Bank announces construction project, legislators call for local funding of schools
Have you ever wondered what life was like in Jacksonville half a century ago? It may have been a different era of history, culture and politics but there are often parallels between the kind of stories that made headlines then and today. As interesting as the differences may be, so are the similarities. These are some of the top stories from the week of March 29-April 4, 1960. The items were compiled from the Jacksonville Public Library’s periodical archives by Staff Writer Max Marbut.
• It was announced that construction would begin in three weeks on the new 11-story Florida National Bank Building on Hogan Street between Adams and Monroe streets, the structure we now know as the Ed Ball Building.
Roger Main, president and board chairman of FNB, said the contract for construction had been awarded to the George A. Fuller Company of New York City, which at the time was one of the nation’s largest builders.
The firm built the Lincoln Memorial, Washington National Cathedral and U.S. Supreme Court Building in Washington, D.C.; the United Nations Building, Flatiron Building and Time-Life Building in New York City; and had constructed capitol buildings in states from Maine to Louisiana.
The building was designed by local architectural firm Saxelbye & Powell. The first floor would be devoted to retail use while the bank would occupy the second, third and possibly the fourth floors.
Main said seven contractors were invited to bid on the building and he expected construction to be complete in 16 months.
• Duval County’s legislative delegation called for a return of financial responsibility for education to the local level, but admitted they had no answers for immediate money problems confronting local public schools.
State Sen. Wayne Ripley and State Reps. Harry Westberry, George Stallings and John E. Mathews Jr. discussed the tax structure and education at the annual legislative meeting of the Duval County Classroom Teachers Association at the Roosevelt Hotel.
Mathews said increasing control over education would be concentrated in Washington and Tallahassee unless local agencies were empowered to effectively support their own school system. He added that a reversal of the trend toward federal and state support “may pay off in a decade.”
Stallings called for constitutional revision or amendment to provide local opportunities for adequate financing of schools through a broader tax structure. He added that “a return of school financing to the people would result in a bright future.”
• With Municipal Judge John Santora sitting in as an observer, the City Pardon Board refused to grant any petitions to pardon inmates of the prison farm.
The board, composed of three City Council members, took no action on applications to pardon six inmates, all of them sentenced in Santora’s court.
The judge told a reporter he was at the meeting simply as an observer. After the meeting Santora had no comment on the proceedings.
As he had done at previous meetings, board member Lemuel Sharp told an applicant he was concerned, in considering a pardon, about newspaper publicity or editorial comment which might result from any pardon application.
• The last financial hurdle toward construction of a municipal auditorium was cleared when the City sold $2.5 million worth of certificates of indebtedness at an average interest rate of 3.718 percent.
Acceptance of the low interest bid made by the New York firm of Goldman, Sachs & Company meant the City would pay $764,496.25 interest on the certificates in addition to the principal.
The law authorizing the certificates required that they be retired with City revenues other than ad valorem taxes and cigarette taxes. It was expected the debt would be retired with revenue from the City Electric Department.
Receipt by City officials of the money in New York on April 19, when the certificates would be delivered, would complete financial arrangements for construction of the $4.5 million auditorium, theater and exhibition hall on the Downtown riverfront just east of the Atlantic Coast Line Building.
• Six acres of property adjoining the Southside Drive-in Theatre on Love Grove Road east of Philips Highway were purchased for construction of a two-story department store.
Realtors Arehart and White Inc. negotiated the sale. Company President William Arehart said the land was purchased by Robert Lehmann, who would build and own the store. Purchase price of the property, owned by Irving Hall, was $47,500.
Arehart said construction would begin in six weeks and the store would have 28 departments, a restaurant and parking for 1,000 automobiles. The total investment would be $2 million.
Lehmann’s company owned and operated 70 similar stores throughout the United States, all separately incorporated and all with different names. The Jacksonville store would be called “The Met” and was scheduled to open in August, Arehart said.
• The Jacksonville Beach City Council enacted an ordinance declaring the City-owned golf course property as surplus and set April 6 to open bids for its sale.
The 113-acre tract included a nine-hole course which the City had already built and the land on which another nine-hole layout was to be built.
Terms of the sale provided that bidders had to post a $10,000 good faith deposit and agree to construct the additional nine holes within 120 days. The bill also stipulated that the property would always be used and maintained as a golf course.
• Thousands of sunbathers, boaters, anglers and sightseers took advantage of the first spring-like weekend to flock to the Beaches, the zoo, parks and other recreational facilities.
Capt. Ray Maxey of the Jacksonville Beach Volunteer Lifesaving Corps said Sunday was “the best day of the year at the Beaches.” He estimated 2,000 automobiles and as many as 5,000 people were on the sand.
D.M. Bozeman, foreman at the Jacksonville Zoo, said about 10,000 people came to see the animals, the largest attendance in three years. Automobiles were lined up bumper to bumper between Heckscher Drive and Main Street and many people arrived at the zoo, circled the parking lot and left when they couldn’t find an open parking space.
• A Northeast Airlines DC-6 with 59 people aboard made an emergency landing at Imeson Airport to examine passenger luggage as a result of what turned out to be a bomb threat hoax.
The four-engine aircraft was on a scheduled nonstop flight from Miami to Boston and 125 miles east of Jacksonville when the pilot received a radio message from Miami instructing him to land at the nearest airport. The airline’s office had received a telephone call that a bomb was on a Northeast plane.
Capt. E.J. Larson of West Medford, Mass., brought the plane to a stop in a remote area of the airport. Passengers were evacuated and the baggage was removed. A team of detectives with a fluoroscope inspected the baggage and no explosives were found.
Larson said the report “threw a double bomb scare into me” because his 18-year-old daughter, Marilyn, was one of the passengers.
• The U.S. Naval Academy played lacrosse against Yale in front of 1,000 fans at the Gator Bowl and won the game 19-6. The Navy team was the preseason pick to win the 1960 collegiate lacrosse title.