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III. JACKSONVILLE, MAYPORT AND PABLO NAVIGATION COMPANY

The Jacksonville, Mayport, and Pablo Navigation Company (commonly called the JM&P) was created in1886 by a Scottish immigrant, Alexander Wallace, and it suffered a tortured history. It never attained the support or status or longevity of the J&A.

Wallace was born between 1828 and 1835 (the U.S. Censuses differ) who went to sea as a young man. Briefly he participated in the California Gold Rush of 1849 but returned east and settled in New York sometime before 1859. The U. S. Census of 1860 said he was an estimated 32 years old (i.e. born in 1828) and lived in the 3rd District, 16th Ward of New York City, that is, where he was in 1859. He did move around but on the sea for he was, as legend has it, a captain of his own ship. He joined the United States Navy to fight for his new country during its Civil War. “He was appointed Acting Master on 5 July 1862, Acting Volunteer Lieutenant on 1 May 1865, and was honorably discharged on 28 November 1865.” He served on vessels in the East Gulf Blockading Squadron--the steamer Magnolia in 1862 blockading off Key West and the steamer Hendrick Hudson in 1863 and 1864 blockading the coast around St. George's Sound near Carabelle.[1]

Florida took his fancy for, according to the U. S. Census of 1870, he was living in Jacksonville as a 36 year old with his wife Mary (born Ireland) who was also 36, their son William (Willie) born in New York in 1865, and a 21 year old white woman named Winifred Leonard who was born in Scotland in 1849. Wallace’s house was worth $5,000 and his personal estate $9,000, quite a bit of money! The Book of Jacksonville, a quarter of a century later, bragged that the average working man’s wage in 1895 was 24 cents an hour, possibly $507 a year if he was lucky enough to work 48 hours a week for 44 weeks, which was unlikely.

The basis of his prosperity was the Alligator Lumber Mill, a business involving buying and selling lumber and operating saw and planing mill. His advertisement in the 1876 Jacksonville city directory featured the sale of yellow pine lumber and timber. He lived on Shell Road (now Talleyrand Avenue) in East Jacksonville. In 1874 he and Thomas V. Cashen were partners in the Alligator Lumber Mill which had established a branch in Palatka, Florida. In 1880, he and Cashen were partners in the Wallace and Cashen Lumber Company. By 1884, he sold out to Cashen.

He had other financial interests. He was a director of the Jacksonville Gas Light Company, chartered in 1885. In 1886, he was a director of the National Bank of the State of Florida along with J. N. C Stockton, a friend and confidant who would be the Wallace estate executor after he died in 1889.

Wallace became infatuated with the village of Mayport close to the mouth of the St Johns River. Mayport (once called Mayport Mills) was important in the lumber business. As with many prosperous Jacksonville men, he had a summer cottage there. Families cruised to Mayport from Jacksonville via steamers such as the famous Kate Spencer or other ships although one could make the trip by a much more difficult and lengthy land route. Much of the land near the village was marsh or shifting sand dunes. In some ways, Mayport was an oasis, an “island,” so to speak. Further east, just south of the jetties on the beach, was Burnside Beach where some people went to picnic or spend the night or part of the summer in the small pre-Civil War hotel. Wallace decided to ease passage by building a three foot gauge railroad from Mayport to Burnside, thus making it easier to reach accommodations there. By 1887, he had moved there from East Jacksonville to Mayport and begun the construction of a sizable house.

The idea of being the Jacksonville, Mayport, and Pablo Railroad through the wilderness to the Atlantic coast was not as far-fetched as it appeared in hindsight. Mayport was a populated place (600 people in 1864) with a thriving fishing business, a history in the timber industry when it was Mayport Mills, a ready port for the newly-discovered phosphate deposit, and access to Burnside Beach. He built the road for tourists, for he first built it on narrow gauge track from Mayport to Burnside Beach and constructed a hotel and pavilion there, all for tourism. Thomas V. Cashen, who would be involved in JM&P affairs for years, built the pavilion. He also planned to generate freight traffic for he realized that the tourist trade would be seasonal.

