Website Note: It was through Herb Anderson's hard work and generosity the original Bayfront History website came into existence. That site has now been updated and merged with this new site, which will now will be manged by the condo association. We wish to thank Herb for all his hard work collecting this valuable history of BFT.
Reflections, a history of Bayfront Tower
by Herb Anderson
Longtime BFT resident, Herb Anderson
I vividly remember the moment when my love affair with Bayfront Tower began. It was August 1980; I was at a cocktail party at the home of Bayfront Tower (BFT) resident, John Kearney. John's home had a unique design -- built from two units on two different floors (units 2605 and 2705). A spiral staircase connected these two sections of his home. I stood at the window at twilight, looking across the bay towards the Albert Whitted airport. I thought this must be the same the panoramic view I'd see from a small plane. John's home was on the twenty-sixth and twenty-seventh floors and the view was magnificent. I was overwhelmed by both the scenes beyond the windows and the elegance of the home. That memory - and the dream that I would someday live at Bayfront Tower - stayed with me for years. In 1993, the dream became reality when my wife Elizabeth and I purchased our present home on the eleventh floor of this wonderful building.
Our life here gets even better with each day. We not only live in elegant style here at BFT but, in the past ten years, all of this part of St. Petersburg has flourished. Our spectacular Beach Drive promenade has blossomed with posh restaurants (offering outdoor seating areas), boutique shopping and several new, stylish, high-rise condos. All this provides us with the best in food, fashion, people watching, dog parades, museum choices, and all topped by a beautiful vista of the marinas lining Tampa Bay one block to our east.
Bayfront Tower residency lends itself to a wonderful life style, but how did that come about? What were the steps taken to create our unique home? As I began to research the history of our home, I continued to stumble across dozens of interesting facts about BFT.
William Langlois, a resident in the tower, first suggested I start compiling a history in 2010. I took his seed of an idea and planted it with several other residents, including my dear friend, the late Carley Gibbs, who worked tirelessly to edit the pages of our history site. As I started sharing these interesting little tidbits with our friends and neighbors, we found that many had their own questions. Some provided letters and old newspaper articles for research. It seemed every answer led to another question.
At one point, there was a suggestion that we put all these facts together to create a written history of our home - something that could be shared with others long after we're gone. So, that was the impetus behind this project. But, this isn't something one person could do by themselves. As the popular saying goes, it takes a village. With a lot of help from some dedicated friends, we came up with this web site. Of course, I realize this is just a start. This is a dynamic process and our history is evolving every day. That's why we've put this collection of memories together as a web site and not a book. That way, we can adapt and edit these memories more easily than we could a printed booklet or thick brochure. So, as you look through these pages, if you see something we should add or correct, please send us a note and help us to further develop this legacy of Bayfront Tower.
Below is a list of friends who contributed to this web site:
Our life here gets even better with each day. We not only live in elegant style here at BFT but, in the past ten years, all of this part of St. Petersburg has flourished. Our spectacular Beach Drive promenade has blossomed with posh restaurants (offering outdoor seating areas), boutique shopping and several new, stylish, high-rise condos. All this provides us with the best in food, fashion, people watching, dog parades, museum choices, and all topped by a beautiful vista of the marinas lining Tampa Bay one block to our east.
Bayfront Tower residency lends itself to a wonderful life style, but how did that come about? What were the steps taken to create our unique home? As I began to research the history of our home, I continued to stumble across dozens of interesting facts about BFT.
William Langlois, a resident in the tower, first suggested I start compiling a history in 2010. I took his seed of an idea and planted it with several other residents, including my dear friend, the late Carley Gibbs, who worked tirelessly to edit the pages of our history site. As I started sharing these interesting little tidbits with our friends and neighbors, we found that many had their own questions. Some provided letters and old newspaper articles for research. It seemed every answer led to another question.
At one point, there was a suggestion that we put all these facts together to create a written history of our home - something that could be shared with others long after we're gone. So, that was the impetus behind this project. But, this isn't something one person could do by themselves. As the popular saying goes, it takes a village. With a lot of help from some dedicated friends, we came up with this web site. Of course, I realize this is just a start. This is a dynamic process and our history is evolving every day. That's why we've put this collection of memories together as a web site and not a book. That way, we can adapt and edit these memories more easily than we could a printed booklet or thick brochure. So, as you look through these pages, if you see something we should add or correct, please send us a note and help us to further develop this legacy of Bayfront Tower.
