The sculpture call "Life" stands at Memorial Park in Riverside, commemorating Floridians killed in World War I. | Dan Scanlan, Jacksonville Today
Published on December 12, 2024 at 5:30 pm
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It’s time to reshoot a photograph from 100 years ago — a shot of snappily dressed men and women gathered around the winged goddess and globe at Memorial Park in Riverside.
The crowd was there to commemorate the 1,200 Floridians who died in World War I and to dedicate the statue by local sculptor Charles Adrian Pillars.
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Now photographer Mark Krancer plans to re-create the historic image, but he needs your help. All you have to do is to gather around the sculpture at 4 p.m. Saturday.
The photo shoot is part of a celebration of the park’s centennial, planned from 3 to 6 p.m. It also will recall why people gathered there 100 years ago, said Patrick Emmet, president of the Memorial Park Association board of directors.
“Not only was it opening a memorial to the fallen soldiers of the state of Florida, but a lot of the mothers of fathers of those fallen soldiers were at that picture,” he said. “It is important that we all need to remember that all of them were there when this thing opened, and it was so important to them. … It is going to be a big day, and we are excited to re-create the picture.”
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Memorial Park’s history
The 5.85-acre public park is the third-oldest in the city, sitting between the St. Johns River and Riverside Avenue. The Rotary Club of Jacksonville suggested building a park in honor World War I’s dead. After the city bought the land, 31 civic groups helped raise money and plan the park.
The Olmsted Brothers, whose family designed New York City’s Central Park as well as a garden behind what is now the Cummer Museum of Arts and Gardens, were commissioned to design the park. Local architect Roy Benjamin helped in the design as Pillars crafted the bronze sculpture known as “Life.”
The names of the Floridians who died in World War I were inscribed on parchment and placed in metal boxes at the sculpture’s bases. Then the park was dedicated on Christmas Day 1924.
The centennial celebration will have live music, food trucks and local vendors, plus presentations by city and state officials. In preparation, the oval at the park’s center was resodded, and a memorial garden is being developed there as well, Emmet said.
But shapely concrete balustrades that once lined the riverfront are gone, victim to recent hurricanes that spared the winged bronze “Life” statue.
Waves and wind from Hurricane Irma in 2017 damaged most of the balustrades and flooded the park and side streets. It took four years to replace the damaged sections along 600 feet of shoreline as the city waited for funding from the Federal Emergency Management Agency.
Then on Aug. 30 last year, waves churned up by Hurricane Idalia once again destroyed the concrete balustrade. Pounding water cracked or washed away almost half of it by early that afternoon.
Erosion also has left puddle-filled depressions in the riverfront walkway, and some park benches nearby are settling into the ground.
Emmet had said he hoped the city would have repaired and replaced the balustrades in time for Saturday’s anniversary. Parks officials committed to that, until they had a closer look at the entire waterfront. No repair work has been done so far, Emmet said.
“They realized that there was more damage to the bulkhead, so they are literally going to rebid the bulkhead, and that has changed the timeline for the balustrades,” Emmet said. “I know it is a big job for the city, and we were disappointed. But I am very understanding, and once the balustrade and bulkhead are rebuilt, it will be done properly this time, and it will look great.”
Emmet said he does not know when the city repairs will be done, and city officials said they are still working on the timeline.
