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Don Boyd | all galleries >> Memories of Old Hialeah, Old Miami and Old South Florida Photo Galleries - largest non-Facebook collection on the internet >> DOWNTOWN Miami, Bayfront Park and Port of Miami Historical Photos Gallery - All Years - click on image to view > 1962 - Downtown Miami looking north with FEC train station on the left
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1962 Florida State Archives

1962 - Downtown Miami looking north with FEC train station on the left

Downtown Miami, Florida


The Florida East Coast Railway was still operating the downtown passenger train station in this image. Judging from the cars, there wasn't enough vehicle parking back then too.


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Jerry F. 19-Jan-2009 03:37
Nice Picture ! Do you rmember the Fageol Twin Coach transit buses that ran in Coral Gables from around 1947-1967 ? Thanks. Jerry @ frettomusic.com
Teekeela Robertson Williams 01-Jul-2008 20:11
On 10-Feb-2008 22:44 Keith quattlebaumDCPC wrote:

I remember going downtown with my uncle we would take the coach city bus to downtown and go to the movies , ..... After which we would take our journey back to 3240 NW 95th Terrrace.

Keith, did you know that you lived not too far from where the FIRST fiberglass boat was created and built? The guy who built it was my uncle-by-marriage.....he was married to my dad's sister.... and he's still living having had his 94th birthday a few days ago.

Title: PIONEER BOAT BUILDERS' SITE -- 1947
Location: 975 North West 95th Street
County: Miami-Dade
City: Miami
Description: For thousands of years most water crafts were built of wood. The first reinforced plastic fiberglass boats in the southeastern United States were conceived and built here in 1947. Two hundred feet north of this marker is the former home and workshop of Troy Wollard, where his shop building still stands. He was an outstanding shipwright who was instrumental in building the durable high-performing crafts with visionary pioneers Arthur H. Siegel (1924-2003) and Dudley Whitman. Challenger Marine
Corporation produced its first boats at this location which was the beginning of the boating revolution. This small manufacturing venture changed the yachting world forever. The 18-foot runabout speedboats had inboard engines that could reach up to 50 miles per hour. They had monocoque (egg shape) construction with full-length stringers that supported the hull and engine. An outline of excess resin used to make these boats is still visible on the floor of the shop. This enterprise was one of the first in the nation to use fiberglass successfully and was the forerunner of an important industry eventually leading to the development of large luxury yachts and commercial vessels.
Sponsors: THE FLORIDA DEPARTMENT OF STATE
Teekeela Robertson Williams 01-Jul-2008 19:48
The FEC .... Florida East Coast .... train station brings back several memories, too. I recall taking a trip to NC one summer during WWII to my uncle's summer home in Hendersonville, NC on the train. I was full of military men and my first train ride. Also, rode on it to Jacksonville a few times to visit family friends. In the mid-1950s my late husband and I had a standing date on Saturday nights to go to the movies. He would park his old Chevy pickup behind the station building, we'd walk past the old Dade Co. courthouse on the east side then up Flagler Street to the theater. After the movie and before leaving the parking area we would listen to R & R on a local radio station while smooching it up..... only smooching...he always had me home well before midnight. Life in Dade County wasn't so hetic back then.
Teekeela Robertson Williams 01-Jul-2008 19:33
I made a mistake in the location of our property's quadrant location.... it was the SW corner of the intersection of NW 6th Ave and 51st Street..... there was a vacant lot on the SE corner across the street.
Teekeela Robertson Williams 01-Jul-2008 19:30
I have memories the same as "S" posted below except I lived in the NW section of Miami. Our home was on the SE corner of NW 6th Ave & 51st Street. It was a double corner lot with the address being 5044 NW 6th Ave. In the neighbor's yard on the south side was a 4' native coral rock wall with a hugh Australian Pine right next to it. I would get on top of that rock wall, then onto the lower branches of the tree and climb as high as I could and in the distance to the south I could see the top of the Dade County Courthouse...... that was in the 1940s. The property where our house at that time is now under I-95. The original house that my paternal grandfather had built on that site was totally destroyed by the great hurricane of September 17-18, 1926. The house that replaced it which was the one my parents lived in when I was born in 1938 was moved to the site from the area around NW 36th Street when the R/W was being cleared for U.S. Hwy 1....Biscayne Blvd.....when the R/W was being cleared for I-95 there was at the time a building code that forbid the relocation of wood constructed houses for fire prevention purposes.... so instead of the house being relocated again it was burned by the Miami Fire Department. My dad had bought the home from his mother after his father died in 1935. The house was built of Dade County Pine (Pinus elliotti v. densa) which became hard as iron when it cured and was virtually indestructible to pest and man.... my dad had a new roof put on it and he told me the workers had a heck of a time trying to hammer nails into that wood.... the nails kept breaking! the house set up on concrete pilings about 2 1/2' off the ground.... it wasn't even anchored to those pilings as that was the custom back then so it could be flexible and could slide off the pilings in high winds or floods then be re-placed back on the pilings. I recall crawling under the kitchen area and playing in the sand and the pine sap was still soft.... I would pick off a glob of it and chew it.... the pine odor was also very fragrant.... I can smell it to this day. I've several old photos of the original house my grandfather built on that site as well as some after the Great 1926 Storm and of the house that was burned..... so all was not lost. My Dad and I happened to be in the area the day the house was burned and we both liked to have croaked as we watched it go up in flames.
Guest 03-May-2008 13:48
I commented re. the courthouse in another pic but here shows the train station, trains, and tracks. It was wonderful to have the train arrive and depart in the heart of downtown Miami. Too bad there wasn't the foresight to retain the train. Many people would be using it today, including me when I lived in North Miami and worked downtown for years. Instead, with everyone else I had to endure I-95's traffic jam to and from work five days a week. Think of the wasted time, wear and tear on vehicles (and people), and gas $$.
Ray25-Apr-2008 02:19
I recently got a great tour of the inside of the roof of the Court House. I got right up near the top. My pictures are here: http://rayvaughan.com/courthouse.htm I just wish I could spend a couple weeks there getting more pictures. The lobby is spectacular! Yes, it's a pain getting through the security, but if you have some time downtown, DO IT. There aren't a lot of good examples of historic preservation in Miami but this is by far the best. I just wish we had more buildings from this era around today.

