This was shot in 1952 according to a note on this Loyd Sandgren photograph of downtown Jacksonville. It appears to have been shot from one of the upper floors of the building now called Residences at City Place, originally built as an apartment building in 1949 on West Ashley Street. The view is looking South down North Julia Street toward the St. Johns River. In the lower left is the corner of the Federal Reserve Bank Building which had just been completed when this photograph was taken. The building now houses the Jacksonville Fire And Rescue Headquarters. On the next lot, half empty in this photograph, the new headquarters for the Independent Life and Accident Insurance Company would be built. It was completed in 1955. The large parking lot would be the location of the Woolworth’s and J.C. Penney’s building which opened in 1954 fronting Hogan Street and behind that the Robert Meyer Hotel which was built in 1960 along North Julia Street. It was demolished in 1998 to make way for the new Federal Courthouse building which now fills the entire city block.
Tags: 007534, downtown, Federal Reserve Bank, historic photograph, hogan street, Independent Life, J.C. Penney, Jacksonville, Loyd Sandgren, North Julia Street, Residences At City Place, Robert Meyer Hotel, skyline, vintage photography, West Ashley Street, Woolworth
I believe the parking lot where Penney’s and Woolworth’s were set to be built had previously been the site of the Windsor Hotel, a Jacksonville landmark for many years.