Tag Archives: Jacksonville

New Story: Baldwin: Everybody’s Restaurant

Posted on October 19, 2019 | Leave a comment

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The restaurant’s “been here forever,” they say, Minnie Bennett-Lynn “renamed it from Sunshine” and “wasn’t messin’ around.” Mr. Thigpen “supplied fresh horses for the stage and for its passengers he supplied food and shelter.” The town called Thigpen city fathers renamed for Dr. A.S. Baldwin. The fried okra’s better’n the fried squash.

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Tagged Baldwin, Dr. A.S. Baldwin, Duval County, Everybody's Restaurant, Everybody's Restaurant Baldwin, fried okra, fried squash, Jacksonville, jaxpsychogeo, Minnie Bennett-Lynn, Sunshine Cafe, Thigpen, Thigpen Florida, Tim Gilmore, West Beaver Street

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

Suddath / Van Valkenburgh House

Posted on April 27, 2019 | Leave a comment

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The citrus grove featured the first Satsumas in North America. Robert Bruce Van Valkenburgh had brought them from Japan. He’d raised 17 volunteer regiments for the Union in the Civil War, included the one he commanded at Antietam. The Suddaths called this rambling house home for 70 years and dug old bottles from the bluff. Jessica climbed the roof as a child.

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Tagged Alfred Schoonmaker, Anna Van Valkenburgh, Antietam, Barbara Suddath, Carl Suddath, Carrie Suddath, CSS Stonewall, Cynthia Parks, Daisy Schoonmaker, Empire Point, Frankenstein, glacis, Hazzard's Bluff, Isaiah Hart, Jacksonville, James Saunt, Janie Coffey, jax psycho geo, Jean Rhys, Jessica Miller, John Keats, Jud Miller, Julia Suddath, kitchen house, Kōtetsu, Lee Adams, Lord Byron, Louis Édouard Fournier, Mary Shelley, Mary Wollstonecraft, Oak Haven, Ossian Hart, Percy Bysshe Shelley, Richard Hazzard, Richard Suddath, Robert Bruce Van Valkenburgh, Sarah Clarke Stuart, Satsumas, Steve Suddath, Suddath Companies, Suddath House, Suddath Moving and Storage, Tim Gilmore, Unshu Mikan, Van Valkenburgh House, veranda, Wide Sargasso Sea

St. Johns Flower Market’s Long Strange Trip

Posted on April 16, 2019 | Leave a comment

From Moonies to “flower pimps” to midcentury modern architecture, Click here for the strange and wondrous story of St. Johns Flower Market.

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Tagged Canary in the Coal Mine, Charlie Strickland, Ed's Roses and Ribs, Emily Gilmore, Fairfax, Fishweir Elementary School, Gina Martinelli, Goal Post Sandwich Shop, Goliath Flores, Jacksonville, jax psycho geo, Jim Pons, Jonathan Lux, Katrina Thiesen, Lenny Thiesen, Leonard Theisen, Lonesome Ride, Madison Square Garden, Marianne Thiesen, Mass Wedding, Moonies, Ortega, Riverside Avondale, Skinner's Dairy, St Johns Flower Market, Sun Myung Moon, Taylor Hardwick, Tim Gilmore, Unification Church, University of North Florida, Virginia King

Wild Bill of Jax and His Leprosy

Posted on March 14, 2019 | Leave a comment

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“Will Bill of Jacksonville” had come back home, but outside a small circle of family and friends, he kept his diagnosis a secret. Not only did the disease frighten people, but in this Bible Belt town, it resonated as the plague of the Old Testament.

The Board of Health moved to quarantine his mother’s home on Rural Route 5 in the small western Duval County community of Hart Haven. “In closing,” he wrote, “let me give your readers, each and every one, a personal invitation. I assure you that when you leave, your outlook and perspective on life will be different.”