Mayport Mills 1862

Wallace and partners formed the JM&P by February, 1886; the Florida Department of State records show the incorporation date as May 8, 1886 with Wallace as president and John B. Togni, Antonio Solary, and Levi R. Burrow as directors. The Florida Times-Union (February 20, 1886) reported that the treasurer was Solary and the Superintendent was A. L. Dolby. The Florida Dispatch, Farmer and Fruit Grower identified the organizers as Wallace, Dolby, Solary, L. S. Burrows, Togni, and E. F. Gilbert. The original plans were to run the road from Mayport along the shore to Pablo Beach; the newspaper said that route had been surveyed and completion was expected within three months. More important was the goal of connecting Jacksonville with the ocean at the mouth of the St. Johns River by building an Arlington-Burnside-Mayport route with a connection between Arlington and Jacksonville by boat. As events transpired during Wallace’s lifetime, the JM&P converted the Mayport-Burnside segment to standard gauge to match the standard gauge track it laid between Mayport and Arlington.[2]

Stock Certificate, JM&P

Source: Cleve Powell JM&P Route

Antonio J. Solary was a grocer, liquor wholesaler and retailer, soft drink bottler, and real estate investor. Born in 1840 in Genoa, Italy, he migrated as a child to Jacksonville in 1849. According to the federal census of 1870, he was a 30 year old retail liquor dealer with real estate worth $5,000 and a personal estate worth $3,000. His business interests expanded to groceries, feed and grain in 1880. He owned real estate in the Jacksonville area and south. In April of 1882, he and others formed the Lake Jesup Steamboat Company and built a wharf and post office in Oviedo near Sanford. In 1887, he was President of the Jacksonville, Mayport, and Pablo Railway and Navigation Company. He died at age 61 of chronic nephritis at his home on West Church Street. Two sons, Antonio J. Solary, Jr. (b. 1874) and Edward J. Solary (b. 1877) and a daughter, Mrs. A. L. McDaniel, survived him.[3]

Solary Advertisement

John B. Togni built the Hotel Togni in 1870 then sold it but bought it back in 1885 and refurbished it. He owned Togni’s Billiard Saloon, the Metropolitan Hall theatre, a wholesale and retail liquor business, and a soft drink firm. He owned at least 83 shares of the Jacksonville Ferry Company (owned by the JM&P) in 1895.

Togni Saloon and theatre

Hotel Togni

Eugene F. Gilbert, a Connecticut Yankee, was born about 1837, married an Ohio woman, and sired six children. By 1876, he was a jeweler and vendor of Florida curiosities and lived on West Beaver Street in Jacksonville but he moved his wife and children to Mayport by 1885. Thus, he was very interested in the development of the JM&P railroad. He bought 180.30 acres of land in the area known as Neptune but is today present-day Atlantic Beach in 1887 and soon began lobbying the Duval County government to build a wagon road to the beach. Gilbert paid for a road survey in 1890 and convinced the county commissioners to use convict labor to begin clearing the road all the way to Pablo Creek and even bridging that waterway but a newly-elected commission rejected this road to nowhere. Nature reasserted itself. When Henry Flagler bought the Jacksonville and Atlantic Railway in 1899 and extended the tracks to Mayport, Gilbert established Neptune Station so the train would stop for him.

Neptune Station Source: Sanborn Maps, 1917

Levi S. Burrows served as a captain in Company E, 3rd Cavalry Regiment Pennsylvania in 1861, having been in born in about 1835. After 1870, he left Crawford, Pennsylvania, for Florida. In 1880, he was living in Mayport as a hotelkeeper and merchant with his wife, Susan A. "Banny" Gheen Burrows, and four children. He died in 1895.

The JM&P began developing Burnside Beach in the summer of 1886. Wallace and associates paid cash for the railroad as it was built. Wallace, Haworth, and Burrows planned the proposed town. Completion of the three miles of track between Mayport and Burnside was expected by July 2^nd. By late August, excursion trains were running between Mayport and Burnside Beach, the passengers traveling between Mayport and Jacksonville by steamer. Once done, passenger service would begin. At Burnside, Cashen was building a large pavilion for visitors. Bathhouses would also be built. According to the Times-Union, lots were being platted around the pre-Civil War Burnside House. These could be chosen on an elevation 10 t0 15 feet above the ocean or 300-400 feet further back where there were shade trees. $1,325 worth of lots were sold. The four-story San Diego Hotel was built.[4]

