1959 - 2009
Village of
Royal Palm Beach 50th Anniversary Souvenir Magazine
A TOWN-CRIER PUBLICATION
The Village of
RECOGNIZED AS ONE OF THE 10 BEST TO RAISE
f Royal Palm Beach
T TOWNS IN THE UNITED STATES E A FAMILY!
The Royal Palm Beach Village Council Left to Right:
Councilwoman Martha Webster, Councilman David Swift, Mayor David Lodwick, Councilman Fred Pinto, Vice Mayor Matty Mattioli
Royal Palm Beach A great place to visit...but you’d probably rather live here!
Main Number ........... 790-5100 Administration ......... 790-5103 Code Enforcement ... 790-5138 Cultural Center .......... 790-5149 Fire-Rescue ................ 790-6105* Parks & Recreation ... 790-5124 Planning & Zoning ... 790-5131 Police Dept. ................ 904-8250* Public Works ............... 790-5122 Senior Services .......... 792-5503 *For emergencies, dial 911
Royal Palm Beach Celebrates TABLE OF CONTENTS Royal Palm Beach Celebrates Opening Greetings A Message from Your Mayor .................................. 2 A Message from the Editor ..................................... 5 A Message from Your Governor ............................. 5 A Message from Your Commissioner ...................... 5 50th Anniversary Special Events ................................ 7 Meet the Artist: Sculptor Mark Fuller ....................... 9 Royal Palm Beach History, Part 1 The Early Years ................................................... 10 - 12 Village Government Grows ....................................... 15 The Mayors of Royal Palm Beach ..................... 16 - 17 The Pioneers Life in the Young Village ....................................... 18 The Colony Employee Who Stayed ....................... 20 A Vibrant Caribbean-American Community......... 20 Gone, But Not Forgotten ...................................... 21 Jess Santamaria Looks Back ................................ 22
Royal Palm Beach History, Part 2 History of Parks & Recreation .................................. 27 Fire Department History ........................................... 28 Police Department History ........................................ 29 History of Religion & Houses of Worship ................ 31 History of Public Schools ........................................... 33 History of Shopping, Business & Commerce .... 34 - 35 The Boom Years of the 1980s..................................... 36 A Local Landmark: The Harvin Center .................. 38 A Last Look Back ....................................................... 39 Royal Palm Beach Today Facts & Figures .......................................................... 41 Village Directory ........................................................ 42 Community Parks ...................................................... 44 Royal Palm Beach Tomorrow Council Members Predict the Future ....................... 46 The Class of 2009 Predicts the Future ...................... 48
A vintage postcard circa 1962 promotes the young Village of Royal Palm Beach.
50TH ANNIVERSARY SOUVENIR MAGAZINE STAFF & ACKNOWLEDGMENTS The 50th Anniversary Souvenir Magazine Published by Newspaper Publishers Inc. in association with the Town-Crier newspaper and the Village of Royal Palm Beach 12794 W. Forest Hill Blvd., Suite 31 Wellington, FL 33414 PHONE: (561) 793-7606 FAX: (561) 793-6090 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED TO CONTENT HEREIN COPYRIGHT 2009, NEWSPAPER PUBLISHERS INC.
BARRY S. MANNING Publisher JOSHUA I. MANNING Executive Editor DAWN RIVERA General Manager STEPHANIE RODRIGUEZ Director of Art & Production JASON BUDJINSKI, RON BUKLEY MARK ESTERLY & MARK LIOI Senior Editors STAFF: Betty Buglio, Shanta Daibee, Evie Edwards, Wanda Glockson, Barbara Isenberg, Georgia Jacoviello, Geri O’Neil and Kristina Webb.
THANK YOU! Aside from the tireless efforts of the 50th Anniversary Souvenir Magazine staff, the help of so many people went into making this magazine a success. Our thanks, with apologies to those left out, to: Diane DiSanto, David Farber, Lou Recchio, Rob Hill, Carlos Rodriguez and others at the Village of Royal Palm Beach; the entire Royal Palm Beach Village Council, especially Mayor David Lodwick; County Commissioner Jess Santamaria and his staff; Barbara Isenberg for the “official” history of Royal Palm Beach, which she originally wrote for us long ago, and we continue to diligently update; Karl Combs for his input and use of his photo archive; Barbara Persson and the entire Persson family for sharing their story and their amazing collection of Royal Palm Beach memorabilia; Rhonda Ferrin-Davis and Adrienne Ferrin of CAFCI; and the many people who agreed to be interviewed for this magazine, among them: Dr. Beverlyann B. Barton, Tom Bolinski, Irv Cowan, Beatrice Mishkit Freeman, Mark Fuller, Bruce Greenfield, John Hill, Ann Killets, Bonnie Leonard, Randy Rieger, Rev. Michael Rose, Father Andy Rudnicki, Chuck Walsey, Suzanne Watson and Penny Young. We further thank all those, living and deceased, who commented for articles in the 30th anniversary and 40th anniversary publications; many of their comments have been carried forward to help give historic context. Special thanks to Trend Offset Printing and the scores of advertisers who supported this important project and made it possible.
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Royal Palm Beach Celebrates A MESSAGE FROM YOUR MAYOR
SARY! HAPPY 50TH ANNIVER
sidents for the many re r ou to ns tio la tu ra ng that I extend my co llage has grown into a vi tle lit ur It is with great pleasure O s. ar ye 50 st enjoyed over the la ing one successes our village has ily Circle magazine as be m Fa by ed iz gn co re en t ch has be anage to achieve this grea thriving municipality, whi m e w d di w ho st Ju . ily raise a fam the ongoing relationship of lt of the “10 Best Towns” to su re a e ar s se es cc and that our su munity, like the rest m co r ou honor? I can tell you firsth gh ou Th ff. sta c leaders and village in among our residents, civi e have remained vigilant w y, om on ec g in gg sa a gh ains of ioned to continue this hi sit of our state, has felt the str po l el w e ar e w lt, su re money. As a managing the taxpayers’ ght tax rate decreases. ai str 14 ng ki rta de un le hi level of public services w unty and an outstanding Co h ac Be lm Pa in s rk pa of the best planned growth and have The village offers some ed nc rie pe ex ve ha e W r residents. opportunities of our ng pi recreation program for ou op sh e th ed nc ha en s, which have e offer so many wellw e us ca be welcomed large businesse e ak m to lt cu ng decisions are diffi ned residents. Likewise, dini hing on our well-maintai fis y da zy la a y jo en n ca Boaters known, great restaurants. rk under the stars. Pa ns ra te Ve in t er nc co g waterways or an evenin e sense of purpose and m sa e th ith w et m be ill , any challenges w mands While our future is bright t that we will meet the de en id nf co am I s. ar ye 50 to the last k you for the opportunity an commitment that marked th , te no al on rs pe a n O to prosper. of the future and continue honor and a privilege. an en be s ha It s. ar ye serve you over the last 16
David A. Lodwick Mayor
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Royal Palm Beach Celebrates OPENING MESSAGES
Welcome To The 50th Anniversary Souvenir Magazine
O
ne of the first major projects I worked on when arriving as executive editor of the Town-Crier newspaper in the spring of 1999 was a special souvenir magazine celebrating the 40th anniversary of the Village of Royal Palm Beach. The interesting information I learned and fascinating people I met during that exciting time in my life have colored my experiences to this day. That is the reason I jumped at the chance to produce this 50th Anniversary Souvenir Magazine.
for the special anniversary celebration June 12-13. From there we move on to the heart of this endeavor — a detailed history of the how Royal Palm Beach came to be. From the early years under Lefcourt Realty, through the community’s adolescence under Royal Palm Beach Colony, to the mature, well-established village of today, you’ll get an in-depth understanding of how it all transpired. Shorter features detail the history of important elements such as village government, public schools, shopping areas, police/ fire protection, houses of worship and recreation programs. We also look at This is the third time the Town-Crier has been involved in a major Royal the early pioneers who helped build Royal Palm Beach and — my personal Palm Beach anniversary publication. We published a special section in 1989 favorite — lots and lots of old photos and images. for the village’s 30th anniversary and joined with the now-defunct Observer newspaper to publish a glossy-format magazine in 1999 for the 40th Toward the end of the 50th Anniversary Souvenir Magazine, we take a anniversary. This year, with the blessing of our friends at the village, we set brief look at Royal Palm Beach today and ponder what might be in store about updating and expanding the historical research from decades past. for the community over the next 50 years. I am so pleased that in addition to the Town-Crier staff, we were able to reunite the key writers of the 40th anniversary magazine so they could lend their expertise to this endeavor. Special thanks to Mark Esterly, Georgia Jacoviello and Barbara Isenberg for their contributions. The format of this 50th Anniversary Souvenir Magazine is simple. After the introductory greetings, we take a brief look at all the village has planned
A MESSAGE FROM YOUR GOVERNOR...
As you read through the pages of this magazine, I’m sure you will be amazed at how far our community has come over the span of five decades. While no one knows for sure what the future will bring, we can be sure that Royal Palm Beach will continue to thrive, building on the unique, family-friendly image it enjoys today. Joshua Manning, Executive Editor
A MESSAGE FROM YOUR COMMISSIONER...
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Royal Palm Beach Celebrates 50TH ANNIVERSARY EVENTS
“The race will be fun, and we’re promoting it as that — as a fun run. It’s not really competitive, although we do give out awards.” Village staffer Carlos Rodriguez on the 5K run/walk set for June 13.
Village To Mark Anniversary With Events June 12-13
T
By Ron Bukley
he Village of Royal Palm Beach has scheduled two days of celebrations on Friday and Saturday, June 12 and 13 in recognition of its 50th anniversary. Festivities get underway at 5 p.m. Friday with the unveiling of a sculpture by public artist Mark Fuller at the corner of Royal Palm Beach and Okeechobee boulevards (see related story, page 9). “This is a piece of artwork that was commissioned by the village to Mark Fuller that will be located at the corner ot Royal Palm Beach and Okeechobee, our busiest intersection,” Village Manager David Farber said. “We will then have a brief reception inviting all past mayors and council members, as well as elected officials from our surrounding communities.” The celebration will continue at 7 p.m. at Veterans Park with the singing of “Happy Birthday” to Royal Palm Beach with free birthday cake, followed by entertainment by the Royal Palm Beach Community Band, as well as var-
ious children’s rides and activities. After the concert, attendees can enjoy the free screening of a movie classic from 1959 — Some Like It Hot with Tony Curtis, Jack Lemmon and Marilyn Monroe, directed by Billy Wilder — along with popcorn and lemonade. A full day of activities are scheduled for Saturday, beginning with a 5K run/walk race at 7 a.m. from Camellia Park to the village hall grounds where bagels, pastries, fresh fruit and coffee will be served (see related story, below). Commemorative t-shirts will be given out and medals presented to winning racers. At 10 a.m., village officials will open a 25-year-old time capsule and bury another for unearthing during the village’s 75th anniversary celebration, Farber said. “We’ll begin the rest of our activities back at Veterans Park with a chili cookoff and a cupcake bakeoff where residents and attendees will be invited to enjoy the wares of both the chili chefs and the bakers,” he said.
Entries in the cookoff and bakeoff competitions are free, and prizes will be awarded to winners in individual, group and restaurant categories. Setup for the competitions begins at 8 a.m., and each event lasts from 11:30 a.m. to 2:30 p.m., with the village providing each entrant with a ten-foot-square space and a table. Competitions entrants are encouraged to decorate their spaces on the village’s anniversary theme of “Through the Decades.” Special prizes will be awarded to the best-decorated booth in each event. The village will provide lemonade and cornbread to supplement the chili and cupcake offerings. Participants are also encouraged to have printed copies of their recipes on hand to share with the general public. Among other festivities on Saturday is a pie-eating contest, with pies donated by Winn-Dixie, Publix, Costco and BJ’s. The Chili Chicks will also be on hand with their line-dancing routine, and a
DJ will be spinning hits ranging from the 1950s to the present day. At 7 p.m., the popular local band Hot Brass Monkey will perform at the amphitheater, and guests can enjoy free hot dogs and
soft drinks. The evening will culminate with a fireworks display at 9 p.m. The entire event is free and everyone is invited to participate, Farber said.
The Chili Chicks will perform Saturday, June 13 at Veterans Park.
(Right) The popular regional band Hot Brass Monkey will perform Saturday, June 13 at 7 p.m. at the Veterans Park amphitheater. Although the group changes depending upon the performance, a typical Hot Brass Monkey lineup includes: (L-R) David Levitan on trombone, Luke Basso on trumpet, Jack Gardner on trumpet, Jody Marlow on saxophone, female vocalist Christina Sichta, male vocalist John Lucas, Tommy Snellgrove on bass guitar and Mitch Farber on lead guitar. IMAGE COURTESY DP STUDIOS/WWW.DNTY.COM
5K Run/Walk Highlights Older Village Neighborhoods
A
By Ron Bukley
historic five-kilometer run/walk through Royal Palm Beach will kick off the Saturday, June 13 events celebrating the village’s 50th anniversary. “The 5k will start at Camellia Park, which represents the beginning of Royal Palm Beach Parks & Recreation,” said Carlos Rodriguez, facility supervisor at the Royal Palm Beach Cultural Center. The 10-acre Camellia Park, located at 6845 Camellia Park Drive in the village’s first-developed neighborhood, is Royal Palm Beach’s oldest recreational facility. “That’s where it all started,” Rodriguez said. From there, the run/walk course will weave its way through other older neighborhoods. “It winds up at village hall, which represents the
future and today,” Rodriguez said. “That was the purpose behind the course.” Kids will have an opportunity to participate in a one-kilometer fun run/walk around the lake at village hall, located at the corner of Royal Palm Beach and Okeechobee boulevards. Registration for the run/walk is $10 and can be done at the Royal Palm Beach Recreation Center at 100 Sweet Bay Lane, by calling (561) 790-5149 or online at www. royalpalmbeach.com if participants have registered before for other programs. “We would prefer that people be pre-registered,” Rodriguez said, noting that the registration deadline is Wednesday, June 10. Registered participants will meet at Camellia Park at 6:30 a.m. where fruit, drinks and snacks will be available. The race will begin promptly at 7:30 a.m. Water tents
and medical areas will be set up along the course, and a continental breakfast will be served at the finish line. Awards will be given for first-, second- and third-place finishers overall and in all divisions (adult men, adult women, teen boys, teen girls and wheelchair). The kids’ 1k divisions will be boys and girls eight and under and boys and girls nine to 12. T-shirts will be provided to all participants. After the continental breakfast, village officials will open a 25-yearold time capsule at 10 a.m., and then bury another to be opened at the village’s celebration of its 75th anniversary. “The time capsule that they will open is behind village hall,” Rodriguez said. Rodriguez encouraged high school track teams to come out and participate as teams. He also encouraged families to participate in a
more leisurely stroll through the historic areas of Royal Palm Beach. “The race will be fun, and we’re promoting it as that — as a fun run,” Rodriguez said. “It’s not really competitive, although we do give out awards. I’m sure we’ll get a lot of families who just want to walk it, which is great.” Volunteers are also needed to work various stations. Call (561) 790-5149 to offer your services. “We’re trying to get church groups, Boy Scouts, people that are symbolic within the village,” Rodriguez said, adding that shuttles will be available at the cultural center and village hall to transport runners to Camellia Park, he said. Following activities at village hall, the day will continue at nearby Veterans Park at 1 p.m. with a full afternoon and evening of food, entertainment and activities, ending with fireworks at dusk.
