BEFORE THE ENTERTAINMENT

(Source of image: 1959 Jacksonville Municipal Yearbook)

Not too pretty: Take a look at the Northbank site of the future Civic Auditorium (today's Times-Union Performing Arts Center).  The photo dates from the mid to late 1950s.

FROM WORK TO PLAY -- Where concerts & theater productions now take place, lumber & fertilizer used to be handled.  During the early half of the 1900s, the Seaboard Railroad Company utilized the docks that lay at the spot pictured above.  The biggest export through the facilities was lumber, while the largest import proved to be fertilizer.  This info came from the late, long-time Jax resident Jack McGiffin, author of the fascinating book "It Ain't Like It Was in the Good Old Days..." 

The Seaboard docks ranked as the most efficient in town, according to Mr. McGiffin.  Six railroad tracks ended at the riverfront there, and narrow warehouses stood between the tracks and also terminated at the water.  Dock workers could often load 150 railroad cars a week with fertilizer from the warehouses.  In addition, the cars could be filled directly from ships, and the cars could be switched without interrupting the task.  A vessel with four hatches could load ten cars each workday (which were ten hours long).  The docks became a part of local history, however, when they were demolished on December 7, 1957, to make way for the auditorium.

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