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Tagged Banished: Living with Leprosy, Bible Belt, Bill Clinton, Billy Burton, Carville: Remembering Leprosy in America, Discovery Channel, Hart Haven, I-10, I-95, Jacksonville, Jacksonville Board of Health, Jacksonville Florida, James Carville, jax psycho geo, jaxpsychogeo, Julia Elwood, leprosarium, Louisiana Leper Home, Marcia Gaudet, Mardi Gras, Mardi Gras at Carville, Marietta, Marilyn Kalfus, National Hansen’s Disease Center in Carville, Old Plank Road, Opal Burton, Opel Burton, Rural Route 5, St. Vincent's, Steve Rothman, Tim Gilmore, Wild Bill, Wild Bill of Jacksonville

Black Masonic Temple

Posted on December 1, 2018 | Leave a comment

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What these walls have seen! Architects Mark and Sheftall began their own firm in 1912 and with a commission for the grandest building in black Jacksonville. The Black Masonic Temple formed the brick foundation of the black community.

Princess Laura Adorkor Kofi preached her “back to Africa” message here in the 1920s. Future Florida Supreme Court Chief Justice Leander Shaw had his offices here in the 1960s. And the tunnels beneath Broad Street would offer protection if Florida’s massacres of black communities at Ocoee, Perry, and Rosewood should spread to Jacksonville.

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Tagged African Lodge no. 459, African Universal Church and Commercial League, Anderson Bank, Black Masonic Temple, C.H. Henry, Central America, Charles Wright, Clara White Mission, D.W. Perkins, Daniel Webster Perkins, Earl Mark, Florida Star, Frank Lloyd Wright, Free and Accepted Masons, Genaro Urso, Gerry Urso, Henry John Klutho, Incorporated Prince Hall Affiliated, Jacksonville, jaxpsychogeo, Jim Crow, John H. Dickinson, July Perry, Jurisdiction, Ku Klux Klan, Laura Adorkor Kofi, LaVilla, Lawrence Moman, Leander L. Shaw, Leander Shaw, Leeroy Sheftall, Louis Sullivan, lynching, Marcus Garvey, Mark and Sheftall, Most Worshipful Union Grand Lodge of the Most Ancient and Honorable Fraternity, NAACP, Negro Blue Book, Negro World, Ocoee Massacre, Padrica Mendez, Patricia Moman Bell, Pedro Mendez, Perry Massacre, Prairie Style, Prince Hall, Prince Hall freemasonry, Princess Laura Adorkor Kofi, Robert Broward, Rosewood Massacre, Stanton School, State of Florida and Belize, The Crisis, Tillman Valentine, Tim Gilmore, United States Colored Troops, USCT, Wainwright Building

Someone Save the Heston House

Posted on November 23, 2018 | 4 comments

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The bachelors were born in this house and died in this house, at either end of a century. The old boathouse fell into the creek. Linden’s boat, the Rapid Rabbit, became an artificial reef.

Charlie fished the whole world, but Sam Skinner drowned off the dinghy. Paul won tennis championships. Their mother watched St. Paul’s Episcopal Church float away on the creek. The beds are made, typewriter fossilized, and the house still waits.

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Tagged Alice Gibson, artificial reef, Atlantic and University Boulevards, Atlantic Boulevard, Campbell Avenue, Charlie Heston, Emily Dickinson, Fletcher Park, Florida linden, Harbor Point House, Heston House, Heston Road, Jacksonville, Jacksonville history, Jacksonville Museum of Arts and Sciences, jaxpsychogeo, Jetties, Lillian Heston, Lillian Holden Heston, Linden Heston, Little Pottsburg Creek, Long Range Navigation, LORAN, Mayport, Museum of Science and History, Oakhaven, Paul Heston, Paul Llewellyn Heston, Rabit's Lair, Rapid Rabbit, Sam Skinner, Samuel Skinner Jr., San Marco Preservation Hall, Skinner's Dairy, South Jacksonville School, St. Paul's Episcopal Church, Thyra Dickson, Tilia floridana, Tim Gilmore, Wakefield wicker

How Mayor Hazouri Defeated Stink / History of the City’s Greatest Offender

Posted on September 29, 2018 | Leave a comment

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When Jacksonville’s air ranked most fatal, when parts of the documentary The Smell of Money aired nationally, when the city was best-known for its stink, Mayor Tommy Hazouri declared war on odor. The oldest chemical plant in the city still offends. It began more than a century ago.