Plat of Burnside Beach and Burnside Addition

Thomas V. Cashen was born February 14, 1835, in Picton, Nova Scotia of a shipbuilding family. He migrated to the United States at age 18 to New London, Connecticut where he apprenticed himself to a carpenter for three years. Then he worked and traveled in Illinois, Wisconsin, Missouri and Mississippi between 1855 and 1859. He was in Louisiana from 1859 until 1862 but left when US General Benjamin Butler captured New Orleans. Cashen, now 27, left to try his luck in Cuba but soon returned to New York where he served in the quartermaster corps of the 145th Regiment, New York Infantry in Louisiana, South Carolina, and Georgia where he was mustered out. In 1866, he moved to Jacksonville. Married Isabel Frances Van Der Grift and they had a son, Thomas Junior. He became so successful as a builder that he was able to become a partner with Wallace in 1872. He became sole proprietor of the Alligator Lumber Mill in 1887 when Wallace cashed out to focus attention on the railroad. The firm earned $200,000 in 1886. In addition, he owns a number of rental houses. In 1882, his personal residence was on St. Johns in East Jacksonville. He was a member of the influential Board of Trade and the Commercial Bank. After the J&A was opened he bought land in northern Pablo Beach (now Neptune Beach) and built a cottage.

Burnside House

Wallace had strong ties to the Haworth family, originally of Union County, Indiana. The Wallace and R. M. Haworth Company created East Mayport and owned many acres of land in the area. R. M. Haworth was Western Agent with the Liberty Union Company of Indiana and one of the large landowners in East Mayport along with JM&P attorney L. S. Burrows who owned the Burrows House in Mayport. Eli Haworth, M.D., originally of Liberty, Indiana, came to the area in 1873 and was the lighthouse keeper. His son Alphonso managed the family hotel, the Burnside House. M. Haworth, owned substantial property to the south of Mayport, including the old Pablo House, a 2-½ story tabby brick structure from the Second Spanish Period located near the Pablo-Mayport Cemetery off Wonderwood Drive. “During the 1880’s, over 2300 acres to the south and east of Mayport were owned by ‘Messrs. Haworth, Keeler, Smith, and Manville’, with numerous summer homes owned by prominent Jacksonville families being located along the road from Mayport to the oceanfront.” [5]

Alphonso Dixon Haworth

The railroad began its commercial life on May 17, 1888 with an all-day excursion by the Knights of Pythias. Alphonso Haworth belonged to the Jacksonville Chapter No. 12, R.A.M. of the Knights. They had a grand time at Burnside Beach but the engine failed to pull the cars across the sand-blown tracks and Pythians abandoned the cars. Some tried to push it. The party had to walk the eight miles to Arlington. Other Pythians were stuck in Burnside. Occasional problems after the railroad officially opened for business June 1, 1888 encouraged the press and others to call it the “Jump Men and Push.”[6] The company never lived the slogan down.

The route is described by Charles Ledyard Norton a few years after service began. One sailed three miles down river from the dock in Jacksonville to the Arlington dock and then boarded the train. For the first ten miles, the train passed through pine forest with the occasional flag stop. Then the train crosses a prairie bisected by Pablo Creek and Mt. Pleasant Creek before plunging into a pine hammock. Lastly, it arrives at Burnside Beach and its hotels, pavilion, and pier. He notes that the Palmetto Hotel charged $7-10 a week. After Burnside, the train backs two miles into Mayport where one could stay and eat at the Burrows House. Mayport was a fishing village but men building the jetties stayed there.[7]

JM&P Schedule

Unexpected events started the decline of the road, Wallace died of a heart attack in November, 1889; he was the principal owner. J. N. C. Stockton, as executor of the estate, ascended to the presidency but faced enormous difficulties. The Yellow Fever epidemic of 1888 cut passenger traffic to the bone. The San Diego Hotel, the pavilion, the pre-Civil War Burnside House, and the new 4-story Palmetto Hotel were destroyed by fire in 1889; they were wooden and susceptible to fire.

