Gilmore’s Furniture Store …
This business was located down on Garden street. Coastal Bank is located in this spot now. This corner had a special meaning to my dad because when his family left Muscogee, FL, they moved to this corner where his mother ran a rooming house that was located on this corner back in 1925. I will share some stories of his in some later posts of this time in his life and living in downtown Pensacola in the late 1920’s. Thanks for looking …
Pensacola Bay Bridge …
This is one of my favorite photos … mainly because of the clouds. The grass in the fore-ground would be Bayfront Parkway today. This photo was made around 1951 or 1952. Below is a photograph that Billy Tarbuck sent me a while back that shows the bridge from over by the train trestle on 17th Avenue, which actually shows the bridge better than in this photo.
You see the building by the bridge entrance better from this angle than from the first photo and the bridge is closer. One thing that was not built in the above photo was the Wayside Park with all of it’s picnic tables. In fact, it does not look as if there was enough land to have built the park along with the parking lot that was with the park, so that land must have been filled in later to build the Wayside Park. My thanks to Billy for sending me this photo …
Old Sacred Heart Hospital Aerial …
This aerial shows the old Sacred Heart Hospital and the Sacred Heart Nurse’s Home on 12th Avenue. To the north of the hospital is the building that once housed Friendly Service Grocery, Moulton’s Drug Store and a series of offices. One of these offices on Gonzalez Street was my father’s first photography studio. Also, notice that there is no office building across from the hospital. My father must have made this photo sometime in the late 1940’s.
Pat Duncan’s Card Shop …
Pat Duncan’s, looks like it is a Hallmark Card shop. My guess would be that it could have been located out at Town and Country Plaza, but as usual, I do not know the location of the business. It must have been in the 1960’s sometime, since if this is Town and Country Plaza, I do not believe it was built until the 60’s. All comments are welcomed … thanks for looking.
Baylen Street …
This is Baylen Street 1955 / 6 or later. You are looking toward Government Street. My father was standing were the Judicial Center would be located today. You see a Markham System business in front of you, which is no longer there. The attorney’s building on the right side is still there, it used to be Mr. Richard Merritt’s law office and now houses several lawyers. Where the Markham business used to be is now a parking lot. My father was taking this photo for Richard Merritt showing the exterior of his office building on the right side of the frame. I have some photos of the interior of the law office that I will post later. Thanks for looking and please check back … Frank
UPDATE … 18 Aug 13 – I mistakenly identified this street as ” Spring Street ” when I posted this image back in June of 2011. It never really dawned on me that this was not Spring Street until the other day … Spring Street in one block over to the west. In the past, Baylen Street traffic was one way heading North and Spring Street was one way headed South. These streets were that way from the 1970’s until the late 2000’s, maybe 2008 or 9. As you can tell from this photo, the traffic flowed both north and south on Baylen Street back in the 1950’s by the way the cars are parked in the street. Thanks … Frank
Port of Pensacola …
I ran across this aerial a year or so back, but never wanted to spend the time to clean it up. It is an interesting view of the Port of Pensacola because it is shot from the east looking back to the west. Most of the aerial views that I have posted before always seemed to be looking north up Palafox or from the west looking back to the east. You even have a decent view of Seville Square, even though it looks to be all trees and not much of a park. I have no date for this image, but I would say early 1950’s. Anyone know a date, please speak out …
Pensacola Regional Airport …
This photo is from the old site … an Eastern Airline Silver Falcon Turbo Prop Jet unloading at the Pensacola Regional Airport sometime in the 1950’s. I can remember flying in this type of plane when I was younger. My father and I used to fly to Chicago to visit his brother back in the 1960’s in this type of aircraft. We also flew several times to the National Convention of the Professional Photographers of America. The one thing that I always remembered was how the cabin would fill with a low level smoke when the air conditioners would cut on … it must have been condensation on the cooling elements being blown out into the cabin. Now, if something like that was to happen, everyone would think that the plane had caught on fire! One more thing, look how the men are dressed coming off the plane, no casual wear among any of these men. Anyone wishing to share their past flying experiences from the Pensacola Airport are welcome to post them here. Thanks for looking …
Al’s Bicycle Shop …
This is not a Frank Hardy Photograph, but a copy someone had brought us to photograph. I usually only saved something if it interested me and for some reason, this one did. Do not know where this business was located, but it looks as it was downtown Pensacola. Judging by the looks of the old car in the photo, this might have been in the 1920’s or 30’s. If this jars anyone’s memory, please let us know.
Spearman Brewery …
The next several posts are new and were not on the old site. This is a photo of Spearman Brewery that my father made. The brewery was located on Barrancas Avenue, just down from Government Street. I do not know any of the history of the plant / beer, but would be interested in hearing some. Note how the top of the main building flares out at the top. That is something that you seldom see in building construction today. When the building was torn down, the steel framing was left in place for years and was left there for what seems to be 10 or 20 years. I can remember the steel frames up in the 1970’s and some of the 80’s when I used to go down to Coast Photo further down Barrancas. I am interested if anyone has any comments on this photo … I will have to add this to my list of places to look up when I go back down to the Pensacola Historical Society. Thanks for looking.
Dreamland Skating Rink …
This is the Dreamland Skating Rink that used to be located on Pace Blvd and this was made sometime in the 1950’s. Notice that all the windows were opened, so this was way before air conditioning. This photo was run through a Photoshop plugin ( Lucis ) to add contrast and bring out detail in the shadows. Below is just a b&w scan …
The Lucis added photo has a little more “snap” to it and I have run it on several other photos. I doubt that I will do it on all the posts in the future, only the ones that I think are improved by it. Next are some interior panoramas done the same way.
With Lucis and the bottom photo is without.
The bottom photo seems to have enough contrast without the Lucis filter being run on it. You can almost imagine the place packed on Friday and Saturday nights. And you know that the place had to be steaming hot with all of those teenage skaters. When these photos were taken, it was before my time, but I can still remember going to birthday skating parties here in the mid-1960’s. I cannot remember if this place was still around in the disco era … if it was, you know that the funk was rising!! As usual, all comments are welcomed and appreciated.
Note: That was the only part of “Disco Inferno” that I could remember. I apologize in advance for not knowing more of the song. Frank
Frank Hardy Made My Photographs Two 
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