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Here’s a panel from tomorrow’s Swampy comic strip.
News this week came that The Parliament House in Orlando is facing foreclosure. Above is a postcard for it from the 1960s, not long after it opened. The Baron of Beef restaurant was a premiere place for a steak in the 1960s and through the early 1970s. The entire establishment changed it’s focus as the ’70s became the ’80s.
Swampy takes the historic tour of Greenwood Cemetery in Orlando this past Friday. Above is Swampy during the tour with tour guide and cemetery keeper, Don Price, with the City of Orlando. Don gives a lively tour with much history Orlando, Florida and the United States.
For more information about the tours or the cemetery itself click here.
Here’s Swampy and tour guide extrodinaire Don Price.
Below are more photos from Friday’s nonstop rainy night. Swampy had to duck for cover during the rain. The large crowd there wouldn’t have liked to have a wet Swamp Ape around.
Swampy’s Collectibles: St. Petersburg Kennel Club
August 28th, 2010 |Posted In: Florida Sports, Swampy's Collectibles
Here’s a Season Guest Pass to the St. Petersburg Kennel Club from 1939. These many years later the name has changed to Derby Lane.
Postcard Wednesday: Port Tampa City
August 25th, 2010 |Posted In: Florida Postcards, Swampy's Collectibles
Here’s a postcard from the collection of what is known as the Port of Tampa today. All of this developed because of the wealth of Henry B. Plant. He named the area Port Tampa City. The rail lines are also Plants and ran folks from up north to Tampa and other parts of Florida. It’s at Port Tampa City that folks could stay in one of two of Plant’s hotels. The St. Elmo Inn is in the foreground and the Port Tampa Inn is the larger structure. Both buildings are long gone now. There was a trolley that would transport folks from hotels into Tampa itself.
This area is now the bustling Port of Tampa and has long since been annexed into the city of Tampa.
The postcard is postmarked 1909 and was mailed with a penny stamp to “Miss Mable Seavey, Punta Gorda, Fla”. No actual address needed in Punta Gorda at the time, I guess.