Below is a list of friends who contributed to this web site:
Louie Adcock
Margaret Allison Joan Appleyard Eleanor Baney Judith Bick Betty Breedon Ken Cowan Marguerite Dawson Myrna Davis A. Wynelle Deese Curt Gibbs Harriet Harvey Hazel Hough Jane Hubben Jane Jenner Betty Jane Johnson |
William Johnson
Mary Jones John Kennedy Dorothy Lang Jim Lang Bill Langlois Helen Leslie Joe Lettelleir Maureen (Tinker) McGee Barbara Olsen Christina Pasqualone Pam Pruitt Jane Roberts Kitty Safford Phyllis Williams |
The original BFT History website was funded by the Continental Group. Special thanks to Maureen Connolly, Senior Regional Director of the Continental Group, for helping make this program a reality.
Noteworthy Residents
Bayfront Tower has always attracted an unusual number of professional and prestigious residents - and that makes the challenge of deciding who should have special mention very difficult. When we started this project, a form was given all residents on which they could submit a name for consideration. The writers then made a decision to limit our list of note worthy residents to those who have made a difference in Bayfront Tower, the City of St. Petersburg, the state of Florida or on national or international level. It is our hope that this section will be added to over the years. Residents are listed in alphabetical order.
John William Galbraith and his wife Rosemary moved into BFT in 1978 and opened his Templeton Funds Management office in one of the ground floor commercial offices. They quickly realized that St. Petersburg was pining for more culture, colleges and development and gave with unconditional generosity to the Florida International Museum, Eckerd College, the Florida Orchestra, the Museum of History, the Tampa Bay Research Institute and the United Negro College fund.
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Robert A. Good, M.D., was Physician-In-Chief of All Children's Hospital, Director of the Children's Research Institute at All Children's in St. Petersburg and Distinguished Research Professor at the University of South Florida in Tampa. He was considered the founder of modern Immunology and a pioneer in bone marrow transplant. A brilliant mind, the late Dr. Good was a pediatrician, microbiologist and pathologist. He was a founding member of the National Institutes of Medicine, Chief Scientist, President and Director of Sloan, Kettering Institute for Cancer Research, as well as an author and editor of more than 2,000 papers and books. Additionally, he trained hundreds of immunology students.
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Ruth Gray wrote a food and dining column in The St. Petesburg Times for over 27 years. She had a loyal following of readers and was an original "foodie."
A longtime resident, Ruth was the acting president and event planner for The BFT Tower Club for over 25 years. |
The people of Tampa Bay, particularly, the city of St. Petersburg, have benefited tremendously from the generosity of Bill and Hazel Hough. Mr. Hough, a U.F. graduate, founded a very successful investment- banking firm, William R. Hough and Co. The Hough's seemingly endless generosity has been especially evident in their contributions to the local arts. A significant gift enabled the opening of the Palladium Theater as a venue for the performing arts. They also contributed the total funding necessary for the 2008 opening of the Hazel Hough wing of Fine Arts Museum in St. Petersburg. Additionally, they have established an endowment fund to name the museum’s Chief Curator, Jennifer Hardin, the Hazel Hough Chief Curator, and to add a curator of modern and contemporary art. They recently provided the University of Florida with a 30 million dollar gift to be used in the support of business programs. At that time it was the largest gift ever bestowed upon the university. In 2012, the Houghs added the Hough Family Endowed Chair on Florida Studies at the University of South Florida, St. Petersburg.
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James Lang and his wife Dorothy have spent much of their lives working for the good of St. Petersburg. Jim was president of the Suncoasters, a local civic association involved with the Festival of States activities, and was elected Mr. Sun in 1970. He was also chairman of the Pinellas County Committee of 100. Jim helped create Pioneer Park and chaired that park’s foundation for many years. He was part of the four man team that succeeded in attracting, what came to be, the Salvador Dali Museum to our city. Mr. Lang and his wife, Dorothy, were early residents in our tower and did much to frame our lifestyle here.
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Helen Krauss Leslie – Helen attended St. Petersburg College in spring 1940 and in 1943, she was one of two female graduates from Auburn University with a B.S. in Business Administration. She was a long-time local businessperson.