John Noble Cummings Stockton, who went by the initials J. N. C. was born on November 17, 1857 in Quincy, Florida until he moved the 185 miles to Jacksonville with his widowed mother and his siblings. At age 21, he began working for Ambler’s Bank as a bookkeeper in 1878, eventually becoming a partner along with John L. Marvin in the newly named firm of Ambler, Marvin, and Stockton. The firm would become Merchants Bank in 1890. Banking was his métier. At age 26, he and other men (including James P. Taliaferro) helped found the Bank of Tampa in 1883; it became the First National Bank of Tampa in 1886. Stockton was a president of the National Bank of the State of Florida as well as the Board of Trade and Chairman of Public Works. He and his brothers Telfair and Thomas Telfair formed The Florida Printing and Publishing Company in 1888, folding the Jacksonville Morning News and the Jacksonville Evening Herald into the established Florida Times Union. J. N. C. was civic-minded both at the state and local levels. He served in 1897 state legislature and ran for governor in 1908, losing to Albert Gilchrist.

The JP&M enjoyed assets. In 1890, it reported to the Florida Railroad Commission that it owned 7,111 acres of land. . The track, stations, docks, rolling stock, and right of way existed. The freight and passenger traffic of the railroad were established and might recover from the 1888 epidemic. Plans to connect the road to Pablo Beach and to South Jacksonville had been halted but not forgotten. So, there were possibilities when Stockton took over the company but he was not a railroad man nor were the other officers for the most part in 1891. He brought his brother Telfair Stockton on board as Treasurer and the twenty-eight-year old son William Wallace, son of the founder, as Secretary. Sherod L. Earle continued as Superintendent and T. T. Bryan was Auditor. Earle had been a conductor on the Savannah, Florida & Western Railway in 1887 would be a city councilman in 1901. [8]

The best solution was to sell the JM&P which was done on February 10, 1892 for $29,000 to James A. Russell and David M. Yeomans, both of Ohio, and Horace A. Scott of Kentucky. The buyers paid $5,000 in cash and two promissory notes, one for $8,000 and the other for $16,000, payable in 90 days for the balance due. Stockton was to retain possession of the stock, with the right to vote the same, as security for the notes, but was to vote it as requested by Russell et al. Thereafter Russell et al. were permitted to operate the road, and shortly afterwards one of them was elected president, and the other secretary, and both were made directors.

Russell and his partners, however, defaulted on the notes, and though the time was extended 10 days, they never paid any part thereof. The Stockton faction then tried to take control of the road but the Russell faction got an injunction to stop them.

Horace A. Scott

Horace A. Scott served in the 3rd Kentucky Cavalry, Company K, being promoted to Captain on January 30, 1863. He was mustered out from the 3rd Cavalry (Kentucky) on July15 , 1865 at Lexington. Not many years after the Civil War, he commanded the Jeffersonville, Madison and Indianapolis Railroad in southern Indiana. The town of Scottsburg, Indiana was founded in 1871 and named after him, the railroad President, when the railroad. In 1878, he ran for Congress in Louisville, Kentucky as a Republican and lost. He was one of several men in the Ohio River valley who had railroad involvement who involved themselves in Jacksonville railroading.

Telfair Stockton

Telfair Stockton was born January 31, 1860 in Quincy, Florida. According to Jacksonville's Architectural Heritage, “at age sixteen, Telfair Stockton had saved enough money from his job as a newsboy to open a news and bookstore, thus becoming one of the youngest merchants in Jacksonville. This entrepreneurship continued throughout his long and varied career.” He switched to real estate in 1884, founding Telfair Stockton and Company. He became one of the largest and most prominent real estate developers in Florida.[9]. He married Florence Fitch on January 15, 1885. Between them, they produced Florence Stockton, James Roosevelt, and Telfair, Junior. He served as President, of the Stockton-Budd Company and the New Springfield Company. He advocated government funding to deepening the Jacksonville harbor, build jetties to channel the river's mouth, dredging the river, and improving railway facilities and inland waterways. 1897-1899--Chairman, Board of Works (1897-1899) and was elected as state representative from Duval County in 1902 but had little interest in politics. [10] He died February 2, 1932.

