SUNSHINE CITY ERA
22
Turn your getaway into your Everyday
Experience
the
lifestyle
you’ve
always dreamed of. From waterfront
estates to vibrant city styles. Tampa
Bay
offers
more
than
just
destination- it offers a home. Let me
guide you to the extraordinary.
Julie Larsen
REALTOR® | 727.773.5592
julie.larsen@corcorandwellings.com
By Wayne Ayers, Author, St. Petersburg: The Sunshine City
During the 1920’s boom era, promoter and newspaper editor
Lew B. Brown created “The Sunshine City” theme to showcase
St. Petersburg’s prime attraction…year-round balmy sunshine.
To back his claim, Brown offered free copies of his paper, the
Evening Independent, any day the sun did not appear.
The Sunshine City era became St. Petersburg’s defining age…a
period of fast and furious growth during which the city’s most
significant institutions, buildings and attractions came into
being and flourished.
• During the period from 1922 to 1926, eleven major hotels were
built in St. Petersburg. Many of these structures remain today:
The Vinoy, Princess Martha, Ponce de Leon, Pennsylvania,
Jungle Hotel (now Admiral Farragut Academy) and Rolyat
(now Stetson School of Law).
• Sunken Gardens began in 1924 as a small flower and
vegetable garden planted by plumber George Turner, Sr.,
in a sinkhole in his back yard. Today, the Gardens are owned
and splendidly maintained by the City of St. Petersburg.
• Tennessee native James Earl “Doc” Webb turned a tiny St.
Petersburg drug store into “The World’s Most Unusual Drug
Store,” a mammoth
wonder spanning
several blocks.
Webb’s City
flourished through
the relentless
promotion of
Doc Webb, until
discount chains
emerged to spell
its doom in the 1970’s.
• St. Petersburg became known nationwide as the City of
Green Benches during the 1920’s. The famed benches were
born in 1907 when real estate agent Noel Mitchell placed a
few benches carrying his advertising message in front of his
offices to draw patrons to his “out-of-the-way” location at
4th Street and Central Avenue.
• Williams Park, with its band concerts and walkways, was the
social center of St. Petersburg in the 1920’s.
St. Petersburg: The Sunshine City, by R. Wayne Ayers contains
over 200 vintage photographic images along with text
presenting a visual tour of the city during the boom days of
the early 1900’s.