Ray
Guest 19-Mar-2008 06:42
As a child my mom would bring us kids downtown to watch the King Orange Bowl Parade, and we would sit right across the street from the old courthouse, in front of the fire station there, and would eat a picnic of mom's potatoe salad and fried chicken. I use to have pictures of the pigeons and buzzards that use to circle the top of the courthouse. I also remember one year some inmate in the jailhouse set a roll of toliet paper aflame and tossed it out one of the higher floors. Dave Helmick Jr.
Frank Linares 15-Mar-2008 19:09
I currently work in this building. Parking lots currently sit where those tracks run. It's incredible to see some of the smaller buildings are still standing today (Mar/2008).
Guest 06-Mar-2008 09:55
Well we've got that thing called Tri-Rail which runs along I-95 right?
Wouldn't been so much more realistic if they could've run it along side of the FEC tracks rather than where it is running now?
If anyone knows what I'm talking about.....
The Tri-rail still has to wait on the CSX freight and AMTRAK trains to pass by through
out its scheduled day.
Futhermore if you take the Tri-Rail to the Ft.Lauderdale stop there is no transportation into the Business district on Sundays.
I know... I used to work on Ft.Lauderdale Beach and it was a pain to get to the bus
terminal to catch the 40 bus to the 17th street causeway.
s 20-Feb-2008 05:55
When I was a boy in the 50's, and would climb a tall tree, if one wanted to brag, one would say, "I can see the courthouse from here," because it was the tallest bldg in town, and there was nothing between it and the Gables/Grove/S.Miami to block the view! Our parents used to scare us by telling us that those weird metal towers on top were for the "Electric Chair up there" if we were bad. In fact, the jail was up there, wasn't it? Of course, the buzzards...I think they can be seen in the picture, meaning it is wintertime...there is a city up north, maybe Ohio, that celebrates the return of the buzzards (black and turkey vultures, act. names) every year, meaning spring has begun. What a memory: "I can see the courthouse from here." Indeed.
Keith quattlebaumDCPC 10-Feb-2008 22:44
I remember going downtown with my uncle we would take the coach city bus to downtown and go to the movies , but before the movies we would go to royal castle and have 2 hamburgers and a birch beer for 49 cents.Then pick a movie house it would be either the Paramount,Olympia. Florida or Town theaters at that time 1957-1961. After the movies we would go to either Burdines or Richards . Then we would eat dinner at the New Yorker restaurant downtown. After which we would take our journey back to 3240 NW 95th Terrrace. Boy ,they were the days. Oh by the way the cost of the movie was 25cents.
Judge Gene Fierro 31-Jan-2008 20:01
As a kid growing up in Miami Beach, I could actually see the courthouse across Biscayne Bay. Top floor was the jail for awhile. Now I'm a sitting trial judge in the same courthouse and because of so many builings constructed along biscayne bay you can't see Miami Beach-Turkey buzzards still sit on the ledges though. We've restored the lobby to nearly original-worth a visit-Al Capone was tried there for a misdemeanor charge
guest 02-Oct-2007 23:07
WOW! Am I ever getting old! I remember the FIRST Orange Bowl Parade! It was so easy to find a parking spot, walk to the court house and watch from the best level of the steps for seeing the show. My stepfather, Pat Carpinelli, soloist with The Caesar LaMonica Band, marched in that first parade and several more! What a thrill----- even to remember!
Guest 11-Sep-2007 19:12
I certainly remember Judge Blanton. Don't remember which one though.

Bobby Zlatkin
K Blanton 06-Sep-2007 23:43
I used to watch the Orange Bowl Parade from the 3rd floor of this building as both my Father & Grandfather were Judges. My Father, John R. Blanton for 25 years & my Grandfather, W.F. Blanton for 50 years. My Grandfather's 3rd floor office faced Flagler street. What I would give for those days again...
Guest 21-Jun-2007 20:03
I worked in this building from Sept, 1965 until May 1980.

First in Accounts Payable 17th floor
then in Payroll 18th floor
then in Internal Auditing 14th floor

Since it was the tallest building in Miami at the time, there was a problem with buzzards landing and hanging out on the roof. The tax assesser & tax collector were both housed in the courthouse at the time and people used to refer to the birds as the Tax Buzzards.