Flamingo fancy, part two

Memento mori

Seen in Gulfport.

On Willow Pond

Willow Pond is located in the Boyd Hill Nature Park.

Fruity Patootie

Seen on 37th Street.

Urban League of Pinellas County

We were framed!

They say the neon lights are bright

...this shop window's certainly are! Central Avenue.

Apostolic Church

Happy Sunday!

Sixties Style

One of several government/business offices in St Pete. This is near Central Plaza.

Fire House Follies

This is a handsome yet disused fire station in south St. Pete. A new Fire Station No. 3 was constructed in the early 1980s a few blocks to the west. It doesn't have the dignity or character of this Streamline version, but it serves the community well. I especially like the terra cotta "FD" in the upper corners and the eyebrow roof overhang in the front.

A quick check in the St Petersburg Times archives shows that this firehouse was built in late 1940. It was "christened" December 26, 1940 with a barbeque (how fitting!) for the-then 54 St Petersburg firefighters and their families. The short article reads:

"St. Petersburg's new $12,000 fire house - one of the most modern in the South - was officially christened last night when Fire Chief Claud Nesbit and Assistant Chiefs Ed Morris and George Arthur honored the 54 firemen, their friends, and others at a barbeque supper...The new fire station, known as No. 3, is located at Fifth Avenue and Twenty-seventh Street South...Fire laddies ate in relays last night to keep the city protected in case an alarm was sounded. Relieved by a substitute crew, the men on duty at each station rode to the barbeque on trucks, parking them where they could make a quick getaway...Those attending consumed three porkers, two ribs of beef, and four lamb quarters."

Back to 2009: Recent "improvements" to the station include painting it mint green and the addition of outlandishly retro (read: 1940s-ish) street numbers placed atop the main "eyebrow." The building is still in use, it appears, for storage purposes only.

Infamy

While much of the world - and, certainly, the United States - was plunged into chaos the morning of December 7, 1941 with the 'sudden and deliberate attack by the Empire of Japan' on US Naval Base Pearl Harbor, life, somehow, continued on. In St. Petersburg, children went to school, trains ran, trash was collected. People still went to work and still came home and still ate their supper by radio, did homework and wash, and fell to sleep. Yes, the world was chaotic (and would be for some years), but here is what was happening in St. Petersburg, safe, isolated perhaps, from the hells of war:

On the morning of December 8, the Evening Independent announced "Aroused U.S. Prepares for Total War." Photographs of both Roosevelt and Hirohito made the front page above the fold. Stocks slipped but did not plunge; the price of wheat and sugar immediately grew higher. Around St Pete, the high temperature was 72, the low, 62. At the La Plaza Theatre at Central and 5th, children could be expected to pay 9 cents to see Edward G. Robinson and Eddie Albert in Unholy Partners.

In the comic strip "Mary Worth's Family," a sexy blond Veronica Lake-like bombshell named Angel smokes a cigarette and wears slacks! The morning after war was declared, you could have had a "special de luxe club breakfast' at Webb's City for 8 cents. Mr and Mrs. C.A. Corson of Detroit were spending a week residing at 550 Seventh Avenue S (which is now a parking garage).

A large advertisement in the Independent for U.S. Defense Bonds and Stamps implores the reader to "Be Thankful - Be Merry - Be Happy - Because you live in America."