10 Surprising Facts about St Petersburg FL

Ten years ago my mom and stepdad moved to St Petersburg, Florida. They relocated from rural West Virginia, where they’d lived for several years. I count myself extremely lucky.

Ever since their re-location I’ve much more eagerly anticipated my visits back to the US. Not only does Florida have super-fantastic weather most months of the year, along with almost unending sunshine and gorgeous semi-tropical trees and vegetation, but St Petersburg (St Pete for short) is a wonderful small city, jam-packed with interesting history, stunning architecture, an explosion of arts & museums, tons of delicious Asian restaurants (and other cuisines) and great places to bicycle.

During my mom’s first year in St Pete, I actually ended up staying one full year. Initially I was there to help her with her new home & gardens. But that’s the year I started up LashWorldTour travel blog, which ended up taking the whole year to get assembled and off the ground.

Kicking off the website while I was in St Pete worked to great advantage. Since St Pete was new to me, and since the city has so many different amazing aspects, I jumped right into exploring the city by joining historical walking tours, visiting its many museums & art galleries, checking out the restaurants & nightlife, cycling to beaches, parks & neighborhoods and otherwise exploring wonderful St. Pete, And then writing articles about it all.

As a result, I really came to know, appreciate and love St Petersburg.

Now, ten years later, I still greatly look forward to returning to visit family and explore St. Pete all over again. The city has been expanding rapidly, especially in the arts, independent shops & boutiques and restaurant/cafe scene, so there’s always more to explore.

Meanwhile, St Pete’s fascinating history and beautifully-renovated iconic buildings remain in tact. Following are some of the most interesting things I’ve learned about St Pete during my usual multiple-month-long visits.

1. St. Pete was named after St Petersburg, Russia

Two key men founded St Petersburg, Florida in the late 1880s. One of them, Mr. John Williams, bought a huge tract of mostly swampy land on the west side of vast Tampa Bay. He later bartered a huge chunk of that land to the Russian aristocrat Peter Demens in exchange for Demens building a railroad line across the state to the newly sprouting town. Together they planned to bring in tourists to brand-new healthspas, hotels and the fine beaches.

Legend has it that Demens and Williams flipped a coin to decide who got to name the town. Demens won the bet and named the town after his hometown of St Petersburg, Russia. Williams built St Pete’s first hotel, the huge Detroit Hotel, and named it after his hometown in Michigan.

2. The world’s first commercial flight took place at St Petersburg, FL!

Most people don’t think of Florida when contemplating the history of aviation. So this important milestone in world aviation might come as quite a surprise. It’s also a little-known fact about St Petersburg.

Ten years after the Wright Brothers launched the world’s first ‘flying machines’ north of Florida at S. Carolina’s Outer Banks, down in St Pete the enterprising Mr. Fansler concocted the idea of running a passenger service by airplane between St Petersburg and Tampa by flying over Tampa Bay. He bought a plane, employed a pilot, scheduled flights and marketed the new service.

On January 1, 1914, pilot Tony Janus flew an open-cockpit Benoist XIV Flying Boat across broad Tampa Bay to Tampa City for the first time in history, establishing the world’s first commercial flight.

The much-publizied event was attended by over 3000 spectators and celebrated with an Italian band playing in a grand parade. The single passenger on the flight, former St Pete Mayor, Abram Pheil, won his auctioned ticket for $400.

The plane skimmed across Tampa Bay at only 5 ft above the water, taking 23 minutes to reach Tampa. The new passenger flight was considerably faster than any other means of transport between the two cities. The trip took about two hours by boat, 4-12 hours by train or 20 hours by driving.

3. The Firestone Grand Prix race is held annually in St Pete

Here’s another little-known but exciting fact about St Petersburg… Every year, for three days in February or March, several streets in downtown are barricaded, re-routed and heavily guarded to create a loop track for the famous Firestone Grand Prix car races.

The looping course goes right past the waterfront marinas, St Petersburg Yacht Club, several parks and makes use of Alfred Witthead Airport runways.