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Congratulations to the Village of Royal Palm Beach on your 50th anniversary! We are proud to provide civil engineering and land surveying services to the Village and to have been located in the Village since 1994 (formerly Crossroads Engineering & Surveying)
1402 Royal Palm Beach Blvd. Suite 500 Royal Palm Beach, FL 33411 Phone: 561-753-9723 Fax: 561-753-9724 Email: heathk@erdmananthony.com
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Royal Palm Beach Celebrates MEET THE ARTIST
“People who put their art in a gallery, it’s not intended for anybody in particular to like it or dislike it, whereas, I find public art to be more sensitive. It needs to stimulate people, but it has to be done keeping in mind that it is for everybody.” Sculpture artist Mark Fuller on designing public art features.
Mark Fuller Selected To Create Anniversary Sculpture
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By Ron Bukley
he public artworks of sculptor Mark Fuller have become landmarks throughout the United States, but especially in Palm Beach County where he makes his home. Fuller, 55, has created more than 50 pieces of public art. Two more will soon grace the intersection of Royal Palm Beach and Okeechobee boulevards. Fuller’s work celebrating the 50th anniversary of Royal Palm Beach is to be dedicated on Friday, June 12 at the southeast corner of the intersection. Another Fuller piece will find a home on the opposite corner in front of the CVS Pharmacy under construction there. Fuller’s commemorative work for the village is an array of five “palm fronds” representing the village’s five decades of existence. Each frond is made of a metal frame containing panels of colored translucent resin that changes color as motorists and pedestrians pass by. Fuller describes the translucent resin he uses as dichroic, which means it separates light beams into various colors. Many of his creations employ dichroic material with fluctuating hues that seldom fail to catch the eye. One of his works in Palm Beach County is Butterfly Grove at PGA Commons in Palm Beach Gardens, a series of staggered uprights imbedded with dichroic panes forming the image of a butterfly whose colors change with the angle of the viewer. Fuller got his start in public art in 1992 when he was designing signs for the Clematis Street streetscape program in downtown West Palm Beach. “At about that time, there was an opportunity to vend a piece of public art for the City of West Palm Beach in a competition,” he said. “I entered that and I won, so that was my first piece of public art. It was the flying fish, the Fish Out of Water that’s down at Palm Beach Lakes Blvd. and Flagler Drive.” Fuller said most of his work symbolizes something about the area where it is placed. That part of the Intracoastal Waterway was a seaplane basin in World War II, he explained. “That is why I came up with the flying fish,” he said. “I wanted the subject matter to relate directly to its location. The wings are in relation to Good Samaritan [Medical Center] across the street. You have good things and bad things happening in hospitals, so I wanted to do the wings kind of like angel wings. The color goes from aqua in the front to blue in the back in reference to the water and the sky. ” Fuller sometimes goes out to see how people interact with his pieces, and when he sat by the flying
fish, he saw people reach out and touch the swiveling piece. “People go by this thing, and they reach out and touch it and turn it a bit,” he said. Fuller’s work often goes a step beyond interactivity to functionality. The circular base of the piece in Royal Palm Beach will double as a pedestrian bench, he explained. In Seminole, Florida, he created a fully functional but artistic bus shelter. “It’s a project that was put out by Pinellas County Council of the Cultural Arts,” he said. “They were looking for a bus shelter. This one is solar-powered, with a solar panel on top. It lights up beautifully at night.” Fuller recalled how he wanted to create a shelter that did more than the average bus stop. “I wanted to create a shelter that gave you refuge from the wind or blowing rain, no matter what,” he said. “It has corners you can get into no matter what the weather. It’s got a big overhang so you get a lot of shade, and it’s got four open sides to let the breeze through, no matter where it’s coming from, and the seats are big enough for two people to sit on.” Fuller said his creations are a combination of creativity and architectural strength. “I love working with metal because it’s so durable and tough, but at the same time you can make it do things,” he said. “You can bend it and roll it.” For the sculpture in Royal Palm Beach, Fuller wanted to create a flowing form with the metal and figure out the geometry and mechanics of it. He hired a firm from out of state to bend the steel tubes in the exact shape he wanted for the central “veins” of the palm fronds, which are built to withstand 150 mph winds. Fuller studied architecture for a while, but did not find what he was looking for. “I was advised by some architects that it is not as creative as I think it is, and it’s true,” he said. “Most architects end up working for another architect, doing window details all day long. They don’t really get to design buildings.” Fuller switched to graphic arts, and in the early 1970s became the senior designer for Lance Wyman in New York, whose designs include graphics for the 1968 Olympics in Mexico City. Fuller learned from Wyman about public art used as landmarks or for “wayfinding.” “He is truly the grandfather of pictogram design, symbols and things like that, so there I got a really graphic sense of symbology in images,” Fuller recalled. He later returned to Florida, and in 1986 started his own business, MTFuller, doing graphic design and signage programs, and eventually public art. Fuller still can’t believe he gets paid for doing something he enjoys so much. “I just love doing this,”
(Clockwise from above) Artist Mark Fuller presents a scale model of the 50th anniversary sculpture to the Royal Palm Beach Village Council; a rendering of what the sculpture will look like at the southeast corner of Okeechobee and Royal Palm Beach boulevards; Fuller explains his inspiration for the project as the RPB sculpture is shown on his computer screen; and Fuller in his work studio.
he said. “My son used to tell me, ‘you know, Dad, you’re the luckiest guy in the world because you get paid for doing what you love to do.’ He added, ‘you’d do it even if you didn’t get paid.’ That may be true, but I don’t think I’d survive without getting paid.” This type of work also provides quicker gratification than larger projects. “I get bored very easily,” Fuller said. “I never like projects that, like architecture, you work on a building for years sometimes before you get to realize and see the results of your work. I like things where I can see almost immediately the results and move right along… [I] actually take the mechanics and knowledge
of industrial design that I learned in New York to design things that are built but are images and symbols and make visual reference to things and that are extraordinary and unusual.” Public art is different than other art forms in that it is created to fulfill a need for a great number of people, he said. “People who put their art in a gallery, it’s not intended for anybody in particular to like it or dislike it,” Fuller explained, “whereas, I find public art to be more sensitive. It needs to stimulate people, but it has to be done keeping in mind that it is for everybody.” Further, the art has to be accessible — people who are not art ex-
perts need to be able to understand it and appreciate it. “It conveys a lot of responsibility,” he said. “It’s going to be there for a long time, and people are going to have to drive by it and look at it every day. You try to do something that is visually pleasing and gives people a good feeling.” Fuller’s pieces often become landmarks and “waypoints” that people use in giving directions. “People use them as locational references,” he said. “The people up at the shops at PGA Commons don’t say go to whatever the address is. They say, ‘by the butterfly.’” For more information about the art of Mark Fuller, visit www. mtfuller.com.
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Royal Palm Beach History THE EARLY YEARS
“When it came to business, Sam Friedland and Art Desser were different in just about every way you could think of.” Irv Cowan, Friedland’s son-in-law and business partner on Royal Palm Beach’s two founders.
Visionaries’ Big Plans Plant Seeds For RPB’s Growth
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By Mark Esterly
here are many individuals who played key roles in the birth and development of the Village of Royal Palm Beach. But it all began with the vision of two men: Sam Friedland and Arthur Desser. In the 1950s, Sam Friedland owned the successful Food Fair supermarket chain and thought his company could turn better profits by growing its own produce. “That was the idea, to grow the fruit here and ship it up north,” recalled Chuck Walsey, who for two decades managed one of Friedland’s first agricultural ventures, Indian Trail Groves in Loxahatchee. In 1954, Friedland purchased the 64,000-acre Indian Trail Ranch, a
sprawling expanse of wetlands and uplands west of State Road 7 and north of Southern Blvd. With the exception of citrus, farming never really worked out very well for Friedland. But he had other big plans. PALM BEACH WEST In 1957, Arthur Desser, a wellconnected Miami-based developer, thought the vast wooded area north of Southern Blvd. was the perfect place to create an inland version of Palm Beach. Even though there was no actual ocean frontage, Desser wanted “beach” in the name. He also liked the idea of majestic royal palm trees lining the streets, thus “Royal Palm Beach.” Desser was president of Lefcourt Realty Corp., which was developing Dade County’s Carol City at the time. The company was named after the famous Lefcourt Colonial
Chief Billy Bowlegs and fellow Seminole tribe members participate in the June 30, 1959 groundbreaking ceremony for Royal Palm Beach to “renounce all claims to the land.”
Building in New York City. (Its architect, Abraham E. Lefcourt, also designed the Brill Building.) Desser approached Friedland with a business proposal to develop 4,200 acres of land, about half the size of Royal Palm Beach today. Desser hired Norm Cortese as his chief engineer in charge of drainage and infrastructure. Cortese brought in some of the best civil engineers in the business, including Kenneth C. Mock of Mock-Roos, drainage specialist Lamar Johnson and land planner Ewing L. Jones. All of them would eventually serve on the first, developer-appointed Royal Palm Beach Village Council. For taxing purposes, the Indian Trail Water Control District was established under Florida Statute 298. As the Indian Trail Improvement District, it still continues to provide road, drainage and park services to more than 50,000 residents in The Acreage and Loxahatchee. RESORT LIVING FOR $250 DOWN According to a 1959 Lefcourt marketing brochure, the first section of Royal Palm Beach “will be a completely planned, self-sustaining community offering all the services available to the residents of a
Sam Friedland (seated), owner of the Food Fair supermarket chain, with Arthur A. Desser, founder of Lefcourt Realty Corp. modern city.” The ambitious master plan called for six elementary schools and three high schools, six shopping centers, six park-playgrounds, seven church sites, a large community services center, a lake with eight miles of canals for boating and fishing, and an 18-hole golf course and tennis courts.
From this sales office, Arthur A. Desser’s Lefcourt Realty sold the dream of Royal Palm Beach to the village’s first residents.
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On June 30, 1959, a groundbreaking ceremony was held to commemorate the founding of the newly incorporated village and to kick off Lefcourt’s new residential project. Members of the Seminole Indian tribe, which had once controlled the territory, attended the event, and it was during this ceremony the tribe “renounced all claims to the land.” Royal Palm Beach was officially born. Lefcourt Realty Corp. had already been marketing home sites and Keller Construction Company was selected to build the first section of the village. Prospective buyers were told they could choose from nine different two- and threebedroom models ranging in price from $8,750 for the “Augustine” to $12,400 for the deluxe “Indian Trail.” With as little as $250 down and $58 per month, “vacation resort living can be yours.” ROYAL PALM BEACH COLONY STEPS IN Home sales in the new community were pretty good for the first few years following incorporation. But drainage problems, storm damage and other unforeseen issues were taking a toll on Lefcourt fiSee EARLY YEARS, page 11
EARLY YEARS, from page 10 nances. Unable to market and build homes, maintain the infrastructure and manage the day-to-day administrative operations of the village, Arthur Desser and Lefcourt Realty Corp. filed for bankruptcy. Sam Friedland needed a new strategy. Friedland and Irv Cowan, Friedland’s son-in-law and financial partner, formed a new company to handle everything from lot sales and construction, to marketing, maintenance and municipal administration. In August 1963, Royal Palm Beach Colony Inc. became the master developer of the Village of Royal Palm Beach. According to a report in the January 1964 edition of the Security and Exchange Commission News Digest, “Royal has not yet engaged in any substantial business, but has taken over operation of the motel, restaurant and bar, swimming pool and public utilities.” Royal Palm Beach Colony Inc. assumed control of Lefcourt’s remaining 4,108 undeveloped acres and was granted an option to buy an additional 5,593 acres of Friedland property at $400 per acre. That land would later become the first developed units of The Acreage. Friedland had no experience in residential home construction, but he envisioned a one-stop, all-in-one housing enterprise revolving around a first-class golf course. Wellknown golf course designer Mark Mahannah had been brought in to build an 18-hole layout on 160 acres in what was then the north end of town. The Willows Country Club opened on Royal Palm Beach Blvd., surrounded by the Willows subdivision and across the street from what would become Greenway Village. Royal Palm Beach would now be marketed as a premier golfing community. “FLY AND BUY” “Fly and buy” was the sales concept that transformed Royal Palm Beach from a planned retirement village to a diverse and vibrant community with new residents from all over the country. Prospective buyers were flown in for a weekend, put up at The Inn, treated to great meals and a round of golf, maybe a trip to the ocean or out to Lion Country Safari and, of course, tours of the model homes by attractive guides. Most visitors were ready to sign a contract the next day. “When it came to business, Sam Friedland and Art Desser were dif-
ferent in just about every way you could think of,” recalled Cowan, a hotelier. In 1965, attorney Herb Kaplan was hired to run Royal Palm Beach Colony Inc. The Colony, as it was known, had separate divisions for sales, home construction, financing, infrastructure and road maintenance, golf course operations and recreation, and also for managing the affairs of local government. “Herb Kaplan was one of the smartest and most articulate individuals I have ever worked with,” said Randy Rieger, who started as a sales associate with the company in 1971 and eventually became managing partner. Kaplan served as Colony CEO and president of the Indian Trail
Water Control District Board of Supervisors from 1965 until his death in 1990. He was replaced as CEO by Marty Katz, who died in a car accident in 1994. STEADY AND STABLE Growth in the village was steady under Kaplan’s direction. In 1969, the Colony opened a new sales center on Royal Palm Beach Blvd., which is now the Harvin Center. Around this time, its construction division, Greenway Construction, began building Greenway Village North, and work was well underway on the Estates, the first single-family subdivision in the village. When the recession of 1974 caused interest rates to skyrocket, the Colony closed down its land See EARLY YEARS, page 12
RPB Colony President Herb Kaplan and Chairman Irv Cowan.
