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 this week in 1960. The items were compiled from the Jacksonville Public Library’s periodical archives by Staff Writer Max Marbut.
• Raymond C. Reynolds, former manager of the transit department at Florida National Bank, was given a suspended sentence and placed on probation for five years on his plea of guilty to embezzling $3,600 of bank funds.
A special condition of the probation imposed by U.S. District Judge Bryan Simpson was that Reynolds make full restitution of the money.
According to FBI agents, Reynolds had taken cash mailed to FNB by the Bankers Trust Co. of New York and used it to purchase a cashiers check which he deposited to his account in another local bank. The embezzlement took place in April, but due to his position at the bank, Reynolds was able to conceal the shortage until August, the agents said.
In other cases before the U.S. District Court:
Two years’ probation was imposed on Hartley John Williams, who pleaded guilty to impersonating an FBI agent while he was on shore leave from his job as an electronics technician on an Atlantic Missile Range tracking ship.
Williams told Simpson he had been drinking in a tavern on Beach Boulevard when he “blacked out.”
Then, according to testimony by FBI agents, Williams went out on the street, flagged down a passing car and told the occupants to pursue another automobile which, he said, was driven by a man in possession of classified military secrets.
The chase ended at the Fuller Warren Bridge where the pursued car was halted and Williams, claiming to be an FBI agent, attempted to put the driver under arrest.
The escapade ended when police arrived. When Williams could produce no identification, he was taken to jail.
The only jail sentence handed out in federal court was meted out to Bobby Joe Braswell, an enlisted man in the U.S. Air Force, who pleaded guilty to violating the white slave traffic act.
Braswell was charged with transporting Doris Ann Bridgman from Atlanta to Jacksonville for immoral purposes. He was sentenced to 18 months.
• Football fans by the thousands poured into Jacksonville for the annual Florida-Georgia classic in the Gator Bowl in Saturday. Major hotels had been booked solid for as long as eight weeks and motels in town and at the Beaches were also expected to be full for the weekend.
The Atlantic Coast Line Railroad ran five special trains and the Seaboard Airline Railroad one special from points throughout the state to the game. More than 3,000 fans were expected to arrive by rail Saturday and a fleet of 59 buses took them from Union Terminal to the stadium.
Restaurants and local merchants in general were expecting a boom from the influx of visitors. A spokesman for the Jacksonville Tourist and Convention Bureau “conservatively estimated” that each out-of-town visitor would spend at least $25 a day while in town for the game.
The Gators shredded the Bulldogs’ defense with three touchdowns in the first three quarters of the game, then hung on through a withering pass attack down the stretch to defeat Georgia 22-14 in front of 48,622 fans, the largest crowd ever to see a football game in North Florida.
The victory moved Head Coach Ray Graves’ squad front-and-center for the host role in the 16th Annual Gator Bowl game that would be played on Dec. 31.
• A price tag of $4.5 million, which was lower than previous estimates, was placed on the cost of the new public library at Ocean and Adams streets and a new branch library in Wilder Park.
The City Council was informed in a letter that the Board of Library Trustees had voted unanimously to recommend that $4.5 million should be the maximum amount listed in a proposed bond issue for library improvements.
Board President Cecil Bailey said in the letter that the board believed the $4.5 million would cover the cost of constructing the new Main Library, including furniture, equipment and architectural fees. Also covered, he said, would be the cost of acquiring as part of the library tract the property on which the Windle Hotel was located.
In addition to financing the proposed new library Downtown, Bailey said the $4.5 million would pay for construction of a new Wilder Park branch, “of adequate size and modern design, including all furniture, equipment and fees.”
When the architect’s plans for the new Main Library were shown to the public Sept. 27, Mayor-Commissioner Haydon Burns said the entire cost would be approximately $5 million and could be as much as $5.25 million.
The City had previously approved the site of the old City Hall as a location for the new library. The administration had also decided that an additional 60 feet of property occupied by the hotel would be necessary to accommodate the new three-story facility shown in the plans.
• The reorganization managers of the Florida East Coast Railway petitioned the U.S. District Court for a final order and decree that would consummate the reorganization.
The managers, Edward Ball, H.E. Wolfe and J. Turner Butler, asked that a hearing on the petition be held on Nov. 25. The petition also asked that all answers, replies, objections or protests to the entering of a final decree be filed on or before Nov. 25.
In the petition, the managers declared that all actions, instruments, documents and things necessary to the reorganization had been done, performed or drafted. The acts included assignments of capital stock to the new company, a revision of the bylaws, the printing of new bonds and mortgages, the preparation of new contracts and leases and the naming of fiscal agents.
The plan for the reorganization of the FEC, which was confirmed by the U.S. District Court on July 31, 1959, would give control of the railroad to St. Joe Paper Co., a subsidiary of the Alfred I. duPont estate.