Sunday Favorites: The Mainland Connection

ANNA MARIA - Today, a day trip to the beach is relatively effortless, save a few traffic jams during certain times of the year. But before the 1920s, the islands were only accessible by boat. It took a lot of ingenuity to build bridges connecting the island to the mainland.

The first settler on Anna Maria Island, George Emerson Bean, arrived in 1893. Bean convinced his friends Samuel and Annie Cobb to move to the island in 1897. The couple settled on the North End and birthed the first Caucasian child born on the island, they named her Anna, according to Alexa Schofiled in her 2018 speech to the Manatee County Historical Society entitled ”Anna Maria’s Early Settlers and the Cortez Bridges.“

In the early 1900s, the only way to get to and from the island was via sailing vessel. Residents would pack overnight supplies and basically camp at the beach in large canvas tents. There were also steam ships that served as transportation vessels for residents in the area. The ships would pick up passengers in the morning, drop them off on the island, then travel to Tampa for supplies and retrieve the passengers on their return route, according to the Manatee County historical archives.

Back then, it was customary to dress up for travel excursions. So steamship passengers arrived in their Sunday best with nowhere to change into their ”bathing costumes.“ This required some attention as it was disgraceful for anyone to change in the woods (yes back then there were woods). The ”largest bathhouse on the Gulf Coast“ was constructed near the present-day Sandbar Restaurant around 1915. This building not allowed beachgoers to wash and clean up after a long day at the beach before departing on their return trip home. A few years later, a concession stand was added, according to the historical archives.

By 1922, people wanted an easier route to the beautiful island. Instead of commissioning an engineer, they called a young dilettante named Jack Leffingwell. Leffingwell had earned a reputation for his ingenuity. He was an inventor of sorts – he refitted a boat with bicycle gear, creating a one-of-a-kind peddle boat. He also used antique wire to rig the first telephone poles and link his father’s home to the village doctor. Other businesses hired him to do the same and before you know it, the whole town was connected, according to Schofiled.

Leffingwell accepted the task of connecting Anna Maria to the mainland, beginning construction of the first Cortez Bridge in the summer of 1921. The crew was a few months into the project when the great Tampa Bay Hurricane of 1921 hit the area, demolishing 80 percent of the Cortez waterfront. Leffingwell and his crew basically had to start over again and the bridge wasn’t completed for another eight months, Schofield said.

The bridge cost the community around $58,000 – the modern equivalent of around $950,000. It connected to the island at present-day Bridge Street and later became the Bridge Street Pier. Scofiled says the fishing pier still includes some of the original materials.

As time went on the wooden bridge began to age. My grandmother and mother used to tell me stories of how the old wooden bridge would leave car passengers panicky as it creaked under the weight of a line of vehicles and swayed on windy days. My mother, Bonne’ Favorite, told me stories of riding over it on a school bus as part of a beach field trip. Could you imagine how nerve wracking that would be?

Folks called for something sturdier and so the city complied, completing a cement bridge in 1957. To showcase its sturdiness, the city hosted a parade led by an elephant. Of course, this bridge was much more expensive than the old wooden one – especially since laws had changed and the city had to hire actual licensed contractors instead of young inventors with bright ideas to comply. The total came to around $750,000 (the modern equivalent of about $7 million). To offset the cost, the city installed a toll booth. Cars paid 30 cents to access the island, but leaving was free of charge. The whole project was paid for by 1964, and the toll was removed, Schofield states.

Today’s bridge is the same one that was built in 1957. Every year there is talk of a new Cortez Bridge; will this year be the year it commences?

Next week begins our annual local ghost story series that runs through the month of October! If you have any local haunted tales you’d like to share, please email me at favorite.merab@gmail.com and I will feature them in my column!