(Above) Ewing L. Jones (right), Lefcourt’s land planner, and Norman Cortese, chief engineer, go over the master plan for Royal Palm Beach. (Left) Sales brochures touted South Florida’s pleasant weather and carefree lifestyle at affordable prices. (Below) Lifetime membership to “The Club” and its Olympic-sized pool was included with the purchase of a home.
1959 - 2009 • Royal Palm Beach 50th Anniversary Souvenir Magazine • Page 11
EARLY YEARS, from page 11 sales division and concentrated on building houses and selling blocks of home sites to other builders. This was also when most of the company’s municipal service responsibilities were turned over to the village. “In the beginning, we needed to do a lot of those things so that our buyers would feel confident,” Cowan explained. “As the population grew, there was a need for some independence.” MORE SUBDIVISIONS OPEN By 1978, approximately half of the village’s original 4,200 acres had been developed. The Estates was completed, and home sales north of Okeechobee Blvd. were being promoted. The new subdivision, La Mancha, featured another 18-hole golf layout, known today as the Village Golf Club. The subdivision was named after the popular Broadway show by the Colony’s head salesman. In 1979, the village’s new civic center opened, and the Colony submitted plans for two more major subdivisions west of Royal Palm Beach Blvd., Crestwood south of Okeechobee Boulevard, and Hawthorn to the north. Crestwood developed pretty much according to plan, but Hawthorn was delayed for many years. When its original builder, Cenville Homes, went bankrupt, the tract was split up. About 400 acres on the north side was bought by Royal Professional Builders, who built Saratoga. The southern 500 or so acres traded hands a few more times before Minto Communities Inc. bought it and built Madison Green just over the past decade. The Colony had built nearly all of the houses in the two eastern sections of the village, Cowan said, but none in the western quadrants. “We were done with building by then,” he said, “but we were happy to sell blocks to the big builders.” PMI-PWCC09.ai 4/28/2009 In the 1980s, the Colony was busy selling land in The Acreage it had acquired in the Lefcourt bankruptcy agreement. The strate-
Randy Rieger, who started as a sales associate with Royal Palm Beach Colony Inc. in 1971, eventually became managing partner. gy was simple: offer spacious, 1.25-acre rural lots at a cheap price. Buyers would have to deal with poor drainage, few roads, and no schools or parks. But the price was right, and local contractors began lining up to take construction orders. At one time, more than 80 registered builders were operating in The Acreage. After Sam Friedland’s death in 1985, Royal Palm Beach Colony Inc. became a limited partnership and continued selling off the rest of its land holdings. The last of the company’s assets was liquidated in 2002. A county 10:19:51 AM of The Acreage, carved out park northwest of that first orange grove, today bears Friedland’s name.
Page 12 • Royal Palm Beach 50th Anniversary Souvenir Magazine • 1959 - 2009
The 1978 master plan divided Royal Palm Beach into four quadrants: two in gray (Willows and LaMancha) were already complete and two in white were planned (Crestwood and Hawthorn). Crestwood was built in the 1980s and ’90s, while Hawthorn languished for years before becoming the neighborhoods of Saratoga and Madison Green.
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1959 - 2009 • Royal Palm Beach 50th Anniversary Souvenir Magazine • Page 13
Page 14 • Royal Palm Beach 50th Anniversary Souvenir Magazine • 1959 - 2009
Royal Palm Beach History VILLAGE GOVERNMENT
“There was absolutely nothing here. You left civilization long before you got out here. It was the boondocks... None of the general public thought this area would ever be much of anything. It was so far out. Leftcourt Realty Corp.’s Norman Cortese on early impressions of RPB.
Government Grows Quickly, Bringing Needed Services By Barbara Isenberg and Joshua Manning
A
rthur Desser of Lefcourt Realty Corporation and several supporters launched a revolutionary plan of faith and action with the June 30, 1959 groundbreaking ceremonies for a new community — the Village of Royal Palm Beach. With Seminole Indian tribe members on hand for the festivities, Lefcourt and subsequent developer Royal Palm Beach Colony Inc. initiated plans for the new community to become self-governing. Although a developer-appointed council governed the village in its infancy, residents’ desire for autonomy soon mandated a popularly-elected council. DEVELOPER-APPOINTED EARLY GOVERNMENT In 1960, the first annual publication of a police directory was issued with a message from developer-appointed Police Chief Joseph W. Klopp and notification that the department planned “to obtain a police two-way radio” to provide residents with “faster, more efficient police service in protecting your life, home and property.” Included in the directory was a list of village officials appointed by Lefcourt. There is, however, some confusion as to just which appointed council was the first to hold office. The police directory issued in June 1960 lists Roy Davenport as mayor with Reginald Pyle, K.C. Mock, Norman Cortese and W.W. White serving as councilmen. Yet a promotional booklet produced by Lefcourt as well as village records name Ewing L. Jones as the first mayor. Ben Irvin, Norman Cortese, Lamar Johnson and K.C. Mock served on council. According to Cortese, everyone except Mock and Johnson was an officer and/or employee of Lefcourt. Mock and Johnson were area engineers who worked on drainage and utilities for the project. “We were names that needed to be on [a council roster] for the incorporation. We weren’t residents,” recalled the former Miamian when interviewed in the late 1990s. “I don’t even remember the group having a meeting. It was just something we had to do, and I don’t think [during that time frame] there were even any residents yet.” Although his recollections were not definite, Cortese said he believes original council appointees did not serve specific terms, and the first year may have seen some shifting of council members. Cortese, Lefcourt’s former vice president of engineering, said when he first saw what was to become Royal Palm Beach, “there was absolutely nothing here. You left civilization long before you got out here. It was the boondocks.”
The site was so remote that many in Palm Beach County never believed the project would succeed. “None of the general public thought this area would ever be much of anything. It was so far out,” Cortese said. Since houses had not yet been built to accommodate those associated with the project, Lefcourt decided to build an inn alongside an engineered lake at the village’s south end. Like other key members of Lefcourt’s team, Cortese didn’t remain for very long. By the early 1960s, he had left to work for another developer. ROYAL PALM BEACH GETS ITS NAME Unlike every other municipality in the county with the word “Beach” in its name, Royal Palm Beach is not a coastal community. So why did this land-locked village get such a seemingly inappropriate name? “Arthur Desser lived in Miami and was smitten with Palm Beach. He was a multi-millionaire, and he wanted the name ‘Palm Beach’ to be used somehow,” Cortese recalled. “We told him we obviously could not call it Palm Beach. Then someone mentioned stately royal palm trees to him, so it was incorporated as Royal Palm Beach.” REQUIREMENTS FOR COUNCIL CHANGE Soon after the initial non-resident council appointees served, a village charter required that office holders had to be at least 21 years old, a registered voter and the owner of village property. But up to three of the five council members did not have to be village residents. A resolution required council members to choose one of their members to serve as mayor and another as vice mayor. Council members were to serve staggered twoyear terms with elections held the second Tuesday of each March. Council members were able to wear more than one hat in those early days. Other appointed posts included tax assessor, village clerk and village treasurer, and council members were eligible to hold any of these in addition to their council seat. Only one council person has ever served as mayor as well as every other available governmental post. The late Anna Hunter was also the only woman to ever serve as mayor, and did so from 1970-72. Hunter, who moved to the village in 1960, also served as vice mayor and councilwoman. The civically minded Hunter also served as village clerk, typist to the village manager, tax assessor, tax collector, secretary to the police chief, supervisor of elections, and a member of the planning and zoning commission. During the ravages of Hurricane Donna in 1960, Hunter is credited with keeping village government running with her typewriter and files she managed to save from destructive flooding. In later years, Hunter served as president of the Palms
West Hospital Auxiliary and, with husband Jim, was active in the Lions Club. Today’s separation between elective and administrative posts is well defined. The council sets policy and the village manager, through direction to staff, carries it out. RESIDENTS TAKE OVER GOVERNMENT CONTROL With Lefcourt gone and Royal Palm Beach Colony Inc. assuming developer’s duties in the small, growing village, it became obvious by March 1964 that the residents rather than developer appointees wanted to hold council posts and control their own destiny. Colony officials wisely handed over village control to residents. But it was to be another 10 years before the mayor would be popularly elected rather than appointed by other council members. In March 1964, Leo E. Schloss became mayor with Ed Vent, Lloyd McConnell, Hunter Virnelson and John Cloppet serving on the council. Council-appointed mayors followed with the terms of Lloyd McConnell, Leon Svirsky, Anna Hunter, Charles Deitel, Dr. Joseph Gayl and Herman Resnick. It was not until 1974 that Resnick, in his second term, became the village’s first mayor to be elected directly by village voters. Resnick, who faced Ray Claydon, received 357 votes to Claydon’s 247 in that first village mayoral election. But Claydon proved to have greater longevity in local government and went on to serve for 13 years on the council and the planning and zoning commission. In the ensuing years, there have been many elections. Some were bitterly fought and hotly contested and others not even held because candidates faced no opposition. MUNICIPAL BUILDINGS ADDED AS RPB GROWS During the 1960s and ’70s, village government was conducted just about anywhere a meeting could be held: from inns and leanto buildings, to condo recreational halls and a building which housed the police and fire departments as well. It was not until 1977 that village government found a home in the present village hall complex, a $1 million municipal center that included the former police station and current fire station on Royal Palm Beach Blvd. In 1989, the village opened a new 11,000-square-foot police/civic center building within the village hall site. With the 1993 opening of the 6,300-square-foot free-standing cultural center across the street from village hall, as well as a new recreational complex on Sweet Bay Lane, the police department (today part of the Palm Beach County Sheriff’s Office) took over the building it previously shared with the village’s recreation department. In more recent years, the village
(Above) Royal Palm Beach’s first village hall was also home to the police and fire departments. (Left inset) Henry Dunn served as the first village manager, taking over in July 1960. (Below) An early magazine promoting the young Village of Royal Palm Beach.
Ray Claydon, who later served as vice mayor, relaxes with his wife in front of their new home on Gardenia Drive, circa 1963. hall site was further expanded to add a separate village meeting hall for the council and other government bodies. This provided additional office space in the village hall building for municipal purposes. Meanwhile, Palm Beach County opened an office building adjacent to the
cultural center across the street. A library building nearby is currently undergoing a major renovation and expansion, adding to the collection of government services conveniently located at the intersection of Royal Palm Beach and Okeechobee boulevards.
1959 - 2009 • Royal Palm Beach 50th Anniversary Souvenir Magazine • Page 15
Royal Palm Beach History THE MAYORS
“The one thing that has been our strength is that we’ve been so open. It has all been a team effort of the whole council and a very consistent staff.” David Lockwick on his ten years as mayor of Royal Palm Beach
Our Mayors: A Ceremonial Post Grows In Importance By Barbara Isenberg and Joshua Manning
U
nlike many large cities with a “strong mayor” form of government, Royal Palm Beach’s mayor, according to the village charter, has one vote like other council members and no more power or influence than the others. However, as the ceremonial head of the council who conducts meetings and signs all official documents, the mayor unquestionably wields prestige and influence. With the exception of Anna Hunter who served from 1970-72, no woman has become mayor during the village’s entire 50-year history. Nonetheless, women have played a significant role on the council as well as on council-appointed boards. The village is far different today than it was a half-century ago when Arthur Desser of Lefcourt Realty Corporation commenced development, and many of those changes can be seen over time in those who have served as the village’s mayor.
