The Osceola Club was a Pensacola social club in the late-nineteenth and early-twentieth centuries. Organized as the Reading and Social Club[1] in August 1872,[2] it changed its name to the Osceola Club in 1878 and was headquartered in at least two buildings during its existence.
The first, located at 21 1/2 South Palafox Street, was built in 1883[3] and can be seen in the Wellge map of 1885. It was a two-story structure with iron balconies and distinctive turrets.
| The club occupies a handsome suite of rooms on Palafox street, convenient for its members, and elegantly furnished, consisting of reception, reading and billiard rooms, etc., and although the membership is small, it is composed of the best element of the city. It has numbered among its membership United States senators, congressmen and governors; the late E. A. Perry, governor of Florida, having been its president for upwards of ten years. The leading newspapers and magazines of the day are to be found in its reading rooms, which are open to its members and guests at all times. Once a year a ball is given by the club to its friends, which is generally looked forward to as one of the society events of the season, and the young people are not forgotten by them, as a children's party or "fancy dress ball" is given annually to the little ones. The officers of the Osceola Club for the present year [1897] are: Thomas C. Watson, president; S. R. Mallory, first vice-president; A. M. Avery, second vice-president; Walter M. Pitt, secretary and treasurer; and Messrs. John B. Guttman, H. T. Wright and J. M. Muldon, executive committee.[1] |
This building was destroyed in (and believed to be the source of) the Halloween Night Fire of 1905.[4]
The club continued its operations at a second building at the corner of Garden and Baylen Streets.[5] The new building was a three-story structure in the modernist style, similar to contemporary structures like the San Carlos Hotel and Pensacola YMCA.
Prominent members
References
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 Bliss' Quarterly: Pensacola of to-day, January 1897.
- ↑ http://www.rootsweb.com/~flescamb/1885appendix.htm
- ↑ As per plaque depicted on illustration.
- ↑ John Appleyard. The Brent Block.
- ↑ http://www.stjohnshistoriccemetery.com/pensacolas_heritages/government.htm