jacksonville parking craters, jacksonville parking garages, jacksonville parking storage, Jacksonville walkshed, James Weldon Johnson Park, Lenny Curry, parking craters, Peter Rumple, Reggie Bridges, St. Johns Episcopal Cathedral, Ted Pappas

This is Where the First House Stood

Posted on July 1, 2022 | Leave a comment

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Here, Lewis Zachariah and Maria Hogans built the first house. It preceded the city (if you could call it that) of Jacksonville by six years. Oddly, the Spanish had built houses here before the “first house” was built. When hotels replaced it, the Old Hogans Well remained. The city burnt and rebuilt and burnt and rebuilt. Today, the concrete discus atop the city looks like a UFO landing pad.

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Tagged "Oldest House in Jacksonville", Atlantic National Bank, Atlantic National Bank Parking Garage, Bob Wolverton, Cafe Belvidere, Duval Hotel, first house in Jacksonville, General John Forsyth, Helmut Jahn, Henry John Klutho, Henry Klutho Seminole Hotel, Herb Coons, Herschel Shepard, Hogans Well, Jacksonville Post Office Tower, Lewis Zachariah Hogans, Maria Hogans, Maria Suarez, Maria Taylor, New Duval Hotel, Nichols House, Parnel Taylor, Patriot War, Peter Rumpel, Robert Pritchard, Seminole Hotel, Seminole Wars, Ted Pappas

New Story: Old St. Johns River Lighthouse

Posted on February 28, 2019 | Leave a comment

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When I climbed the lighthouse in the year 2000, we found, in place of the light, the nest of a great night bird of prey. The Old St. Johns Lighthouse should stand for hundreds of years, perhaps a thousand, says Herschel Shepard, the architect who restored it. The door’s long buried in the risen ground. Wanton S. Webb called it a “pretty romance,” the story of a retired maritime sergeant who locked his daughter in the lighthouse a century and a half ago.

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Tagged "The Story of Mayport", Audubon Society, bar pilots, barred owl, BEAKS, Bird Emergency Aid and Kare Sanctuary, Bluebeard, convolvulus, Elizabeth Stark, Fanny Brandt, Fresnel, George A. Smathers, Glenn Bartley, Hazard Light, Hazard Lighthouse, Herschel Shepard, Jack Spottwood, Jacksonville Beaches, jax psycho geo, jaxpsychogeo, Jean Ribault, John Kunkel Small, Ken Smith, Mayport, Mayport lighthouse, Mayport Navy Base, Morning Glory, Old St. Johns Lighthouse, Rapunzel, Ribault Monument, Tim Gilmore, Wanton S. Webb