HERMAN RESNICK: FIRST POPULARLY ELECTED MAYOR It was not until the village was 15 years old that the mayor became an elected post rather than an appointed job. It was a role first won by Herman Resnick in 1974. After serving a year as appointed mayor, Resnick defeated Ray Claydon in the first village mayoral election, taking 357 votes to Claydon’s 247. A former civilian instructor for B24 Air Force aircraft, he took a dim view of successive council practices. Twenty years ago, during the village’s 30th anniversary celebration, Resnick chided the council for imposing a three-minute time limit on comments by the public during council meetings. Resnick was also critical of a controversial 1987 vote to rezone office commercial space to a general commercial zoning designation — a decision which enabled a Publix supermarket and the Crossroads plaza to be built at the corner of Okeechobee and Royal Palm Beach boulevards. Resnick predicted there would be a rash of bankruptcies filed by small retailers who couldn’t succeed with increasingly more competition. In the two decades
since Resnick’s warning, many village stores and restaurants have indeed closed — but were promptly replaced by others. SAM LAMSTEIN LEADS THE “BOOM” YEARS After Resnick, Milford Meyer took over as mayor in 1978, serving three years until his untimely death in a car accident. Harold Silverman served as mayor for a short interim period, before Sam Lamstein was elected. Lamstein led council from 1982 to 1990 during a time when the village was literally the fastest growing community (in its population category) in the United States. His first involvement with village government began in 1977 as a council appointee to the village’s planning and zoning commission, of which he became chairman. In 1981, Lamstein ran for the council and was elected. He resigned his seat to run successfully for mayor in 1982. Lamstein noted that the “boom” decade of the 1980s was busy and challenging. When he took office as mayor, Royal Palm Beach was without a village manager and the finance director had just quit along with the police chief. Two village residents who were
The 16 Mayors Of Royal Palm Beach The 16 mayors who served Royal Palm Beach have been a diverse group comprised of developer employees, retired businessmen, active businessmen and one incredibly civic-minded woman who held every village governmental post available. Despite differing backgrounds, each has shared the goal of giving residents the highest quality of life possible while maintaining an affordable tax rate. The office was appointed until 1974, when the village switched to a popularly elected mayor. • Ewing Jones and/or Roy Davenport — August 1959 - July 1961 • Edward Vent — Nov. 1961 - March 1964 • Leo Schloss — March 1964 - March 1966 • Lloyd McConnell — March 1966 - March 1968 • Leon Svirsky — March 1968 - March 1970 • Anna Hunter — March 1970 - March 1972 • Charles Deitel — March 1972 - Sept. 1972 • Dr. Joseph Gayl — Sept. 1972 - April 1973 • Herman Resnick — April 1973 - March 1978 (appointed mayor, elected March 1974) • Milford Meyer — March 1978 - Aug. 1981 (died while in office) • Harold Silverman — Aug. 1981 - March 1982 (assumed post at death of Milford Meyer) • Sam Lamstein — March 1982 - March 1990 • Irving Shapiro — March 1990 - March 1992 • Tony Masilotti — March 1992 - Nov. 1998 (resigned when elected county commissioner) • David Lodwick — Nov. 1998 - to date (appointed mayor, elected March 1999)
Mayor Milford Meyer (left) was elected in 1978 and served until his tragic death in an automobile accident in 1981. He was succeeded by Mayor Harold Silverman (right), who served less than a year. certified public accountants stepped forward to assist in running the village’s financial affairs, he recalled. As the trickle of new residents increased into a deluge of thousands, Lamstein and council members spent long hours grappling with a never-ending list of priorities. During his administration, Lamstein and fellow council members: reduced the permitted height of multi-family dwellings from five to three stories; finalized and passed a village comprehensive plan — the blueprint for the community’s growth; donated, with Royal Palm Beach Colony Inc., land to build Crestwood Middle School; computerized the internal functioning of municipal administrative offices; successfully lobbied the county (in conjunction with neighboring communities) to install traffic lights and widen Okeechobee Blvd.; formed the Western Communities Coalition to present a large, unified voice to the county and state on behalf of western communities residents; installed street lights in LaMancha, as well as initiating much-needed drainage relief for residents there; purchased the water and sewer utility in 1983 and didn’t raise utility rates for the average household; obtained hundreds of thousands of dollars in developer donations to help fund needed equipment; expanded recreation facilities and programs; built a police station follow-
Page 16 • Royal Palm Beach 50th Anniversary Souvenir Magazine • 1959 - 2009
Sam Lamstein served eight years from 1982-90. During that time, RPB was one of the fastest-growing communities in the nation. ing approval of a voter referendum and added an enhanced 911 system; lobbied for the extension of State Road 7; purchased land across the street from Village Hall to build county government offices so residents didn’t have to travel to downtown West Palm Beach; fought to bring hospitals to the western communities; and began what was to become a decade-long negotiation with the county and the Diocese of Palm Beach to bring Seminole See MAYORS, page 17
MAYORS, from page 16 Palms Park to the village off Southern Blvd. on what was later named Lamstein Lane. “We built on the council that came before us. They had nothing but the welfare of the village at heart,” Lamstein said of earlier mayors Silverman and Meyer, and former councilman Barney Ditkoff. Lamstein was a major proponent of maintaining green space and building parks. It’s a priority the council has maintained in the two decades since Lamstein’s tenure. To this day, Royal Palm Beach maintains one of the highest parkland ratios per capita in all of South Florida. And when new parks are being proposed, Sam Lamstein is still around to lobby for them. IRVING SHAPIRO FOCUSES ON THE ARTS, TREES The late Irving Shapiro followed Lamstein as mayor in 1990 after serving on the planning and zoning commission and the council. Unlike his predecessor, who accomplished goals through an unusually adept understanding of the political process, Shapiro’s focus was an aesthetic one. In a tenure that lasted only two years, it was Shapiro who spurred an interest in art in public places as well as beautification of the village through tree and flower planting programs. “I think Irv was the only one who knocked on every door in the village. He was like Governor Chiles. He loved meeting people,” recalled his widow Corinne Kresberg Shapiro back in 1999. Drawing his inspiration from Palm Beach, Biscayne Bay, Europe, great art masterpieces and countless museums, Shapiro envisioned Royal Palm Beach as an even lovelier community he believed it could and should be. Following the January 1986 space shuttle disaster that killed seven astronauts, Shapiro proposed a plan for a park at the village’s southern end, which included the installation of a sculpture by Colbert Collins as well as plantings and seven commemorative boulders. It is now known as Lakeside Challenger Park. The adjacent lake is known as Lake Challenger. Despite some criticism and even ridicule for his beautification projects, Shapiro remained undeterred in his enthusiastic quest to instill a love of beauty in the hearts
of village residents. While others were concerned primarily with hard-core governmental issues, Shapiro, an avid amateur painter known as “Nunya,” delegated much of that job to the village’s administrative staff and directed his focus on village beautification and approving and building the present cultural center. “I used to scold Irving and tell him he was more concerned with (beautifying) the village than our own home,” Kresberg Shapiro said. TONY MASILOTTI BRINGS YOUTH, AMBITION TO JOB In the years before his controversial and ill-fated time on the Palm Beach County Commission, Tony Masilotti made a name for himself as a dynamic, hyperactive mayor of Royal Palm Beach. He became mayor in 1992 by handily defeating incumbent Shapiro and several others. Masilotti showed that youthful enthusiasm, ambition, popularity and a background as a successful businessman were traits village voters wanted in a mayor. Prior to his election, Masilotti had held no previous elected posts but had served on the village’s architectural & aesthetic review commission and charter review committee. Masilotti, who at the time was also running a thriving insurance office, had a willingness to maintain a high visibility within the community and for years attended countless events to mingle with constituents. In return, Masilotti garnered many awards for his service, including being named the county’s top mayor. During his years as mayor, Masilotti ran for re-election unopposed and parlayed what began as a lack of political experience into a sixyear administration that ended only when he resigned his mayor’s seat to win one on the county commission. When he assumed the mayor’s office in 1992, Masilotti tackled the task of transforming a community originally geared more to retirees into one which met the needs of an increasingly diverse population. An aging infrastructure and utilities also needed improvements, and residents were demanding that green areas be set aside for recreation and preservation. In response, Masilotti and other council members made changes to the village’s comprehensive plan to increased
Irving Shapiro spent two years as mayor in the early 1990s focusing on aesthetic improvements. parks and open space. A landscaping program was also carried out throughout the village to beautify the medians and entrances to subdivisions. The Kevin M. Harvin Center, formerly the offices of Royal Palm Beach Colony Inc., village hall and later a library was a project that made Masilotti most proud as he left office in 1998. Established to provide seniors and youngsters with various services, Masilotti said shortly after he left office that the center “epitomizes the village and what it stands for. It provides services that touch people’s lives.” DAVID LODWICK: RPB’S LONGEST-SERVING MAYOR Current Mayor David Lodwick, who was appointed to the job by fellow council members upon Masilotti’s departure in November 1998, narrowly won election in March 1999. The council veteran, who was first elected in 1993, barely edged fellow Councilman Matty Mattioli by a 13-vote margin. Like Masilotti, Lodwick works in the insurance field and brought a younger, family-oriented outlook to the job. Despite the similarities, Lodwick’s style has been significantly less assertive and more compromise-oriented, working to foster a team approach on the council. “The one thing that has been our strength is that we’ve been so open,” he said. “It has all been a team effort of the whole council and a very consistent staff.” Asked about his top accomplishments in office, Lodwick rattled off a litany of structural changes that he said put the village in a stronger
Mayor Tony Masilotti presides over the grand opening of the new Royal Palm Beach Recreation Center in 1994. financial position to weather the current economic storm while improving services to RPB residents. “It has been an interesting time,” he said. “I think we’ve done a lot, beginning with my very first meeting as mayor with the fire department merger with Palm Beach County. Of course, we’ve seen the Palm Beach County Sheriff’s Office merger, the sale of the utility company at the peak of the real estate market, and the purchase of the Tradition Golf Club, which is now being turned into a park, all while reducing taxes every year.” When making big decisions, Lodwick said he tries to balance what makes financial sense with what is best for residents and taxpayers. “I am proud of what we have accomplished over the past decade,” he said. “If you look at the protection level we currently have from our police and fire, we’re a lot safer. Our parks are in far better shape than they were, and we’re still planning to make parks bigger and better.” Lodwick does admit to a few re-
grets. Ironically, one of his top accomplishments is also the item he lists as his biggest misstep. “Buying Tradition was the right thing to do, but I got directly involved [in negotiations] instead of turning it over to staff,” he recalled. “That caused some animosity, and I would have done that differently in retrospect.” Work is currently getting underway turning the shuttered golf club into the new Royal Palm Beach Commons Park. Lodwick is also excited about a major road improvement project. “I want to see us get out to bid quickly on the improvements to Royal Palm Beach Blvd. on the north end, which we were able to win some federal stimulus money for,” he said. As the village celebrates its 50th anniversary, Lodwick hopes residents come out to enjoy the festivities. “First and foremost, just have some fun, but appreciate how far we’ve come,” he said. “And that only happens when you work together as a community, focused on common goals.”
1959 - 2009 • Royal Palm Beach 50th Anniversary Souvenir Magazine • Page 17
Royal Palm Beach History THE PIONEERS
“I guess it was quite an event. We were the youngest family there, and everyone was excited when we brought her home.” Barbara Persson on the birth of her daughter Debbra, the first baby born in Royal Palm Beach.
Life In The Young Village: A Very ‘Perssonal’ Account
B
By Mark Esterly
arbara Persson and her husband Richard never planned on raising their family in Royal Palm Beach. In fact, they probably would never have even visited the tiny outpost had it not been for some friends who insisted on taking a drive out west one Sunday afternoon in the fall of 1959. “I’m a fish person, my husband was a steak man, and we had heard about the great food at The Inn,” Barbara recalled. The Inn was the centerpiece of the newly incorporated Village of Royal Palm Beach. After a tasty meal, the four friends took a walk a few blocks up the street to where ground had just been broken on some model homes. “We didn’t plan to buy in Royal Palm, but we really liked this one lot on the corner,” Barbara said. They signed the papers for a three-bedroom, one-bath model home, paying about $10,000. It was the sixth house purchased in the new village. Construction took six months, and in May 1960, Barbara and Richard Persson and their two little boys, Billy, 4, and Donald, 2, became full-time residents of the Village of Royal Palm Beach. Less than a month later, on June 6, 1960, Debbra Louise Persson entered the world, the first baby born in the new village. “I guess it was quite an event,” said Barbara. “We were the youngest family there, and everyone was excited when we brought her home.” Two more daughters would join the Persson family, Denise in 1962, and in 1964, Geraldine, who goes by GiGi. “It was a lot of fun growing up there,” GiGi recalled. “People actually went outside to play. They weren’t stuck inside in front of the TV and on their computers, and there were no cell phones. I always
(Above) The Persson family’s three-bedroom, one-bath home on the corner of Dahlia Drive and Royal Palm Beach Blvd. was the sixth house purchased in the village. (Right) Billy and Donny Persson with their baby sister, Debbra Louise. On June 6, 1960, Debbra became the first baby born in Royal Palm Beach. tell my kids I wish we had that now.” “I remember when we would go away for a weekend, and we didn’t even lock the house,” Debbra added. “We had kids at our house all the time,” Donald said. “You’d get home from school, do your homework as fast as you could, then just run around the neighborhood to one house or another. People talk about the good old days, but for us it was true.” There were no schools in Royal Palm Beach while the Perssons were growing up. All of them rode the bus into West Palm Beach to attend various schools, including Wynnebrook, Melaleuca and Palm View elementary schools, and Golfview and Roosevelt junior high schools. All five siblings graduated from Twin Lakes High School. JUNIOR POLICE PATROL In 1968, Billy and Donald Persson became members of the village’s first Junior Police Patrol organized by Police Chief Robert Horn. The squad was similar to a school safety patrol, but there was no school. There was only one designated crosswalk in town, and it was manned by a paid crossing
guard. So the Junior Police Patrol members would help keep order while kids waited for the bus, making sure there was no fighting or running in the street. “It was something Chief Horn did to bring us kids together,” Billy recalled. “It was more like a club.” That first patrol unit got to visit Washington, D.C., as guests of Congressman Paul Rodgers. They also visited the Bahamas, raising their own money for airfare and a return boat trip. One of the patrol members was Ceslie Adams, daughter of the late actor Don Adams (Get Smart). Donald recalls a run-in he once had with Ceslie on the bus ride home. “Somebody said something, I don’t remember what it was about,” he said, “and the next thing I know, when we get off the bus, she knocks me down and throws sand in my face. That was my first fight.” Big brother Billy had to step in and break it up to prevent total embarrassment for the family. Donald went on to become a top wrestler in high school and earned a scholarship to Cornell. He began coaching and refereeing high school wrestling in 1982, eventually coaching his son
In 2007, the Persson family gathered for a family reunion at Camellia Park. Pictured (front, L-R) are Donald Persson’s children Sarah, Michael and Hannah. Behind them (L-R) are Doug and GiGi Jury, Denise Schmaltz and her daughter Brittany, Donald Persson, Billy Persson, Donald’s wife Kathy, Barbara Persson, Debbra Underwood and Matthew Persson (Billy’s son).
Congressman Paul Rodgers (standing, third from right) welcomes the Royal Palm Beach Junior Police Patrol. Billy and Donald Persson are pictured kneeling to the right. Michael, who became a regional wrestling champion and made the state finals. A GREAT PLACE FOR KIDS Although Royal Palm Beach had few public amenities, there were plenty of things for kids to do. Because their parents had bought a home, every member of the Persson family could swim for free at The Club next to The Inn (out-oftowners were charged 50 cents). There was golf at the par-three course in front of The Inn and youth golf lessons at the Willows Country Club, dances and fish fries at the Lions Club, and arts and crafts classes at the recreation center. “The Fourth of July was always a blast,” Debbra recalled. “We had a barbecue at the pool, and everyone would walk down to the lake, and the fire department would stage fireworks over the lake.” Donald said he and Debbra and some of their more adventurous friends used to crawl through the newly installed cement drainage pipes from one end of town to the other, their own secret tunnel system. There was the “moon rock,” a large, yellow, clay-like mound located over by the water plant that some of the kids used to climb and roll around on. Billy said someone else had clued him in that it was ac-
Page 18 • Royal Palm Beach 50th Anniversary Souvenir Magazine • 1959 - 2009
tually a pile of treated sewage. “I learned to stay away,” he said, “but I didn’t tell Donny right away.” (We won’t mention the time an ornery bull trapped Billy and Donny up a tree and, on another occasion, Debbra and Denise.) WHERE ARE THEY NOW? Richard Persson passed away in 1983 at age 48, and the Persson family sold the house in Royal Palm Beach shortly afterward. Barbara Persson said her 16 grandchildren and six great-grandchildren keep her very busy. She now lives in Palm Springs, not far from her daughter Denise (Persson) Schmaltz and her husband Robert. They have three children, ages 20, 15 and 13. Debbra (Persson) Underwood, 48, has four children and four grandchildren and lives in Valdosta, Georgia. Donald Persson, 50, is a math teacher at Palm Beach Central High School and lives in The Acreage with his wife Kathy. They have three children, ages 24, 12 and 10. GiGi (Persson) Jury also lives in The Acreage with her husband Doug and two children, ages 19 and 12. Billy Persson, 52, lives in Toledo, Ohio. He is married with four children and two grandchildren.
