Jordan Park collection, 1938-1980

Summary

Creator:

West Coast Title Company (St. Petersburg, Fla.)

St. Petersburg Times

Abstract:

The materials in the Jordan Park Collection nearly were discarded; the good fortune of the preservation of these items is considerable. Poynter Library received the various photographs, property records, maps, documents, and scrapbooks from Dayton Stone in June 2009. These materials depict the Jordan Park residential units built by the St. Petersburg Housing Authority.

Extent:

10 boxes 4 Document Boxes, 4 Object Boxes, 2 Oversized Boxes

Language:

English

Preferred citation:

Jordan Park collection, Nelson Poynter Memorial Library Special Collections and University Archives, University of South Florida, St. Petersburg, FL.

Background

Scope and content:

Materials related to the Jordan Park Housing Project in St. Petersburg, Florida including project documentation, photographs and album, scrapbooks, and maps.

Biographical / historical:

The materials in the Jordan Park Collection nearly were discarded; the good fortune of the preservation of these items is considerable. Special Collections and Archives at the Poynter Library received the various photographs, property records, maps, documents, and scrapbooks from Dayton Stone on 18 June 2009. Stone had discovered these items while cleaning out an abandoned property in St. Petersburg. Subsequent review of the materials revealed the necessity of some conservation work and arrangement due to the condition in which these items had existed prior to his fortunate discovery. These records fill an important gap in our history.

Historic sources strongly indicate that Jordan Park was named for local black pioneer, Elder Jordan Sr., and that he donated land for the housing project. Indeed, Jordan Sr. was a successful entrepreneur who owned a reckonable amount of real estate in St. Petersburg during the height of the Jim Crow years. It should also be noted that Jordan Elementary School, the second school available to local African American students in St. Petersburg, sat in close proximity to the site where Jordan Park housing project was built. (The red brick school building still stands and has been renovated for use by a local Head Start program as part of the city's Midtown initiatives.) Elder Jordan Sr. built housing along 22nd Street South (the thoroughfare at the heart of St. Petersburg's black community), as well as houses laid out in courts further southeast of this area. Logical inference based on several historic sources point toward the housing project being named for Jordan Elementary School, and the school being named for Jordan Sr., who was for all purposes, a prominent developer in the local African American community.

These records fill an important gap in our history. The initial Jordan Park residential units were constructed between 1939 and 1941. After some success in relocating residents from "derelict" structures to this new facility, authorities approved additional housing at the Jordan Park site. The majority of the funding for its construction came from federal sources during the New Deal as part of the Wagner-Steagall Housing Act passed in August 1937. Beyond the importance of the items specifically concerned with Jordan Park, there are several photographs and records that document the substandard housing that existed in St. Petersburg's African American neighborhoods at the time that Jordan Park was expected to replace, including structures in Peppertown and the Gas Plant district. Many of the original black neighborhoods have since transitioned into other use (including the site of Tropicana Field on the former Gas Plant property) with little reference material available to researchers to learn about them.

Beyond the importance of the items specifically concerned with Jordan Park, there are several photographs and records that document the substandard housing that existed in St. Petersburg's African American neighborhoods at the time that Jordan Park was expected to replace, including structures in Peppertown and the Gas Plant district. Many of the original black neighborhoods have since transitioned into other use (including the site of Tropicana Field on the former Gas Plant property) with little reference material available to researchers to learn about them. The Jordan Park Collection fills many gaps in the historical record and allows researchers to reconstruct, in part, certain neighborhoods from the time in a way not previously possible.

Processing information:

This collection was originally published in 2009 and was updated in 2024.

Rules or conventions:

Describing Archives: A Content Standard

Indexed terms

Subjects:

Florida—Race relations.
African Americans -- Segregation
African Americans -- Florida -- St. Petersburg (Fla.)

Names:

Housing Authority of the City of St. Petersburg (Fla.)

Terms of access:

None. The contents of the collection may be subject to copyright. Visit the United States Copyright Office's website at http://www.copyright.gov/ for more information.

Preferred citation:

Jordan Park collection, Nelson Poynter Memorial Library Special Collections and University Archives, University of South Florida, St. Petersburg, FL.