Thousands of race car fans flood the sides of the race course to watch the colorful zooming cars fly past with tremendous roaring noise. Grandstands are set up for fans willing to pay aadmission to get a much better view of the races.

A week-long festival is run in conjunction with the races, offering various activities, food & beverage stalls, driver autograph booths and more.

The St Petersburg race is considered one of the most respected motorsport events in North America.

4. The Salvador Dali Museum holds the world’s largest retrospective collection of a single artist in the world

The Salvador Dali Museum is one of St Pete’s most important icons andtourist draws. People from all over the US and the world visit St Pete specifically to visit this amazing & important world-class museum.

Founded in St Pete in 1997 (in a different location), the museum holds the largest collection of Dali’s work in the world. In total, they have nearly 2000 original Dali works completed between 1913-1970. They include paintings, drawings, shetches, sculptures, short movies and other Dali works.

Many of Dali’s most famous original paintings adorn the walls, while lesser works are rotated from the collection. Meanwhile, the amazing architecture of the contemporary-design museum mimics Dali’s work. It’s also stunningly located right in front of the municipal marina, filled Math private yachts.

Dali museum was originally housed in a converted warehouse at nearby University of … The much newer & artistic building was completed in late 2010 and its splashy grand opening was held on January 11, 2011.

How a vast collection of Spanish artist Salvador Dali’s work ended up in St Petersburg, Florida is a fascinating story that I wrote about in this article.

5. St Pete’s waterfront is the third longest city waterfront in US

St Petersburg is situated right on the western side of huge Tampa Bay, directly across the bay from Tampa. The stunning waterfront runs for a total of over seven miles, with more than four miles located right at downtown St Pete.

The entire four miles is lined by large gorgeous, shady parks filled Math huge trees, wide lush lawns, landscaped gardens, walking paths and park benches. There are two small beaches, swimming pools, tennis courts, beach volleyball courts and exercise stations.

All this parkland provides spectacular, unobstructed views over massive Tampa Bay all the way to the far eastern shores and skyscrapers of downtown Tampa.

Along the way, the waterfront’s passes three marinas filled with sailing yachts & powerboats, large iconic historic buildings, long St Petersburg pier, three major museums, historic Al Lang Stadium, the venerable Vinoy Hotel, a series of huge historic private mansions, Coffeepot Bayou, Snell Isle and tiny …island, which is filled with throngs of waterbirds squalking away most times of the day.

Not surprisingly, St. Pete waterfront is one of the most beautiful, enjoyable and iconic parts of the city. Arguably, the waterfront is really what makes St. Pete so beautiful.

6. Sunshine Skyway Bridge is the world’s highest & longest cable-stay bridge

This exceedingly high and unbelievably long bridge is a thrilling – to some people, petrifying – bridge to drive over. In its center section, the bridge soars through the sky 191 ft above Tampa Bay, with the water situated way way down below.

Skyway Bridge is located at the southern end of St Pete city and crosses the very broad mouth of huge Tampa Bay, ending it’s journey in Bradenton city on the east side of the bay, which is south of Tampa city. The bridge covers a total distance of over 5 miles.

For adventurers, thrill-seekers and visitors looking for new & exciting experience, driving over Skyway Bridge is one of the most memorable things to do in St Pete.

The current Skyway Bridge, with its dozens of bright yellow cables, was opened to motorists in 1987 to replace the original cantilever Skyway Bridge that dated from 1954. The original bridge was damaged beyond repair in 1980 when a huge cargo ship smashed into one of its main pillars during a blinding rainstorm. The crash caused the deaths of 35 motorists who were crossing the bridge at the time.

Interestingly, long parts of the old bridge were kept in tact and converted into long fishing piers and parks.

Driving over Skyway Bridge and back can easily fill several hours or an entire day, with stops at the various small parks and piers near either end of the bridge. Views over the bay, Gulf of Mexico, the Gulf coastline and St Petersburg are spetacular.