Helen served as president of Business and Professional Women’s Club at the local, state and national levels and was extremely active in women’s cause on an international level. In 1972. Mrs. Leslie was the recipient of the Certificate of Achievement from the American Bureau for Medical Aid to China and also a recipient of the “Outstanding Service to St. Petersburg” citation. A dynamic force for professional women world wide, she presided at the First Congress of Business and Professional Women of the Americas and chaired conferences in Puerto Rico, El Salvador and Mexico. |
Bill Mills affiliate construction company, Federal Construction Company, performed the interior fitment for some of the units in the building after the bank take over in 1978. He and his wife Helen became early and long time residents here. Mills was responsible for construction of many of St. Petersburg’s landmark buildings: Maas Brothers Dept. Store, the Florida Power headquarters, much of the Eckerd College construction and many other noteworthy projects throughout the state. He was extremely active in Bayfront Tower’s early development and for twenty five years, a strong voice in all decisions made regarding building maintenance and amenity upgrades.
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During WWII Odette Patterson worked with the general contractor in charge of the first atomic bomb. Odette was honored by the Florida governor for her many years of service in support of crime victims. She also established a trust to assist police and fire fighting city employees. A meeting with Odette always began with her happy statement of “It’s a wonderful world we live in!,” followed by her delightful smile.
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J. Crayton Pruitt, Sr., MD, was a cardiovascular surgeon, a visionary, entrepreneur and philanthropist. He dedicated much of his surgical practice to the prevention of strokes. Among peers, the late Dr. Pruitt was recognized for the great number of carotid endarterectomies he performed. He is author of A Crusade For Strokes Prevention and endowed $10 million to the University of Florida’s department of Biomedical Engineering. The department was renamed the J. Crayton Pruitt Family Department of Biomedical Engineering.
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Though Massachusetts born, Fernand St. Germain was elected to the Rhode Island House of Representatives from 1952 – 1961. He was elected as a Democrat to the next 13 succeeding Congresses (January 3, 1961 – January 3, 1989). St. Germain served as chairman of the Committee on Banking, Finance and Urban Affairs (Ninety-seventh through One Hundredth Congresses); the Garn-St. Germain Depository Institutions Act of 1982 is named for him.
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Gus Stavros served in the 94th Infantry Division of General Patton’s Army. Gus' display of valor, and wounds received during a battle in Germany, earned him the Bronze Star and a Purple Heart. Frances served in the U.S. Navy WAVES and was stationed at the Naval Air Station in Jacksonville. After the war they attended Columbia University and married in 1948. They moved to Pinellas County in 1958 and in 1960 Gus started Better Business Forms, a very successful business. Both Gus and Frances have given generously of their time, talent and treasure to our community. They are best known for their efforts in the area of education. Examples include the Gus Stavros Institute at the Pinellas Education Foundation (home of Enterprise Village for 5th graders) and Financial Park (for 8th graders). The couple has donated $18 million to educational causes and raised an additional $20 million for charity.
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Henry Van Kesteren - Henry joined the Army Air Corps before Pearl Harbor. He was a flight instructor and later flew P-40’s and P-51”s as the war ended. After WWII he and his wife Ginny built an airport in Selma, Alabama and offered Flying Services until 1952 when he was recalled into Military Air Transport Service. Henry flew worldwide and retired from the USAF after 41 years of service. He and his wife purchased the FBO (fixed base operation) Bay Air and Piper dealership at Whitted Airport (just south of BFT) in 1973 and established VK Aircraft fourteen years later. When the Van Kesterens moved to their BFT unit 2706 they had a special window constructed on the south side so that they could watch the airport and planes.
Mr. Van Kesteren’s company built a Lancair IV-P and his company continued in experimental work and developed several STCs (a FAA approved aircraft modification or process) which enhanced aircraft performance. Henry was also presented with the Charles Taylor Master Mechanic’s Award in 2001. |
Robert V. Workman worked with bank officials during the difficult construction years. Without his dedication to the development of Pioneer Park and the area surrounding our building, BFT would not enjoy the presence in our community it does today. With all the effort he put into BFT, Workman still had time to spend years as Commodore of the St. Petersburg Yacht Club.
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