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Royal Palm Beach State Rd 7, One Light South of Okeechobee 1959 - 2009 • Royal Palm Beach 50th Anniversary Souvenir Magazine • Page 19
Royal Palm Beach History THE PIONEERS
“At the time, there were ten homes on the lake behind the hotel, and they had a ‘fly and buy’ program, so every few days I would find myself in a different room.” Bruce Greenfield on his first year as a Royal Palm Beach Colony employee living at the Royal Inn.
The Royal Palm Beach Colony Employee Who Stayed By Georgia Jacoviello
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any people have contributed to the success of the Village of Royal Palm Beach since its early days, among them onetime Royal Palm Beach Colony Inc. employee Bruce Greenfield. Founded by Arthur Desser of Lefcourt Realty Corp. in 1959, Desser’s dream of a “Palm Beach West” soon fell to economic realities when Lefcourt went bust. Original property owner Sam Friedland then took over the project through his company, Royal Palm Beach Colony Inc. Fresh out of the University of Georgia, with degree in hand, Greenfield came to the young village in June 1970 to work for Royal Palm Beach Colony as administrative assistant to the vice president of construction. When he arrived, Greenfield drove to the model housing area on Croton Drive by way of a dirt road, Old Okeechobee Blvd. “There were five model homes and a towing company where the 7-Eleven store is currently located,”
recalled Greenfield, who stayed at the Royal Inn for the first year in his new job. “At the time, there were ten homes on the lake behind the hotel, and they had a ‘fly and buy’ program, so every few days I would find myself in a different room. The front desk clerk would see me come in after a hard day at work and tell me that they had moved my things. When I think about it now, I guess it was rather comical, but it was all in a day’s work back then.” Greenfield finally got an apartment in West Palm Beach, but eventually bought a home on Ponce de Leon Street in LaMancha. Greenfield had a great respect for Friedland, who he called a “genius.” It was a sad say for everyone involved when Friedland passed away in 1985. But a new direction at the firm led to a change that has turned out very profitable for Greenfield. “The Colony decided to downsize, and they asked if I was interested in buying Boulevard Title where I was employed. They sold me the company in 1983 for $10,000 and gave me two years to pay it off,” recalled Greenfield, who is still running the business today.
Although he no longer resides in Royal Palm Beach, Greenfield kept his business here because he continues to be impressed with how well the community is run. “In the last ten years, the village has really matured even more, and the planning and development has become more sophisticated,” he said. “I think that the village has handled the growth well, and some of the stormy times between the municipality and its developers in the early days moved on, left a rainbow, and the town emerged stronger for everyone’s efforts.” Greenfield said the village over the years went from a mostly vacation or seasonal location to a fullfledged, year-round, family community, and he credits early village leaders such as Milford Meyer, Barney Ditkoff and Ray Claydon for that success. They planted the seeds, which continue to grow. “It’s a great place to live,” he said, “and I find it a wonderful place to do business.” While many of those early Royal Palm Beach pioneers are no longer around, some, like Greenfield, are still here to enjoy what has been created over the past 50 years.
Boulevard Title’s Bruce Greenfield at his Royal Palm Beach office.
Royal Palm Beach’s Vibrant Caribbean-American Population Comes Together For Community Service
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By Georgia Jacoviello and Mark Lioi
aribbean-Americans for Community Involvement or CAFCI had its beginnings as a social club in Royal Palm Beach two decades ago, but grew quickly into the well-respected community service organization it is today.
Rhonda Ferrin-Davis, one of the group’s founding members, recalled how the organization got its start in 1989 as the CaribbeanAmerican Friendship Club. “The whole thing arose out of my middle son’s christening,” she recalled. “We had a gathering and we said, ‘there’s so many of us around here, we ought to start a club.’ That’s how it started.” Ferrin-Davis’s parents Vivian and Adrienne Ferrin were also founding CAFCI members
Adrienne Ferrin (right) with her husband, the late Vivian Ferrin.
and worked to build the organization into what it is today. The Washington, D.C. residents visited their friends Victoria and Jess Santamaria every year until finally buying a piece of property in La Mancha at their urging in the early 1980s. Although Adrienne was all for moving from Washington, D.C. to sunny Royal Palm Beach, it did take a while for Jess and Victoria to convince Vivian. Adrienne recalled how her late husband was set against buying any “swampland in Florida” — at first. “I must say that he was not really enchanted with the idea, but he said that he would give me the down payment if I would handle the mortgage payments,” she chuckled. The couple moved to Royal Palm Beach in 1985, but Vivian, the director of the Bureau of Consular Affairs for the U.S. State Department, continued commuting to Washington, D.C. until his retirement in 1987. “He was always interested in government — it was in his blood — but due to his job, he could not become involved in village government until he retired from the State Department,” Adrienne said. After several years of volunteer service on village boards, Vivian Ferrin began serving on the Royal Palm Beach Village Council in 1998 when he was appointed to fill a vacancy. Vivian went on to retain the seat by election twice. In his largest victory margin, he took 74 percent of the vote. The same years saw the growth of the club he and his family started along with about a dozen other couples, including Isaac and Ethel Palmer, Marjorie and Leonard Schleifer, and Junette and Neil Powell. “Junette and Neil were very instrumental because Neil was our first president,” FerrinDavis said.
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As the organization grew beyond its original social purpose and members became increasingly involved in volunteer work and community service, the club was renamed Caribbean-Americans for Community Involvement in 2000. “We found ourselves going in that direction, and we decided to change our name to suit what we were about anyway,” FerrinDavis said, noting that is when the group received its federal non-profit status. But the organization has nevertheless been known from the start as CAFCI — it began as the Caribbean-American Friendship Club Inc., originally incorporated as a state-recognized nonprofit organization. Ferrin-Davis said the new name was chosen very carefully. “We came up with an acronym that stayed with CAFCI,” she recalled. While Vivian Ferrin chose not to run for another council term in 2003 due to health reasons, and sadly passed away in January 2004, the club he helped establish remains strong and has some 200 members today. CAFCI members participate in many charitable events such as the American Cancer Society’s Relay for Life. Through collaborative efforts with the village and the county, CAFCI also produces programs to celebrate Diversity Day and Martin Luther King Jr. Day in the village. CAFCI is also celebrating its own milestone anniversary this year, the 20th of the club’s existence. Through its many fundraising and social events such as the popular Youth Talent Show, CAFCI raises money for college scholarships, the Vivian A. Ferrin Memorial Scholarship, and the My Brother’s/Sister’s Keeper scholarship program, which was founded by Jess Santamaria.
Royal Palm Beach History THE PIONEERS
Gone, But Not Forgotten: Pioneers Leave Their Mark By Georgia Jacoviello
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he early days of Royal Palm Beach began with a firm foundation built by its early residents, who grabbed the golden ring when they decided to settle in this affordable, friendly community. While some of those pioneers are still around, many have passed away. They may be gone, but they are certainly not forgotten. Here’s a tribute to just a few of the colorful characters who dedicated their golden years to building our village… THE OFFICIAL ARTIST OF THE VILLAGE Commercial artist Sam Finglass, who arrived from Baltimore in 1970, left his legacy all over the Village of Royal Palm Beach. Dubbed the “Official Artist of the Village” by former mayor Milford Meyer, Finglass designed the village’s logo, a palm-lined thoroughfare centered by a sun medallion featuring a family — it was then, and remains today, the perfect rendering of all the village has to offer. The design graces all official village stationery, signs and documents. All the accolades, however, were a surprise to Finglass, since his intentions were to paint portraits during his retirement years as a village resident. But once word got out about the successful, award-winning graphic artist who never charged a fee, Sam was more than happy to oblige and donate his time and his talent wherever it was needed. Finglass, who died in April 2004 at the age of 90, always said he enjoyed helping others and that it felt good to be wanted. Along with his artistic contributions, Sam also raised a considerable amount of money for many charitable organizations. It was because of his work and community-oriented nature that Finglass was inducted into the Crestwood Performing Arts League’s Hall of Fame. He was a founding member of the organization. His work is still evident at organizations, businesses and schools around town. Finglass will always be remembered for his generosity and artistic flair. Although he may not have ever had enough time to paint all those portraits he was expecting to, he forever captured the community of Royal Palm Beach in one simple image. THE GUIDING LIGHT BEHIND C-PAL Bonnie O. Goldberg, known as “Bonnie O” to her friends, may no longer be with us in body, but she will always be with us in spirit — and what a spirit it was!
“Official Artist” Sam Finglass
Cultural pioneer Bonnie Goldberg
The former educator arrived in 1972 with her husband Bill and jumped right in as a volunteer and community activist, becoming involved in both education and the arts. Being involved with various organizations in the area kept her busy pursuing her own interests, since she did not share her husband’s love of golf. Goldberg was not one to slow down when she moved from her old Kentucky home to the laid-back Village of Royal Palm Beach. Besides participating in her homeowners’ association, the fun-loving, energetic retiree spent years covering the school beat for the Town-Crier newspaper. “Writing the school stories helped me stay young and made me think of my teacher career,” Goldberg recalled when interviewed after she won a Town-Crier Community Service Award in 2000. Perhaps her top accomplishment was bringing the performing arts to the village as a founding member of the Crestwood Performing Arts League. At first, performances were held in the cafeteria at Crestwood Middle School (hence the name). Still going strong today, C-PAL is based at the expanded, more sophisticated facilities at Royal Palm Beach High School. The organization, through the years, has given tens of thousands of dollars to local schools and continues to do so.
Seniors advocate Lillian Maggio
“MISS LILLIAN” OFFERED UP MEALS FOR SENIORS You could see her coming from a mile away with her hair and makeup always done up to perfection. Lillian Maggio was the woman responsible for the Royal Palm Beach senior meals program that is still in full swing today. “Miss Lillian,” as she was fondly called, not only ran the program, which was originally housed at the Kevin M. Harvin Center, she ran it as a volunteer! The Queens, New York native made it her mission to serve both the young and the old in her adopted hometown of Royal Palm Beach when she arrived with her husband in 1979. She worked for the county while volunteering hundreds of
hours at Palms West Hospital before retiring to spend more time with her husband Albert, who died in 1999. “Miss Lillian” also liked to disguise herself at times acting as Mrs. Claus and Mrs. Rabbit. She even held a “prom” for the little graduates of the Head Start program, also housed at the Harvin Center. She loved being involved in all volunteer aspects of her community and won many awards for her efforts. “Miss Lillian” especially loved to host birthday parties for her beloved Royal Palm Beach senior citizens when they hit their 100th year, marking their milestones with big extravaganzas for friends and families. Sadly, she never got to celebrate her own, having passed away in 2002 at the age of 80. Her friends and fellow residents grabbed the chance to honor her anyway as they swapped stories about their beloved caretaker and advocate at her memorial service. They remembered her performing in Greenway Village theater productions, and they recalled her fabulous, out-going, takecharge personality. Many will remember “Miss Lillian” herself — but all senior citizens in Royal Palm Beach owe her a debt of gratitude for many of the programs they enjoy today.
Good government activists Rose & Leo Shaffer ACTIVISTS CRUSADE FOR GOOD GOVERNMENT Rose and Leo Shaffer were like two peas in a pod. The couple spent just about every minute together, and that spilled over into their service to the Royal Palm Beach community as well. With backgrounds in the auto industry and union reform, the Shaffers retired to the village in 1974. Upon their arrival, Leo found out his retirement was not going to be as laid back as he had planned. Through the Greenway Village grapevine, it became known that Leo was a man of experience — someone who could get things done. Before the last box was unpacked, he was pushed into service as the chairman of the condo association. The story goes that two men knocked on the door, saying they wanted to welcome the couple to the area. After presenting Rose with a small gift, they made the announcement that an election had taken place, and thus began the couple’s journey of whipping the village into shape. Since Royal Palm Beach was considered “way out west,” Rose and Leo realized that there were not many amenities available to residents. This caused them to spearhead a plan to build a medical center on Okeechobee Blvd.,
which was a consumer-owned, consumer-operated, non-profit primary healthcare facility. They even helped to raise half a million dollars to get it built. So, it was only natural for Leo to serve as the first chairman of the executive committee and its president. Eventually they became more and more involved in their new community because of their backgrounds in union activities. Not pleased with the way government was being run in Royal Palm Beach at the time, Leo and Rose founded a watchdog group called Citizens for Open Government (COG). Its mission was to keep elected officials honest. But their commitment did stop there. Leo and Rose were also active in the Royal Palm Beach Lions Club and sponsored health fairs. Rose was also busy with the Tamar Chapter of Hadassah, ORT and the Royal Palm Beach Lioness Club. Sadly Rose and Leo Shaffer both died within months of each other in 1996. Leo always wanted to write a book, but he never got to do it — not on paper at least. But through his and Rose’s actions, his book was written in the minds of all the people they helped. Their work laid part of the foundation that makes Royal Palm Beach what it is today.
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Royal Palm Beach History THE PIONEERS
“What bothered me was that basic services were lacking. There was not a single doctor. There was no dentist, no supermarket, no drugstore. That’s what made me think that maybe I can bring in just the basic needs of any family.” Jess Santamaria on how he got his start in commercial development.