In 1893, Archer Harman was President with J.N.C. Stockton as Secretary-Treasurer. The directors were Harman, Stockton, H. H. Buckman, T. P. Denham, and Horace Scott (of Louisville, Kentucky). At the end of December of that year, the JM&P owned 4 locomotives, 14 passenger cars, 2 baggage cars, 2 box cars, 7 flat cars, a caboose, and two ferry boats. In 1893, the Florida Comptroller reported it had a total value of $49,090 of which $8,415 was rolling stock.[11]

Archer Harman, ca. 1899

Archer Harman enjoyed the many advantages of being the son of a famous Virginia Colonel in the Civil War. He was born August 16, 1859 in Staunton. Although the War damaged the family's economic circumstance, his father sent him to Virginia Military Institute at age 15 on September 14, 1874. VMI expelled Archer on February 23, 1875 for being drunk on guard duty. He returned to the family farm where he was during the 1880 US Census. Staunton needed to rebuild its economy after the War so leaders decided to repair the Virginia Central Railroad and build the new Valley Railroad to connect Staunton to Baltimore, Maryland and to Salem in the extreme southwestern Virginia so, on January 26, 1866, the leaders held a public meeting at which they proposed to extend the Virginia Central to the Ohio River and raise funds to begin building the Valley Railroad, of which Archer's uncle Michael Archer became President. The Valley Central had been built by Cornelius Rice Mason before the War. C. R. Mason bought a farm near Staunton to be in position to extend the line to Covington but the war intervened. Mason joined Michael Harman and others in the Ohio project. They obtained the backing of Collis P. Huntington, he of transcontinental railroad The name was changed to Chesapeake and Ohio., Asher Harman worked for Mason. Construction began in 1869 and ended in 1873 when they reached the Ohio River. Then Mason, turned this crew to the Valley Railroad. When they had built to Lexington, Asher sent Archer to VMI; when Archer blotted his copy paper, Asher put Archer to work on constructing the Valley road but then the Mason contractors shifted their attention to Kentucky when they won two contracts with the Cincinnati Southern Railroad., a project of many years hindered by cost overruns and the Panic [Depression] of 1873.

In 1885, Harman left railroad work and moved to a independent businessman. He invested in the Southern Asphalt Company . He became involved in coal land speculation and not always honest with his partners and investors. When he lost a $1.6 million suit at the Kentucky Supreme Court Level December 1892, his career as a contractor and businessman in Kentucky ended. He moveed to Jacksonville and partnered with Horace Scott.[12]

Henry H. Buckman

Henry Holland Buckman, born June 20, 1858 in Jacksonville., earned a degree from Cumberland University in Tennessee and was admitted to the Bar on June 20, 1879. He was a Law partner with Aristides Doggett, one of the most prominent attorneys in the city until latter’s death in 1890. Buckman served a term as Jacksonville Police Commissioner. He was appointed in 1895 as Assistant United States Attorney for the Southern District of Florida. He was involved in real estate and promoted Atlantic Beach. In 1893 he represented JM & P as an attorney. , state representative who authored the Buckman Act (1905) which created three higher education institutions, the present University of Florida, Florida A & M, and Florida State University. He died May 3, 1914.

This RR ran from Arlington to the beach near the jetties (Burnside Beach) and then backed into Mayport. Built by a corporation in which Wallace had the majority of the stock. Opened in June, 1888; Wallace died in 1889. Stockton (yes, the same family as the powerful real estate form and the Times Union for years) was the executor. Stockton managed to sell the road early in 1892 to three men who issued a promissory note but defaulted. When they didn't meet the 10-day extension, Stockton took the road back. The Russell group had extended the track from Arlington to connect with the ferry at South Jacksonville. The ferry was how passengers of the J&A and the RR to St Augustine go to the trains. The J&A, however, didn't want to give the JM&P permission to cross its track so the JM&P bought the ferry and denied J&A passengers until the J&A yielded. It did. All of this cost and probably is why Russell et al. defaulted and why they wouldn't let go of the road.

On Thursday, June 30th, the Stockton directors met and demanded possession from the Scott party but they refused. On Friday, July 1^st, the directors met and deposed Russell thus putting Stockton in charge. They guarded the track on Friday night and chartered a boat to Arlington, went east on the track for a mile or so, met a train, showed the engineer the director’s resolution, and took possession of the train with their engineer driving the train to Arlington.

