A plan for construction of Jacksonville’s first enclosed shopping mall was announced by developers and owners Joan and Martin Stein.
The mall in Arlington would be known as Regency Square.
Tenants would include 60 retailers, including many of Jacksonville’s leading department stores and specialty shops.
In selecting tenants for the center, which would be the largest enclosed mall in Florida, Stein said his goal was to get a cross section of established Jacksonville retail and service businesses.
A spokesman for the Steins provided an overview of the philosophy behind the mall.
“The 60 stores in the Regency Square will provide every kind of merchandise and service a customer would normally expect to find in an urban shopping area, but she will not have to fight Downtown traffic or pay for parking,” said Maurice Alpert, developing agent.
“She will have more time to actually shop and she will be able to go from store to store without having to brave the elements or changes of temperature,” he said.
Stein said the center could be characterized as emphasizing elegance and convenience.
“High fashion, jewelry stores and accessory shops have been designed so that shopping may be done on a coordinated basis,” he said.
The $12 million project was scheduled to begin in November with completion expected by February 1967.
• St. Regis Paper Co. asked the Duval County Equalization Board to reduce 1965 real estate tax assessments totaling $11.4 million on its mill and forest lands.
The company’s pleas highlighted a session in which the entire timber industry in Duval, along with dairy and beef farmers, vigorously protested their new assessments.
One of the complainants, a spokesman for the dairy farmers, said dairy farms would be virtually extinct in Duval County within five years if improved pasture land was assessed at $160 per acre as proposed by the assessor’s office.
The same scenario was forecast by a spokesman for beef cattle farmers. He said the western United States was running out of pasture land and Florida could fill the void, but not with an unfavorable tax structure.
A spokesman for the timber interests said at the new assessment rate of $50 per acre, Duval County growers were paying twice the taxes as their competitors in nearby counties.
J. McHenry Jones of Pensacola, southern counsel for St. Regis, contended the firm’s paper mill along Eastport Road should have been assessed at $4 million rather than the $7.8 million figure levied by the assessor.
He said if the machinery and equipment were removed from the plant, it would be difficult to sell because it was not constructed to house equipment developed since St. Regis opened the mill in 1950.
• Police searched an area of Riverside for a man they said possibly was armed with a machine gun and who claimed he would not be taken alive.
Police identified the man as Ernest Harsfield, age and address unknown. Officers said he could be armed with a machine gun, which he reportedly carried in a sling under his shirt.
Three other people, believed to be companions of the man, were arrested in the 1200 block of Ingleside Avenue. They were being held for investigation of burglary and possession of narcotics.
• Two men died from lead poisoning caused by drinking improperly distilled moonshine whiskey,
Assistant County Medical Examiner Dr. Edward Willey warned that if unchecked, cases of lead poisoning from illegal liquor could reach “epidemic proportions.”
At least four others, all friends of the dead men, were known to have been afflicted with similar but less severe poisoning.
The deceased lived together along University Boulevard north of Jacksonville University.
On the enforcement side of Jacksonville’s 1965 moonshine situation, officers from the vice squad destroyed five stills in the Chaseville area of Arlington, including the one believed to be the source of the deadly contaminated moonshine.
• A group of young men from Jacksonville traveled to Michigan and then found themselves in a pickle.
The high school students were participating in a U.S. Department of Labor program intended to alleviate a national shortage of farm workers and were picking cucumbers.
When the rookie harvesters began having trouble meeting their 1.5 bushel daily production quota, the Heinz Growers Association warned them to either pick it up or pack it out and go home.
“They are just not pickle-pickers, but they are better than nothing,” said Jeff Hays, Heinz Agricultural district manager.
After consulting with their counselor, Van Pelt, a teacher at San Mateo Elementary School and a Heinz field representative, the students decided to give it their best in hopes of returning home on their originally scheduled date, Aug, 27.
The group was made up primarily of students from Andrew Jackson and Ribault high schools.
• Three men were injured when a shed at Mayport Naval Station in which they had sought shelter from a thunderstorm was hit by lightning.
Lt. J.C. Brown of the station security force said the men were fishing from a 16-foot plastic boat in the St. Johns River near the north jetties when the storm began.
He said the trio tied the boat to the rocks and then took shelter about 100 yards away in a shed at a construction site at the station.
Lightning then hit the building, knocking the men unconscious. The first man to regain consciousness made his way to a car nearby to seek help, where he found a retired U.S. Navy chief petty officer, who administered first aid and sent for an ambulance.
The fishermen were first taken to the Mayport Dispensary and then transferred to Beaches Hospital.
• The Jacksonville Beach City Council raised the price for burial plots in H. Warren Smith Cemetery.
New charges for adult grave plots formerly costing $150-$200 went up to $200-$300.
The cost of infant graves in the cemetery’s “Babyland” section would remain at $30. The infant graves were one-sixth the size of adult graves.
Charges for opening and closing graves were not increased. For adult graves, including the use of a tent and equipment, were $50 Monday-Friday and $75 on Saturday.
Council members also agreed to sponsor boxing matches at the Jacksonville Beach band shell.
“Boxing is one activity that helps stem juvenile delinquency,” said council member John Joca.
• Muriatic acid leaking from a faulty connection on a tank truck in Riverview put two men in a hospital and forced evacuation of several residents from the area.
Charles Smith, manager of a cleaning firm at Lem Turner Road at Trout River Boulevard, where the leak occurred and the truck driver, Clyde Sutton of Brunswick, Ga., were taken to St. Luke’s Hospital after being overcome by fumes.
Capt. Larry Beck of the Riverview-Lake Forest volunteer fire department said residents were evacuated from about 10 nearby homes for more than three hours.
Henry Melzer, Duval County fire marshal, said a faulty valve caused about 150 gallons of the acid to leak onto the ground while being transferred from one tank truck to another, the latter to have been used as a storage tank.
• Jacksonville University Registrar Thomas Dula Jr. was appointed assistant director of schools for the Diocese of St. Augustine.
The announcement was made by Rt. Rev. Msgr. Mortimer Daniher, director of schools for the diocese’s department of education.
Dula joined the JU staff in 1962, serving as director of institutional research as well as registrar.