There was once a time when downtown Jacksonville was considered a premier shopping destination. Small shops and massive department stores lined its streets, often flanked by theatres or restaurants. Shoppers routinely walked from store to store and through Hemming Park, which served as somewhat of a center court for all of the activity.
Those days are long gone at this point, unfortunately, with many of the buildings that housed those stores having been demolished years ago. But many of the city’s longtime residents have fond memories of shopping downtown as children, before the days of shopping malls and suburban sprawl.
We’ve highlighted several of the grand department stores from downtown Jacksonville’s shopping era below, as a way of reminding present-day Jax residents how active downtown once was – and why we should fight to make it a hub of activity once again.
J.C. Penney held a certain affinity for Northeast Florida, having developed the town of Penney Farms in the late 1920s. So it’s no surprise that he opened one of his department stores in downtown Jax.
J.C. Penney first opened in 1933 at the corner of Main and Bay streets. It operated from this location for just over two decades before it moved into a new building, right next to Hemming Park.
Penney was joined in the new building by five-and-dime store F.W. Woolworth Co., with both opening their doors in 1955. Despite the shared space, J.C. Penney still had around 100,000 square feet to work with.
The building was home to Ax Handle Saturday, a major race riot in which Black sit-in protestors were violently attacked by a white mob at the Woolworth’s lunch counter. Penney was mostly unaffected by the incident.
The store closed in the mid-1980s due to the decline of foot traffic downtown, as well as the chain’s expansion into suburbia. Its building was later demolished to make room for a new federal courthouse.
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