Jess Santamaria Looks Back On His 35 Years In RPB By Ron Bukley
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hen Jess Santamaria arrived in Royal Palm Beach in 1974 there were no supermarkets, drugstores, gas stations, doctors or dentists. The only commercial establishments were the Royal Inn motel with 32 rooms and a restaurant, a golf course, a convenience store, a laundromat and a one-woman beauty salon. Royal Palm Beach had a population of about 2,500 and nearby Wellington had no completed homes, only a trailer selling vacant lots starting at $6,000, Santamaria recalled. Santamaria, who now represents the western communities on the Palm Beach County Commission, said he was drawn from Philadelphia to Royal Palm Beach largely for the weather. Having earned a degree in chemical engineering as well as a master’s degree in business administration after emigrating from the Philippines, he had worked for Exxon and IBM, but had grown weary of Philadelphia. “I felt Philadelphia was not where I wanted to raise my children — the big city life, the crime, the traffic,” he said. Santamaria was also interested in the real estate business in Florida. He started looking around the state in 1973, including the Tampa area, central Florida, the Orlando area and Pensacola. But it was a chance meeting that changed the course of his life. Royal Palm Beach founder Sam Friedland, owner of the Food Fair grocery store chain, lived in the suburbs of Philadelphia. Santamaria met Friedland’s vice president of sales and marketing at a social function there. “He knew I was starting to dabble in real estate, and he said, ‘why don’t you come visit Royal Palm Beach?’” Santamaria recalled. Santamaria accepted the invitation, and he and his family stayed at the Royal Inn, which Santamaria eventually purchased. Royal Palm Beach was “a sleepy town” — exactly what he was looking for. “I saw next to nothing, but I liked what I saw, a lot of openness, a lot of open space,” he said. “And so I figured this would be a place to start and raise my family, because at that time my kids were just little babies.” Santamaria moved to Royal Palm Beach and started to buy and sell property. “I was buying some real estate for myself, and I sold some to friends and relatives in Pennsylvania. That’s how I started in Royal Palm Beach in 1974,” he said. Santamaria built his own house in LaMancha on Galiano Street, where he lived for the next 25 years. By 1977, Santamaria had started building homes in Royal Palm Beach, but knew he would need commercial services in the area in order to attract homebuyers. “One
thing led to another,” he recalled. “What bothered me was that basic services were lacking. There was not a single doctor. There was no dentist, no supermarket, no drugstore. That’s what made me think that maybe I can bring in just the basic needs of any family.” Santamaria called Publix, but they brushed him off. “When I told them where I wanted to build a market, they said, ‘forget it. You’re in the boonies.’ I tried Winn-Dixie and basically got the same answer,” he said. His next attempt was with Darrell Miller, owner of Miller’s Super Value at Southern Blvd. and Military Trail. “I walked into the market, I asked for Mr. Miller, and he was kind enough to talk to me,” Santamaria recalled. “He offered me a cup of coffee and a donut, and we began a nice friendship. When I spoke to him, he didn’t say no. He said maybe, and that was good enough for me.” For the next ten months Santamaria was one of Miller’s regular visitors. “I had lots of cups of coffee and lots of donuts and cookies,” he said. In 1980, he was able to persuade Miller to open a market in Royal Palm Beach. Santamaria built the market building and the surrounding Royal Plaza at the northeast corner of Southern and Royal Palm Beach boulevards. The market, which opened in 1981, opened the gate for more commercial growth. Eckerd Pharmacy, now a CVS, told Santamaria it would open a store if a supermarket were there. That first shopping center also offered Royal Palm Beach its first fast-food restaurant (McDonald’s), its first gas station (Mobil), its first medical offices with four doctors, a pizza parlor, a bank, a sports bar and more. “That was the beginning of civilization, the first commercial center,” he said. Santamaria said he can look back with pride at almost all of his accomplishments in Royal Palm Beach, including the homes he built and the shopping centers. Through the years, he also tried to correct things he thought were not right. One such issue involved the future Madison Green development. The property received approval from the village in 1994 to eliminate a golf course in the original site plan and build more homes on the space, he said. Santamaria filed a lawsuit to make the village withdraw its approval of the homes. “The golf course had not been built, but it was zoned for a golf course, and it was a beautiful plan, but the landowner wanted to do away with the golf course and put 300 more homes,” he recalled. “I objected to it, but they ignored my objections and approved it anyway. I had no alternative but to file suit to stop the removal of the golf course.”
Miller’s Super Value, Royal Palm Beach’s first supermarket, opened in 1981 in Jess Santamaria’s Royal Plaza. Shown here at the grand opening are: (L-R) landscape architect Bob Nelson, Jess Santamaria, Mayor Harold Silverman, grocer Darrell Miller, property manager Raymond Kahn, architect Rodrigo Saavedra and contractor Jim Bernard. After five years and $500,000 in legal fees, Santamaria’s lawsuit prevailed. “Just before trial, the attorney for Royal Palm Beach said they were going to void the approval and build the golf course that was originally planned, and I got refunded my half million dollars in legal fees. They stopped the suit from proceeding to court. What you see there now would not have been there if not for my lawsuit. I think that was one of the things that has made Royal Palm Beach one of the top ten cities in the country,” he said, referring to an article in the August 2008 Family Circle magazine listing Royal Palm Beach as one of the top ten cities to raise a family, mentioning Madison Green and the village’s open space as one of the community’s top attributes. Santamaria said he has always sought to improve the quality of life in Royal Palm Beach by providing services and trying to stop what he believed was not good for the community. To ensure a good future for Royal Palm Beach, Santamaria said people must improve on the good things, keep it safe and preserve assets such as open space, parks and other public facilities. “We have to support law enforcement because, obviously, we don’t want gangs in the community,” he said. “I’ve always been supportive of the fire and police in Royal Palm Beach. I’m happy that it’s now under the county.” What Santamaria wants most is “reasonable growth.” “We can have growth, but it has got to be reasonable, well-planned growth,” he said. “I have no problem with growth as long as it doesn’t
After years as a community activist, Jess Santamaria was elected to a seat on the Palm Beach County Commission in November 2006. Here he is shown taking the oath of office as his wife Victoria stands by his side. hurt the current residents. We have to protect the good things that brought them here. That’s my objective: to protect the good things that brought people here to begin with.” Santamaria said his fondest memories of Royal Palm Beach are of the really nice people he has known over the years. “There were a lot of really great people that made Royal Palm Beach what it is today,” he said. “People who joined me in protecting the quality of Royal Palm Beach.” He mentioned a few by name, including Bonnie Goldberg, Leo
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Shaffer, Sam Finglass (who designed the village emblem), former Crestwood Middle School assistant principal Frank Bostwick and former mayor Milford Meyer. “There were so many nice people,” he said. “Everybody knew everybody. That’s the great thing about small towns. You lose that when the town gets bigger. The people in the ’70s and ’80s were just wonderful people that I miss because almost all of them have passed away. They were all active members of the community until they finally left this Earth. I was 37 when I arrived, so I was the kid in town.”
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Royal Palm Beach History PARKS & RECREATION
“I was a staff of one. Umpiring, dragging the fields, lining the fields, putting out the schedule, getting kids to the games, you name it.” Tom Bolinski on the early days of the Royal Palm Beach Parks & Recreation Department.
Community Parks, Programs Take Shape In The 1970s
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By Mark Esterly
uring Royal Palm Beach’s early years, village residents had limited recreational opportunities. There was golf at the Willows Country Club, swimming at the Royal Inn, and cards or dancing at the Lions Club. But there were no community parks, baseball fields, soccer fields or public tennis courts until the early 1970s. By 1974, the village had taken over most municipal functions and public works duties from Royal Palm Beach Colony Inc., and with more young families moving in, there was a growing need for recreation programs. Work had begun on Camellia Park, a donated 10-acre parcel behind the Evangelical Covenant Church along Camellia Drive. Tom Bolinski was hired to run the new parks and recreation department with an annual budget of $30,000. “I was a staff of one,” Bolinski recalled. “Umpiring, dragging the fields, lining the fields, putting out the schedule, getting kids to the games, you name it.” Bolinski, who was also in charge of code enforcement, worked initially out of the village hall trailer, then moved into the first municipal recreation center, a house-like structure at the east end of Camellia Park. The parks “division” at that time was also one employee, George Morris, who cut the grass at Camellia Park. Morris didn’t really have an office, unless you count the maintenance building where the mowers were stored. Camellia Park had a picnic area,
Tom Bolinski, the first director of the Royal Palm Beach Parks & Recreation Department. a playground, two tennis courts and a sandlot softball field, but with no organized baseball program, local baseball players had to travel to West Palm Beach and Lake Worth for Little League and Pony League play. But Bolinski thought the village should have its own program, and to drum up interest, he and Morris drove around in a van with a PA system urging youngsters to sign up. In order to have enough players for the games, Bolinski would often pick kids up and drive them to Camellia Park. The recreation department held summer camps and adult arts and crafts classes at the small recreation center, swimming lessons and life-saving courses at the Royal Inn pool, and by 1980, youth basketball and flag football games were also being held. In 1986, adult softball and baseball leagues were enormously popular at Camellia Park, but youth
Current Royal Palm Beach Parks & Recreation Director Lou Recchio points out features on a map of the planned Royal Palm Beach Commons Park, previously the Tradition Golf Course.
One of the first organized recreation programs in the village was youth golf. In this 1965 photo, Bill Kaplan, the first club pro at the Willows Country Club, demonstrates proper backswing. sports programs were still lacking. In November of that year, an informational meeting was held at Crestwood Middle School to gauge interest in forming a non-profit entity that would organize and manage youth baseball, softball and soccer. Lou Recchio, who later went on to lead parks and recreation programs for the village, scheduled the meeting in the school library. Recchio was hoping maybe 50 parents would show up. “They had to move us into the cafeteria, which is a lot bigger, and it was standing room only,” he recalled. “That’s when we knew there was a major interest in getting something going here.” In just a few months, the Royal Palm Beach Youth Athletic League had formed a Saturday baseball league. The season kicked off with a youth fest parade, just as it does today. “The athletic program in the community really mushroomed,” Bolinski said. “It got a lot more parents and sponsors involved.” The baseball and softball fields at Camellia Park and Crestwood Middle School were in constant use, and more athletic facilities were needed. A village-owned tract of land on Okeechobee Blvd. was designated, and Bolinski wound up designing the layout himself. The land was swampy with thick weeds, so Bolinski donned a pair of hiphuggers and began slogging around, scribbling down where he thought certain things should go. “I’m not an engineer,” he said. “I guess it turned out OK.” Willows Park opened in 1988 and featured five adult and youth baseball fields, two soccer fields and a multipurpose practice field. Everyone was thrilled with the new facility — well, almost everyone. “We had a big opening night event for Willows Park,” Recchio recalled. “I remember hitting the switches with Tom Bolinski to turn the lights on. I can’t remember the man’s name who lived on the corner, but boy, he comes running out and just cuss-
ed us out for putting lights on in his backyard.” The anti-park neighbor was clearly in the minority, as the athletic league would soon have more than 1,000 youngsters playing ball at Willows Park. Now known as the Bob Marcello Baseball Complex, facilities include a total of eight ball fields for players age four to 15, plus tennis and basketball courts, a picnic pavilion, jogging trail and tot lot. In 1991, the village recreation department moved into the civic center building on Okeechobee Blvd., sharing space with the police department. The former recreation building at Camellia Park was donated to the Jaycees. Three years later, the Royal Palm Beach Parks & Recreation Department took a huge leap forward with the simultaneous openings of the Royal Palm Beach Recreation Center and the Royal Palm Beach Cultural Center, both facilities funded by a voterapproved bond issue. “There were so many people in town who needed a venue for their meetings, luncheons, local performances, and the Cultural Center really opened things up for our seniors, too,” Bolinski said. The 33,000-square-foot Royal Palm Beach Recreation Center wasn’t overwhelmed with children right away, Recchio recalled. “We’re sort of tucked away behind the school, so not everyone knew we were here,” he said. But that changed when the department started issuing quarterly brochures and direct mailers to residents promoting community recreation. Teens and adults began to flock to the center to play basketball, shoot pool in the game room or work out in the weight room. With the village’s recreation program the envy of the booming western communities, Bolinksi left in 1995 to take a similar position in Ocala. He retired in December 2008. Recchio was the assistant director for a little over a year, before
becoming the department director in 1997. At the time, the department had an annual budget of $1.2 million. The annual budget now is $2.9 million with 33 full-time employees and 26 part-timers. Approximately 200 recreation programs are offered with more 3,000 children participating. With the help of $2 million in federal, state and county funding, the village has developed and maintains more than 200 acres of active and passive park space, not counting the 160-acre former Tradition Golf Course on Royal Palm Beach Blvd., acquired in 2005. Village park facilities include 16 baseball/softball fields, four soccer fields, eight tennis courts, 10 basketball courts, nine children’s playgrounds, four bocce courts, six sand volleyball courts and six fishing docks. The Royal Palm Beach Recreation Center is contained within the 65-acre Preservation Park and has added outdoor basketball courts, a roller hockey rink, soccer fields. In 2008, a bike and nature trail opened on 25 acres just to the south. Since 1999, major improvements have taken place at other facilities such as Todd Robiner Park, Bobbie Jo Lauter Park, Crestwood Park, Vivian Ferrin Memorial Park and Homeplace Park. “We have renovated literally every park in the community, and now we’re on our second run through,” Recchio said. The 2003 opening of Veterans Park was another major achievement, Recchio said. The next big challenge will be the development of Royal Palm Beach Commons Park, the new name of the former golf course. Current plans call for a nine-hole executive course with about 60 acres set aside for more of the features that make Veterans Park so popular. “You take those six acres at Veterans Park and multiply by ten, that’s what you’re going to be seeing at Commons Park,” Recchio said.
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Royal Palm Beach History FIRE DEPARTMENT
“Most of them were retired people, and I guess that’s why they were interested in me. They knew they needed some younger guys.” Karl Combs, recalling how he was recruited into the village’s fledgling fire department in 1965. He would serve as chief from 1972 to 1997.
A Proud Tradition Starts With A Handful Of Volunteers By Mark Esterly
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n Jan. 2, 1963, a meeting was held at the trailer serving as village hall for the new Royal Palm Beach community to see if there was any interest in organizing a volunteer fire department. Eight individuals signed the roll-call sheet that evening, laying the groundwork for village’s first firefighting corps. The following year, according to village records, Arthur Quigley was named the first fire chief, while Lloyd McConnell was named assistant chief, and Cortland McCombs was appointed secretary-treasurer. In 1965, the group recruited an elementary school teacher named Karl Combs, a move that would change his career path. “Most of them were retired people, and I guess that’s why they were interested in me,” said Combs, who was 35 at the time. “They knew they needed some younger guys.” Quigley resigned as fire chief in 1969 and was replaced by Clarence Gollwitzer. Combs replaced Gollwitzer in 1972 and would remain chief for the next 25 years. Combs retired in 1997 and now lives in Maryville, Tennessee, about 15 miles from Knoxville. Combs recalled well the early struggles of the tiny volunteer fire department. The first “station house” was a makeshift lean-to behind village hall. A donated 1949 Dodge pick-up with a small water tank and a portable pump was parked underneath. In 1969, the fire department moved into a large metal building near the east end of Camellia Park. The village leased the building from Royal Palm Beach Colony Inc., which only needed about a third of the floor space to store its maintenance equipment. The metal building featured three large bays and two fire trucks. It was later moved from Commerce Park to the public
(Above) A $10,000 donation from Royal Palm Beach Colony Inc. helped the village purchase its first new fire truck in December 1973 for $25,800. Shown here, Chief Karl Combs accepts a check from RPB Colony’s Mel Bell. (Right) After 25 years on the job, Combs retired in 1997. Less than two years later, the independent fire department merged with Palm Beach County Fire-Rescue. works complex on Okeechobee Blvd. On July 4, 1976, the village celebrated the nation’s bicentennial with the grand opening of the municipal complex at 1040 Royal Palm Beach Blvd., where the fire department’s 11 full-time employees shared space with the village’s police department. In 1991, Station 2 in Counterpoint Estates opened, significantly reducing response time in the east side of the village. VOLUNTEERS GIVE WAY TO PAID PROFESSIONALS The all-volunteer fire department protected the residents and property of Royal Palm Beach for eight years before the first paid positions were approved. Combs had just become chief, when he persuaded village officials to allow him to start paying his personnel. Ed Gatchell and Fred Bulifant were the first fulltimers, earning about $6,000 per year. The following year, three more full-time firefighters were hired. Combs became the first paid chief in July 1975 at a salary of $13,500 per year. It was about $3,000 less than his teaching job paid, so his wife Karen went to work at Photo Electronics Corp. to help make ends meet.