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Tagged Alton Box Company, BMW, Buckman Sewage, Crestwood, Crude Sulphate Turpentine, CST, Cummer Museum of Art and Gardens, Druid Hill Lane, Earl Thomas, Environmental Protection Agency, George Herbert, George Robbins, Glidden, Glidden Chemical Company, Great Stocking Rot, Gwen Yates, Gwendolyn Yates, Jacksonville, Jacksonville Environmental Protection, Jacksonville: The Consolidation Story, James Crooks, Jan Hill, jaxpsychogeo, Jefferson Smurfit, Joseph Hagan, LyondellBasell, Mattie Browning, Melissa Bush, Mike Templeton, Mike Tipping, Millennium Specialty Chemicals, Moncrief Creek, Norwood, Pinova Holdings, Prime Osborn, Renessenz LLC, Robert P.T. Young, SCM Glidco, SCM Organics, Seminole Kraft, Sharonda Powell, Standard Turpentine Co., Symrise, The Smell of Money, Tim Gilmore, Tommy Hazouri, Trout River, Union Camp Corporation, Wellington Cummer, William C. Gentry, William Gentry, World Cars, Yellow Fallout

New Story: The Cosmic Church of Truth

Posted on September 21, 2018 | Leave a comment

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In that little blue house in North Riverside, the spirits spoke through Ethel Tunks and told her she and Harold should found The Cosmic Church of Truth. A headline told readers, “Take a tour of the city’s nether world from séances to a visit to a haunted house.” Half a century later, though the Tunkses are gone, The Cosmic Church of Truth continues in its fourth location.

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Tagged Arthur Findlay College, Barbara Bomar, Bob Milkey, Both Sides Now, Bronson Alcott, Cosmic Church of Truth, Edgar Cayce, Edgewood Avenue, ESP, Ethel Tunks, Evy Irwin, Harmonic Convergence, Harold Tunks, Jacksonville, jaxpsychogeo, Jennifer Londrico, Jerusalem Syndrome, Jimmy Cox, Jo Ann Dunaway, Jo Anna Moore, José Argüelles, Joseph Smith, Kathryn Milkey, Louisa May Alcott, Mary Cox, Murray Hill, North Riverside, Oneida, Riverside Avondale, Rose of Riverside, Spiritual Lighthouse Church, Spiritualism, Theosophical Society, Tim Gilmore, Transcendentalism, Tzadikim Nistarim, WHVH Bookstore, William James

From the JaxPsychoGeo Archives: Dine with the Man in Green

Posted on September 20, 2018 | Leave a comment

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He lived in the tiny “cottage” on top of the Florida Life Building of the “Laura Street Trio.” For 35 years, he operated Berney’s Restaurant where Bark Downtown is now. As reported in Ripley’s Believe it or Not and Time magazine, Bernard Berney wore all green from head to toe. So did his Boston Terrier Peggy. In the restaurant, the chairs, booths, floor tiles, columns, menus and the bar itself were green. People called him a leprechaun. But he wasn’t Irish. He was Russian. In the 1990s, 30 years after closing, the bar, tables, chairs, and mirror were covered in dust like Miss Havisham’s Wedding.

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Tagged Andre Breton, Bark Downtown, Bernard Berney, Berney's Restaurant, Berney's Restaurant Jacksonville, Elks Club Building, Florida Life Building, Frances Berney, Glenn Emery, Henry John Klutho, J.B. Charles Jr., Jacksonville, jaxpsychogeo, John Beacham, Laura Street Trio, Leah Greenhut, Man in Green, Mason Hotel, Mayflower Hotel, Peggy Boston Terrier, Ripley's Believe it or Not, Robert Ripley, Roosevelt Hotel, Tim Gilmore, Victor Brauner, Walter Rose

Tag Archives: Jacksonville

New Story: Baldwin: Everybody’s Restaurant

New Story: Thomas Porter House

Suddath / Van Valkenburgh House

St. Johns Flower Market’s Long Strange Trip

Wild Bill of Jax and His Leprosy

Black Masonic Temple

Someone Save the Heston House

How Mayor Hazouri Defeated Stink / History of the City’s Greatest Offender

New Story: The Cosmic Church of Truth

From the JaxPsychoGeo Archives: Dine with the Man in Green

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