7. Many of St Pete’s historic buildings dating from 1910s-1920s are on National Register of Historic Places

Because of St Pete’s booming tourist days and generous investments in development in the 1900s-1920s, downtown St Pete is filled with gorgeous historic buildings of many different architectural styles.

They include several gorgeous iconic buildings such as the stately Vinoy Hotel, built in Mediterranean Revival style, and Stetson University College of Law buildings, also constructed in Mediterranean Revival style.

There are also several churches, commercial and government buildings (including the Open-Air Post Office), dozens of stunning homes in the Old Northeast Quarter, the cute Bungalow-style homes in Historic Kenwood neighborhood, Mirror Lake Library (built as a Carnegie Library in 1924), the Shuffleboard Clubhouse and Lawn Bowling Clubhouse, Al Lang Stadium, former hotels converted to other uses, and many other structures.

Joining one the many historical walking tours of St Pete or doing a self-guided walk of historic sites is a great way to appreciate St. Pete’s intriguing history and beautifully renovated buildings.

8. St Pete hosts the world’s largest shuffleboard club

Shuffleboard is a relatively unknown outdoor leisure game that originated on British naval ships. Apparently, shuffleboard is currently popular in Canada, England and Europe, particularly in Germany.

The St Petersburg Shuffleboard Club was established in 1923. There, the club members invented the land version of the game. Since its inception, the St Petersburg Club has held title as the world’s largest.

The club was set next to beautiful little Mirror Lake, just a few blocks inland from the waterfront and major hotels. Today, the club is still situated at its original location.

Nowadays, the club has xxx shuffleboard courts and welcomes non-members to play. In 2005 they established ‘Friday Night Shuffle’ as a major evening for the public to go play a few games. It’s been hugely successful and nearly every Friday night, the club is bustling with about 100-150 people – couples, familes, groups of friends, both members and non-members, enjoying their early evening sliding pucks down the courts.

(Btw – The world’s oldest Lawn bowling club in US and only bowl balancing center is also located just down the road from the Shuffleboard Club).

9. St Pete has a huge, diverse and important arts’ scene

St Petersburg has a massive and extremely diverse local arts scene. In particular, there are several important glass artists and potters. In addition, there are also many painters, sculptors, metalwork artists, wood carving artists and dozens upon dozens of art galleries, studios, classes and workshops.

On top of all that, downtown St Pete is bursting at the seams with large art murals painted on buildings throughout downtown. This is all in addition to a dozen large museums, including Dali, MFA, Chihuly Glass and others.

Happily for the many local artists, several large non-profit art organizations have been long-established to support St Pete’s thriving & expanding arts scene and individual local artists. There are several art collectives as well.

This cultural aspect of St Petersburg makes the city even more appealing and enjoyable to explore.

10. Open Air Post Office and Bicylcing Postmen

St Pete’s rather famous open-air post office, located on 4^th Street in downtown, was opened in 1916 as the country’s first open-air postal service, Math postal boxes located outdoors so that owners can accesse them any time of day or night.

It was constructed in Mediterranean Revival style to imitate the architecture of a hospital in Italy. The beautiful & unique building showcases many intricate details no longer found on government buildings, including curved archways, American eagle carvings, and rows of brass postal boxes.

Amazingly, the post office has been in continuous use since its opening in 1916. In 1975 it was listed on the National Registry of Historic Buildings.

This post office is unique on another counts as well…St Pete postmen deliver mail by bicycle! Only one other place in the US, in Arizona, has bicycle mail delivery.

St Pete has 15 bicycle delivery routes. Postmen arrive at 7:30am, sort mail for about 2 hours, then set out on their 6-hour pedal around the city. Since they can’t possibly carry all the mail for the entire day at once, the post office has set up ‘relay boxes’ around the city where postmen stop to pick up their next batch of mail.

Conclusion

As this list illustrates, St Petersburg has many intriguing and unique historical points of interest, modern attractions, and fun, cultural activities to explore. There are actually many more around the small beautiful city.

I, for one, am always very happy to be in St. Pete and always look forward to my next visit when I’m out traveling the world.

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