One of Chief Combs’ priorities was to find paramedic-trained firefighters. He had been in charge of the village’s rescue squad since 1966, a program that was borne out of tragedy. One of the original volunteer firefighters suffered a heart attack at his home, and it took too long for an ambulance to arrive from West Palm Beach. “The department was very upset about that and [Chief] Art Quigley said, ‘Well, we’re just gonna start a rescue squad ourselves,’” Combs recalled. Combs and Quigley went for training in Miami and became certified triple-As: advanced ambulance attendants. A village resident purchased a used Cadillac hearse from a funeral home and turned it into an ambulance, and Combs was promoted to lieutenant. “All we could do was basic first-aid and CPR, but that was really important,” he said. Another program Combs initiated was the junior cadets, which gave teenagers a chance to learn about the firefighting profession firsthand. There weren’t many takers, probably because it involved a lot of manual labor, but one eager cadet was Chief Combs’ son Chris. “We took
first-aid classes and cleaned the vehicles, that type of thing,” Chris Combs recalled. “When my father became the chief, I started hanging out at the station a lot. I liked the people, it was sort of like I had all these big brothers.” Chris Combs and Gary Weiss, the only other junior fireman, went on to become professional firefighters. Chris has been with Palm Beach County Fire-Rescue since 1983, and it appears his son, Chris CombsLeVelle, will continue the family tradition. He’s studying to become an EMT. A NEW BEGINNING WITH THE COUNTY The village’s independently operated municipal fire department was absorbed into Palm Beach County Fire-Rescue (PBCFR) in March 1999. Tom Vreeland was the village’s fire chief at the time. Back then Karl Combs, who had retired 18 months earlier, did not support the merger. “And I have to admit that I was wrong. I think it was a good move for the village,” he said. “It gave them a lot more fire protection. Of course, they are paying more for it, but I see that it turned out to be a good thing.”
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Twenty-nine of Royal Palm Beach’s 32 firefighters became county personnel. PBCFR Driver Operator Richard Kingston, a 15year firefighter, is one of the former village firefighters still at the Royal Palm Beach station house. “It has been good being with the county,” Kingston said. “You have more staffing, better equipment, more resources.” PBCFR Lt. Kevin Shaw said it’s important to keep a few long-timers like Kingston on staff because they know the village so well. “Royal Palm has a very interesting street numbering system; you have some addresses out here that aren’t all that consistent,” said Shaw. “If he doesn’t know where it is, it doesn’t exist.” The village’s former Station 1 on Royal Palm Beach Blvd. is now Fire-Rescue Station 28. The old Counterpoint station became FireRescue Station 29. Between the two, a total of 14 county personnel — 12 crew members, a district chief and an EMS captain — are on duty at all times. Station 28 also serves as the headquarters for Battalion 2, which serves most of western communities. Chief Nigel Baker is the battalion commander.
Royal Palm Beach History POLICE DEPARTMENT
“They still have their own police department. It might be a different color uniform, and some of the names and faces are different, but we’ve got a very good organization over here. I haven’t heard anything but positive things.” PBSO Lt. John Hill, a 25-year veteran of the RPBPD, on the merger.
Law Enforcement: From ‘Klopp The Cop’ To The PBSO
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By Mark Esterly
he Royal Palm Beach Public Safety Department was founded on June 6, 1960, beginning a long and unwavering commitment to putting the safety of village residents first. The village’s first police chief was Joseph Klopp. According to an original Royal Palm Beach police directory, the impressive resume of “Klopp the Cop” included stints as a special investigator for the U.S. government and as Maryland’s chief criminal investigator. Those early years of law enforcement in Royal Palm Beach may have been a lot like the fictional town of Mayberry patrolled by Sheriff Taylor and Deputy Fife. Besides Klopp, there was one fulltime officer and a secretary/dispatcher. A handful of auxiliary officers were recruited as needed to assist with emergencies and weekend traffic duty. The department’s only police car, a radio-equipped Mercury station wagon, easily covered the 10 developed streets where approximately 300 residents lived. The main concern in the sleepy retirement community was speeding. The village couldn’t afford to have its few officers spend half the day traveling to West Palm Beach for traffic court appearances, so a small municipal court was set up in the village hall trailer on Camellia Drive. The judge was H. Lawrence Cooper. There were no schools in the village; students were bused into West Palm Beach. And there was one part-time crossing guard, who helped the children get across Royal Palm Beach Blvd. where the bus picked them up and dropped them off. The police officers wore brown uniforms, switching to blue in the 1980s. In 1997, shorts became an official uniform option. 13 POLICE CHIEFS Joseph Klopp served as police chief until 1965 when Emory Pickren assumed the post. Subsequent chiefs were Robert Horn, Fred Everett, Michael Manning, Richard McMonagle, Clifford Pittard, David Mulberry, Noah Huddleston, Jeff Waites, Phil Redstone, Michael Bruscell and Ed Stepnowski. Waites served the longest of any police chief, 13 years, retiring in 1996. Through the 1960s, the police department occupied a small room in the village hall trailer on Camellia Drive. In 1973, a separate public safety trailer was purchased. Three years later, the police department was sharing space with the fire department in the municipal complex on Royal Palm Beach Blvd. The village “jail” was a one-cell lockup located in the back of the building. The Planning, Zoning &
(Left) Joseph Klopp is sworn in as the village’s first police chief by Mayor Ewing L. Jones. (Above) Chief Klopp and his “force” in 1960 as shown on the cover of an early Royal Palm Beach directory. Building Department later used the jail cell for records storage before moving its operations into the expanded village hall complex. In 1989, the police department moved to the civic building fronting Okeechobee Blvd. where it operated until being absorbed by the Palm Beach County Sheriff’s Office (PBSO) in 2006. The building now serves as the PBSO’s District 9 Substation. RPBPD JOINS THE PBSO The merger with the Palm Beach County Sheriff’s Office on Oct. 1, 2006, may have signaled the end of the independent village police department, but not the communityoriented approach to law enforcement that local residents had come to know. “They still have their own police department,” said PBSO Lt. John Hill, a 25-year veteran of the RPBPD. “It might be a different color uniform, and some of the names and faces are different, but we’ve got a very good organization over here. I haven’t heard anything but positive things.” When Hill began his career as a road patrol officer in Royal Palm Beach, Ronald Reagan had just entered the White House, Rick Springfield and Hall & Oates were all over the radio, Hill Street Blues was a top TV show, and Major League Baseball was bracing for a strike. Hill’s future wife Debbie had been hired by the department three months earlier. They were married in 1983. Richard McMonagle was the police chief, the first of seven chiefs the Hills would serve under. Hill said there are some obvious differences between working for a small municipal police department and a large county agency, such as broader territories to cover and a longer chain of command, “but police work is police work. It has been a great experience,” he said. Hill, who still lives in Royal Palm Beach, is now assigned to District 3 in the Northern Region, a coastal zone that extends from Lantana to the Martin County line. For Hill, it means a lot more driving — his beat covers several hundred square miles
compared with the village’s 12square-mile jurisdiction. The Royal Palm Beach substation is now headed by Capt. Eric Coleman. Major Tony Araujo Jr. oversees the entire Western Region, which includes Royal Palm Beach, Wellington, The Acreage, Loxahatchee and the Glades. Araujo’s executive assistant is Kelly Turaniczo, who had served in a similar capacity for 15 years with the RPBPD. She said joining the PBSO has worked out very well. “I wish I’d done this years ago,” she said. “He’s the best boss I could ever ask for, and this is such a great organization.” At the time of the merger, the RPBPD had 50 sworn officers and 26 non-sworn administrators, office assistants, dispatchers and part-time crossing guards. All were hired by the PBSO except for Chief Ed Stepnowski, who opted to retire. A total of 34 former Royal Palm Beach sworn officers are based at the District 9 substation. EVER EVOLVING AND IMPROVING During their years with the RPBPD, John and Debbie Hill saw the number of officers increase tenfold. He thinks the most important change in day-to-day operations occurred in 1988 when the department joined the computer age. Mainframes were installed enabling officers to log their calls and incident reports electronically. “At that time, you hand-wrote everything,” Hill recalled. “It was a very timeconsuming method and not always very accurate.” In the 1990s, laptops were purchased for patrol cars, further improving accuracy and speeding accessibility to information. Also in the 1990s, at the insistence of Chief Jeff Waites, the department gained national accreditation, which significantly improved how the department’s records were kept and procedures were followed. A central communications system was installed, automatic pistols replaced revolvers and video cameras were mounted in patrol units to record road incidents.
Joseph Klopp, the village’s first police chief, served from 1960 to 1965.
Jeff Waites, the village’s longestserving police chief, retired in 1996 after 13 years on the job.
Major Tony Araujo, commander of the PBSO’s Western Regional Bureau, with Capt. Eric Coleman, who took Araujo’s place as commander of the District 9 substation in Royal Palm Beach. Public outreach also took on new importance. The Royal Palm Beach Police Athletic League was established to give at-risk youths a safe place to hang out away from drugs, alcohol and gangs. The DARE (Drug Abuse Resistance Education) program helped thousands of youngsters avoid getting involved with drugs. The police marine unit kept a watchful on village lakes and canals, National Night Out was regularly observed, and the Community Service Unit initiated by Chief
Phil Redstone provided extra eyes and ears while handling routine police tasks. From “Klopp the Cop” to today’s sophisticated hierarchy, the law enforcement professionals sworn to protect the residents of Royal Palm Beach have dutifully answered the call. They take great pride in the fact that throughout the village’s 50-year history, no officer has been killed in the line of duty, something that’s attributable at least as much to good training as it is good luck.
1959 - 2009 • Royal Palm Beach 50th Anniversary Souvenir Magazine • Page 29
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Royal Palm Beach History HOUSES OF WORSHIP
“After the fire, it was the Jewish community that rallied around and allowed us to meet in their activity room for four or five months until our church was back in order again.” Bonnie Leonard, daughter of Rev. Eugene Lundberg, on how early religious groups in RPB worked together.
Early Religious Groups Form Diverse RPB Community By Ron Bukley
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hen the Village of Royal Palm Beach was founded, residents travel to West Palm Beach to attend religious services — but not for long. The first house of worship built in Royal Palm Beach was Evangelical Covenant Church, which in turn offered meeting space for services to several other congregations in the village’s early years. Known today as Royal Palm Covenant Church, Evangelical Covenant Church got its start in 1961 when residents Mr. and Mrs. Bill Larson asked retired pastor Arvid Jones to organize a church. Its first service took place in an empty house, but it found a place to call home in 1962 on a one-acre lot at 600 Royal Palm Beach Blvd., and a concrete-block structure was built the same year. The church acquired an organ in 1963 through a $500 contribution from Mr. and Mrs. Ed Bolt and got its first full-time pastor in 1964 when the Rev. Eugene Lundberg and his family moved to Royal Palm Beach from New York City. Lundberg’s daughter Bonnie Leonard was 21 when she accompanied her parents on the move and became the church organist. “I was single at the time, and I moved down with my parents,” she recalled. Lundberg was pastor at the church for 25 years, until he retired in 1989. “There were 29 members when he first moved down,” Leonard said. “By the time he left, there were 150.”
(Above) Temple Beth Zion founders Helen Schwartz, Ruth Baraoidan, Brian Schwartz, Marsha and Robert Sade, Herb Kaplan, Lou and Caroline Zweig, Eli Rosenthal and Rabbi Nathan Zelizer stand by a sign announcing the temple’s future home. (Right) Roz Freedman, Bea Mishkit Freeman, Rabbi Seymour Friedman and Annie Schiller during a dedication ceremony on Sept. 28, 1986.
A variety of other congregations held services in the building those first few years, and Royal Palm Beach’s interfaith cooperation gained national attention. Newspapers in New York, Chicago and Los Angeles carried the story of a Jewish family from California seeking to Royal Palm Beach, which they considered “paradise on earth” because everyone got along so well. Leonard recalled the church sharing space with other worshippers, including members of the fledgling St. Rita Catholic Church in Wellington. “They met there for four years,” she said. “The Jewish group would come in for their High Holy Days before their temple was finished, and there were a few other congregations that met there,” she said, along with community groups and scout troops. When the church was damaged in a fire in 1970, the Jewish community reciprocated the hospitality. “It was pretty awful,” Leonard said of the fire, which destroyed the church’s wooden roof, its organ and the pastor’s study and library. “It was lot of work to get it all back. After the fire, it was the Jewish community that rallied around and allowed us to meet in their activity room for four or five months until our church was back in order again.” Eventually the church was rebuilt, and in 1976 a Sunday school and classrooms were added along with a fellowship hall to meet the needs of the growing congregation. The Rev. Michael Rose is the current pastor of Royal Palm Covenant Church, now a multicultural congregation holding two Sunday services, one in Creole and another in English. Royal Palm Beach’s Temple Beth
Zion, now in its 29th year, was the first Conservative Jewish congregation in the western communities, formed by eight families in 1980. Beatrice Mishkit Freeman, who was president of the temple from 1983 to 1987 and again from 1990 to 1993, said she was drawn to the congregation because it allowed full participation of women in services, unlike many other Conservative synagogues. The congregation built its temple in 1986. By that time, Freeman said, the temple’s membership had grown to more than 200. She considers the construction of the temple and the establishment of a Hebrew school as her most significant accomplishments during her presidency. “I was president when they built the temple and walked into it,” she recalled. Rabbis at Temple Beth Zion include Nathan Zelizer (1983-85), Seymour Friedman (1985-88), Stefan Weinberg (1988-90), Gerald Weiss (1991-97), Lester Schwartz (1998) and Nason Goldstein (1999 to 2005). Current Rabbi Bertram Keiffer joined the congregation in August 2006. Our Lady Queen of the Apostles Catholic Church got its start in 1988 when a group of about 140 parishioners left St. Rita Catholic Church in Wellington to form a parish in Royal Palm Beach. Father Kevin MacGabhann conducted the first service at the Royal Palm Beach Lions Club on Sept. 2 of that year, and the first baptism was held on Sept. 25. “They started looking almost immediately for a permanent site,” said Father Andy Rudnicki, who has been pastor since 2006. A 17-acre property on Crestwood Blvd. was purchased in 1989. Father Leo Pembert was appointed parish administrator in 1992, and a groundbreaking for the pavilion, where services initially took place, was held in July 1993. One year later, ground was broken for a multipurpose building that was finished in March 1995. “We hold mass and we hold many activities there,” Rudnicki said. “We also have offices in this building.”
