The Laura Street Trio of historic buildings at Forsyth and Laura streets in Downtown Jacksonville are shown Nov. 11, 2024. | Monty Zickuhr, Jacksonville Daily Record
Published on May 20, 2026 at 3:54 pm
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Four new sites, one of them a pre-Civil War home, have been added to a list of endangered historic structures in Duval County.
The Jacksonville History Center released its annual list Tuesday. With it, the History Center announced some historic sites that are success stories due to preservation and redevelopment.
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Some buildings on the latest endangered list have been there for years, History Center CEO Alan Bliss said. A few are very close to being restored, or at least are being studied for revival, he said. They include the Laura Street Trio in Downtown Jacksonville.
“We list buildings on the endangered list because they are at risk for demolition, either through neglect or intentionally, and we believe they have a valuable story to tell about the people and events of Jacksonville’s past,” Bliss said. “I call attention to some of the success stories listed on there, and I’d also call attention to the fact that some examples – the best known the Laura Street Trio – that we have high hopes that that is going to be a success story in the future. There seems to be a lot of encouraging discourse.”
Still endangered
The history center issues the list every year in observance of National Historic Preservation Month. This year’s list has 28 sites, including three churches, seven schools and five commercial structures. Some have been listed for years:
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THE LAURA STREET TRIO: The Trio consists of the 114-year-old Florida Life building, 117-year-old Bisbee building and the Florida National Bank, built in 1902. They were built after the Fire of 1901. Multiple plans to redevelop the Trio have fallen through, although Becovic Management Group of Indiana has purchased them, plus the restored Barnett National Bank Building, with plans for a mixed-use development there.
SNYDER MEMORIAL METHODIST CHURCH: The church at 226 N. Laura St. was designed by architect J.H.W. Hawkins with detailed carved stone and stained glass windows. It also is historic due to its use as a refuge during Ax Handle Saturday, as Black civil rights demonstrators sought sanctuary when under attack by a white mob.
POST-CIVIL WAR COTTAGE: This small, boarded-up pine cottage is on Chelsea Street in Jacksonville’s Brooklyn neighborhood. Often called the “Buffalo Soldier’s House,” it was built between the late 1860s and 1885 by Black Union soldier veterans from the Civil War. It is now is the last of its kind, according to an article in 2022 by Ennis Davis, an experienced planner and architect.
The full list of 2026 endangered historic buildings, plus those being redeveloped, are in the History Center’s 12-page list:
New endangered sites
ONEIDA BUNGALOW COURT IN MIXON TOWN: The former centerpiece of a thriving Black working-class neighborhood on Wade Drive, this group of 24 homes was built in 1925. It was one of two Jacksonville sites nominated for the state’s most threatened historic places list last year by the Florida Trust for Historic Preservation.
THE ST. JOHNS RIVER LIGHTHOUSE: Built in 1858, it is the oldest surviving structure in Mayport Village. The lighthouse, decommissioned in 1929, is now on Naval Station Mayport property and was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1976. The nonprofit Mayport Lighthouse Association is working to move the 81-foot-tall lighthouse to city-owned land in Mayport Village.
LaMEE HOUSE: This pre-Civil War vintage home at 9845 Heckscher Drive was built for river bar pilot Captain William LaMee in 1855. Later incorporated into the Timucuan Ecological and Historic Preserve, it was fired upon by Union gunships during the Civil War, according to historians.
“It is part of Jacksonville’s early maritime community where residents commuted by mail boat,” said historic sites committee member Scott O’Connor.
1901 RESIDENTIAL BUILDING: This building is possibly the oldest residential structure in Downtown Jacksonville at 332 E. Adams St. It was built in 1901 to replace one destroyed in that year’s Downtown blaze. The private home was turned into a boarding house, then used as an office building for the past two decades.
Brighter future for some sites
LAWTON L. PRATT FUNERAL HOME: The building at 525 W. Beaver St. has been reimagined as The Raven, a boutique hotel renovated by Avant Construction Group and opened in December. The original funeral home was designed in 1916 by African American architect Joseph Haygood Blodgett.
UNION TERMINAL WAREHOUSE: Built in 1913 as a grocery warehouse, and considered the largest of its kind once in the state, it was redesigned last year with 228 apartment units, a restaurant and office space.
THE DEBS STORE: The structure was built in 1913 at 1478 Florida Ave. Lebanese immigrant Nick Debs bought it in 1927, and it operated as a grocery store in the city’s historic Eastside until 2011. Debs’ grandson, Joe Debs, partnered with LIFT JAX to restore the building as a neighborhood grocery store called The Corner at Debs, with a fresh food market plus career and financial services for residents.
FEDERAL RESERVE BUILDING: Built in 1923 at 424 N. Hogan St, it was designed by Henrietta Dozier, the city’s first female architect. Listed as a National Historic Landmark after being abandoned for 40 years, it is being redeveloped by JWB Real Estate Capital as a mixed-use space.
FLORIDA BAPTIST CONVENTION BUILDING: Built in the mid-1920s at 218 W. Church St., and designed by Henry Klutho, this historic five-story structure fell into disrepair until JWB Real Estate restored it with a restaurant and retail sites, plus 24 apartments.