The Scott party retaliated by hiring legal counsel (H. H. Buckman and H. Bisbee) who filed suit in federal court in a suit entitled James A. Russell, D. M. Yeomans, citizens of the State of Ohio, and Horace Scott, citizen of Kentucky, versus John N. C. Stockton, Arthur Meigs, L. P. Earle, and Thomas P. Denham , citizens of the State of Florida, for conspiracy and trespass; damages $50,000. The Russell faction won that round.[13]

Arthur Meigs, JMP director, was according to the 1895 Jacksonville directory, the manager and treasurer of Atlantic Lumber Company. He was also General Manager of the Mount Rogers and Eastern Railroad in Virginia in 1901.

T. P. Denham was involved in banking and railroads. He became Cashier of the National Bank of the State of Florida. In 1903, he was one of the founders of the Atlantic National Bank, the second largest in Jacksonville. He was President, and a director of Atlantic Suwannee River & Gulf Railroad Company, founded in 1893.

David M. Yeomans was an incorporator of the Cleveland [Ohio] Safe Deposit and Trust Company in 1891 and the Director and President of New York and Atlantic Railroad in 1892.[15]

JM&P and J&A tracks converging in South Jacksonville Source: Cleve Powell

JM&P 1893 Timetable

On July 9, 1893 as date the new JM&P from South Jacksonville to Burnside Beach and Mayport opened just missing the 4th of July excursions. A bonanza of cash never came. The December, 1894-January 1894 Corbett v Mitchell prize fight brought revenue because Corbett trained in Mayport and people took excursions to see him but this was not recurrent revenue. On September 5, 1895, the JM&P was sold at public auction to Telfair Stockton who renamed it the St. Johns & Atlantic. Trains quit running on December, 14, 1895. Mail was delivered by hand car until 1900; there weren't many people on its route. People fought over the assets. They were sold stored, or abandoned.

The corporation was plagued by law suits, some after it quit operating trains. There were bones to be picked clean. The JM&P suffered a series of lawsuits in the 1890s. The most significant one national was the Jacksonville, M. P. Ry. & Nav. Co. v. Hooper et al. (January 13, 1896) involving the claims that the railroad corporation owed the Hoopers money from unpaid lease payments and for not insuring the San Diego Hotel $6,000 as promised. The court ruled that railroad corporations could own businesses beyond the actual operation of a railroad. The hotel burned in November 28,1889.

The J&A got an injunction in mid-June 1893 to prevent the JM&P from crossing its track This delayed the opening of the Arlington-South Jacksonville route until July 9, 1893, thus preventing the JM&P from capitalizing ion 4th of July excursion revenue. A court settled the dispute on June 29, 1893 when the JM&P agreed to pay either $500 or $40 (8% on 500) a year for crossing rights, the choice being that of the JM&P . However, the J&A brought suit on October 16, 1896 saying no money had been paid. The October 25, 1897 judgment was against JM&P for $160. Stockton trying to get out of paying the $40 it seems.

[The JM&P] went to sale under foreclosure and on September 15, 1895, Robert S. Cockrell, Special Master, conveyed to John N. C. Stockton right of way, rails, machinery, rolling stock, etc. The sale was made by virtue of a decree of the Circuit Court of Duval County in the cause of George F. Broughton vs. the company. John N. G. Stockton and wife conveyed all the property received by deed from Mr. Cockrell, Special Master, to H. H. Buckman on June 27, 1899. There appears to have been other claims, for the records show that on May 26, 1899, John R. Horr, U. S. Marshal, conveyed to Albion W. Knight, the railway including the right of way, track material, etc. Mr. Knight sold the rail to Sabel Brothers of Jacksonville, and on June 12, 1899, conveyed to H. H. Buckman all the remaining property which he had acquired from the U. S. Marshal. Mr. Buckman having evidently obtained undisputed title, conveyed the old road-bed and right-of-way, which lay within the Dewees grant, to the Mayport Terminal Company [a Flagler corporation], by deed dated September 5, 1900.

Wallace's dream was a chimera.[15]

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3: Jacksonville, Mayport and Pablo Railway and Navigation Company