Pensacola’s Christmas Past by Gina Castro
One of the many perks of being the first city in the U.S. is that there is just so much history everywhere you look. There are thousands of interesting stories about the people who walked these streets, the buildings that once stood here and the ones that still do. Since this holiday season won’t be quite what we anticipated at the start of 2020, Pensacola
Magazine figured you all could enjoy visiting Pensacola’s Christmas past. With the help of UWF Historic Trust archivist Jessie Cragg and Dustin Dewey, we pieced together a few interesting and heart-warming stories that show what Pensacolians were doing at various points in history during December.
Merry Christmas, Prisoners
Women’s Holiday Fashion in 1851
The ladies of Pensacola followed fashion tips straight from Paris, which were published in Harper’s New Monthly Magazine. In December of 1851, Pensacola women wore the following three fashionable cloaks: Parisian, Frileuse and Camara.
Christmas day in 1889 turned out to be a very generous day. Some would say it was perhaps too generous. On this day just in time for Christmas dinner, Pensacola Mayor William Dudley Chipley released every single prisoner confined at the station. Although the crimes of the prisoners are not mentioned, the daily news reported that there were 22 prisoners released. The article describes the bunch as the happiest people in Pensacola: “They were a happy set indeed, and all vowed that their first drink of Christmas egg-nog should be a toast to Mayor Chipley [sic].”
The Big Snow Storm of 1893
Yes, in 1893, it snowed heavily in Pensacola. A photo of a family playing in the snow in Pensacola was taken on Dec. 21, 1893. The image shows Pensacolians dressed warmly with snowballs in their hands. There weren’t any articles published about this snow storm. The only information about this strange occurrence is written on the back of the photograph. The writing on the back states that the image was taken East of Wright Street about a block and a half from the old L&N Station. Some of the people shown in the photo are the following: Julia Moreno, Dottie Blount, Julia Lee, Miss Emma Chandler, Rust and Octavia Smith, Cora and Dudley Hunt, Ruby Mallory, Little S.R. Mallory, Maude Fernald, Fan Warren, and Edna Thompson. JUNE '20
15