The village’s first church was Evangelical Covenant Church, now Royal Palm Covenant Church. (Above inset) Rev. Eugene Lundberg, the church’s first pastor, in 1968. (Below) Rev. Lundberg’s daughter Bonnie Leonard in a photo from the 1990s. In July 2000, Father Tom Skindeleski was named pastor. “When he came, he built the flexible hall and the rectory on the property,” Rudnicki said. The church is now building a 24,000-square-foot sanctuary for the 7,000-member congregation. It is scheduled for completion in December 2009. The $4.2 million structure is funded largely through contributions from parishioners, Rudnicki said. “This is a blue-collar congregation,” he said. “Our pledges were not very big, $5,000 or $10,000.” This is Rudnicki’s second time at Our Lady Queen of the Apostles. He served as parochial vicar there from 2000 to 2002. Opportunities for worship in and
around Royal Palm Beach have multiplied in the past half-century, helping to build the sense of community and spirit that prevails after 50 years.
A rendering of the new Our Lady Queen of the Apostles sanctuary currently under construction.
1959 - 2009 • Royal Palm Beach 50th Anniversary Souvenir Magazine • Page 31
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Royal Palm Beach History PUBLIC SCHOOLS
“Royal Palm Beach was way ahead of its time. The community and village staff always supported education, and I still cherish my years there.” Ann Killets, now the school district’s chief academic officer, on her time as principal at H.L. Johnson Elementary School.
School System Scrambles To Stay Ahead Of Growth By Georgia Jacoviello
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ow home to three elementary schools, one middle school and a high school, it is hard to remember that public schools did not arrive in Royal Palm Beach until 1983 with the opening of Crestwood Middle School, followed a year later by the opening of H.L. Johnson Elementary School. Before that time, village students were bused to schools “out east.” Ann Killets, who served as principal of H.L. Johnson from 1985 to 1995, is now chief academic officer for the School District of Palm Beach County. To this day, she remains impressed by how the Village of Royal Palm Beach and its residents work hard to support their schools. “Royal Palm Beach was way ahead of its time,” Killets said. “The community and the village staff always supported education, and I still cherish my years there.” Killets often runs into former students, many of whom have become teachers. “It’s great how they remember me and some of their favorite teachers, and for me to see how successful they have become,” she said. “It really touches my heart.” Overcrowding was already on the horizon for the village’s first middle school before it was even built. With an enrollment projection of 700 back in the early 1980s, Crestwood Middle School was eventually built for 1,200 students thanks to its first principal, Beverlyann B. Barton. With her innovative style, Barton and her staff were able to get to know the total child, and it was the first time a middle school in Palm Beach County had six assistant principals (one for each grade and three in student services acting as guidance counselors). Today, schools throughout the county use this model. Barton officially retired in 2000 as the district’s central area superintendent. But her creative ways of getting the job done right prompted the district to bring her back in 2002 to serve as a principal on assignment for low-performing schools in the north area, where she facilitated academic improvement in the classroom while mentoring teachers and principals to do the same. Barton stayed until 2006 and since has completed her doctorate at Columbia University. Barton said she often reflects on her time at Crestwood and the beautiful memories of the children. “I always have and always will say that those students were the smartest and most special children in Palm Beach County,” she said. She may be right on the money with that. Barton recalled how her daughter called from Illinois recently to tell her to turn on the televi-
(Above left) Beverlyann B. Barton, Crestwood Middle School’s first principal. (Above right) Principal Walter Murray (far left) with students in Mrs. Mauney’s 1985 fifth grade class at H.L. Johnson Elementary School — among the first kids to graduate from the school. sion because a former student was on the soap opera Days of Our Lives! At first, H.L. Johnson Elementary School was housed in portables on the campus of Wellington Elementary School in 1984. The school’s permanent campus opened in August 1985 with Walter Murray as its first principal. Just months later, Murray left to open Loxahatchee Groves Elementary School. When it was time to choose a name for the new school, Howard Johnson, a project planner for the school district, submitted his father’s name. H.L. Johnson Sr. was a longtime educator in the county and principal at Melaleuca Elementary School. Built for 764 students, it opened well over capacity. A few years later, H.L. Johnson appeared on the national television show Good Morning America as the largest elementary school in Florida with over 1,700 students. There were 13 kindergarten classes alone. Today there are about 900 students. In 1989, Cypress Trails Elementary School opened in Royal Palm Beach in an effort to ease school overcrowding in the fast-growing community. As growth continued, it soon became obvious that still another elementary school would be needed. In 2002, Royal Palm Beach Elementary School opened. Penny Lopez, now retired, served as its first principal with an enrollment of about 900 students. It was built specifically to alleviate the overcrowding at both H.L. Johnson and Cypress Trails. According to current Principal Suzanne Watson, the school was built in an innovative way through a partnership between the district and the village. The Village of Royal Palm Beach donated part of the land as an interlocal agreement and built the school on a public park site now known as Vivian A. Ferrin Memorial Park. “The deal was that the three softball fields belong to the village, and they have full use of them after school hours and on
weekends,” Watson explained. “We use them during the day, and the community enjoys them when school is not in session.” Watson, who took over as principal in 2006, just loves her job. “The kids and the parents are fantastic,” she said. “We continually exceed the number of volunteer hours needed and have received recognition because of our outstanding volunteers and active Parent Teacher Organization. Royal Palm Beach Elementary School has also been an A-rated school since it opened thanks to our wonderful faculty and staff.” In 1997, the doors of Royal Palm Beach High School opened and students were welcomed by Principal Dr. Brenda Montgomery. The first year there was no senior class because the district allowed those students to remain at Wellington High School to graduate. Lots of controversy surrounded the opening of the village’s first high school, ranging from construction delays to outraged Acreage parents whose children were not assigned to the new school, which opened with only half of the expected enrollment of 2,500. Due to the senior rule, the school opened with grades nine through 11 — a convention that other new district high schools have since adopted — and didn’t have a graduating class until 1999. That first graduating class consisted of only 200 students, but that didn’t stop them from
walking proudly on that day in June, as the first of many graduating classes to come. Montgomery, now Dr. Brenda Magee, left the school a few years later and went on to serve in several senior positions at the school district. And just as Crestwood has a few famous graduates, RPBHS also has its share of celebrities. Graduate Jarrod Saltalamacchia debuted in May 2007 for the Texas Rangers. The catcher certainly made his mark as a student athlete during his years at the school and continues to make his fellow Wildcats proud on the baseball diamond.
Today, as the school district looks to build more area schools, the Village of Royal Palm Beach continues to actively lobby for neighborhood schools in an effort to make sure that future students never need to be bused out of town to get an education. In August 2008, the village was honored by Family Circle magazine as one of the “10 Best Towns for Families.” Chosen from almost 2,000 towns that were submitted, Royal Palm Beach made the list for a number of reasons, chief among them its family-friendly atmosphere and great schools!
(Above) An aerial view of Royal Palm Beach High School under construction. (Below) Superintendent Joan Kowal cuts the ribbon at the school’s dedication ceremony Aug. 17, 1997.
1959 - 2009 • Royal Palm Beach 50th Anniversary Souvenir Magazine • Page 33
Royal Palm Beach History BUSINESS & COMMERCE
“I approached Winn-Dixie, and I approached Publix. Both told me that the village was too small and too slow.” Jess Santamaria on his early efforts to get the large chain supermarkets interested in Royal Palm Beach.
RPB Shopping Grows From Mini-Marts To Mega Stores
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By Barbara Isenberg and Joshua Manning
t was hardly a “shop ’til you drop” experience for Royal Palm Beach’s pioneer residents in the early 1960s. Although an inn, Olympic-size swimming pool and nine-hole golf course provided recreational and social amenities for local residents and guests, getting to the market was quite a trek. SHOPPERS HAD FEW CHOICES, TRAVELED FOR EVERYTHING Prior to the 1962 opening of the village’s first general store, residents were faced with a lengthy drive east to West Palm Beach on a narrow two-lane Southern Blvd. to purchase their basic needs. Okeechobee Blvd. ended at State Road 7 in those days, as did Forest Hill Blvd. In fact, sales brochures for “America’s newest executive retreat” noted, “there’s plenty of shopping, sightseeing and glamour in the neighboring cities of Palm Beach County.” The community’s few residents may have experienced a collective sigh of relief in 1962 when Lloyd and Edith McConnell moved to the village to open Colony Food Market, which featured fresh meats, gro-
ceries, beer, ice cream, ice and dairy products. Located on a site now occupied by the Royal Plaza at the intersection of Royal Palm Beach and Southern boulevards, the convenience store/mini grocery also featured hardware, including electrical and garden supplies as well as tools and fishing tackle. A laundromat and tiny post office were also part of the one-stop shopping complex, and village ladies seeking a fashionable coiffure to withstand the Florida heat could visit a beauty salon next door. But at least one longtime resident recalled that the market’s open overhead doors invited in as many flies as shoppers. “It was like going into a big garage, and there were a lot of flies buzzing around,” recalled Marge Mason, a resident since 1964. “You wouldn’t buy any meat in there.” The late Ellie Hope, who moved to Loxahatchee Groves in 1962 remembers McConnell’s as a “good little place to go for the incidentals. You wouldn’t do a week’s shopping there, and it couldn’t compete with prices at Publix.” Hibiscus Drive resident Betty Naze and her husband Fritz were next-door neighbors to the McConnell family. In a 1999 interview, Naze agreed with Hope that McConnell’s store was better suited to offering fill-in items than a
week’s worth of groceries. “The store was a 7-Eleven type we had for emergencies,” she recalled. Lloyd McConnell, who served as mayor from 1966-68, sold the grocery store and laudromat in 1969. GROWTH SPURS PLANS FOR FIRST SUPERMARKET By 1966, Royal Palm Beach Colony Inc. unveiled a $100 million plan to develop 55,500 acres, which included the village plus vast areas north and west of the community in what is now known as The Acreage. The development plans included extensive national and international promotion of the village and featured complimentary stays at the Royal Inn, meals and rounds of golf for prospective buyers. Soon the village’s streets began to stretch north past the canal at Hibiscus and Camellia drives with the influx of new residents. The demand for better shopping and services was evident. In 1977, the former McConnell’s store property was sold to Jess Santamaria, who moved to the village in 1974 from Philadelphia. The former chemical engineer and Wharton Business School alum had previously worked for Exxon and IBM, but had become involved in real estate before moving to Florida. It was Santamaria who was to build RPB’s first full-fledged shop-
ping center at the southernmost end of Royal Palm Beach Blvd. By early 1978, there were 877 single-family homes and 702 apartment-style residences in the village, according to a “welcome to the village” publication compiled that year by the Homeowners Association of Royal Palm Beach. Santamaria built the Royal Plaza in phases, beginning construction in 1979 and completing the first phase in 1980. The plaza’s second phase, built the following year, included the 21,000square-foot Miller’s Supermarket. “I approached Winn-Dixie, and I
approached Publix,” Santamaria recalled. “Both told me that the village was too small and too slow.” Although the food giants rejected Santamaria’s proposal to become the village’s first supermarket, West Palm Beach grocer Darrell Miller was eventually convinced by Santamaria’s vision of what the growing community would soon be. For seven years, Miller’s served western communities shoppers under the ownership of Miller, followed by Canadians Georges and Aline Trottier and finally under the operation See SHOPPING, page 35
In 1970, the extension of Okeechobee Blvd. to Royal Palm Beach Blvd. paved the way for the development of the village’s northern half... and eventually created a new shopping district.
Early Royal Palm Beach residents got basic supplies at McConnell’s Colony Food Market, the first store to open up in the village.
Page 34 • Royal Palm Beach 50th Anniversary Souvenir Magazine • 1959 - 2009
SHOPPING, from page 34 of Certified Grocers of Ocala, suppliers to V. Richard’s, the store’s name prior to its abrupt closing Oct. 1, 1988. Since the market’s departure, the store space was reconfigured into a flea market, operated for a time as a bingo parlor and more recently a health club. In 1978, Santamaria purchased what is now the Royal Inn, the village’s early hub of social and dining activities. Over the years, Santamaria has expanded the inn’s room capacity and has continued to modernize and improve the facility. The decade of the 1970s drew to a close with a flurry of building activity, which brought other muchneeded services to the village. Fidelity Federal Bank opened a village branch in March 1976 and was followed one year later by a Southeast Bank branch. GROWTH EXPLODES, COMMERCIAL SPACE MUSHROOMS If the 1960s and ’70s were the years of mushrooming residential and commercial growth in the village, then the 1980s could only be characterized as the boom years. By then, the formerly reluctant grocery chain leaders were nearly knocking themselves over to open supermarkets. By the mid-’80s, Winn-Dixie had opened in the Village Royale plaza on the northwest corner of Okeechobee and Royal Palm Beach boulevards. Following a controversial rezoning of an office commercial property across the street on the northeast corner to a general commercial designation, Publix built a store in the Crossroads plaza. Although many residents were eager for the Publix store, some residents, including Santamaria, contended that there was already enough general commercial retail space in the village and the two supermarkets already in the village were sufficient for residents’ needs. Cries of “overcommercialization” began to resound in the village. The Royal Palm Beach Village Council initially turned down the developer’s rezoning application. However, the March 1987 council elections resulted in the ousting of two council members opposed to the project, and the plan was ultimately approved. Santamaria and Wally Sanger, his business partner at the time, were
meanwhile busily creating commercial office and retail space in addition to building homes throughout the village. The final phase of Royal Plaza was completed as well as the addition of Royal Commerce Park, a 38,000-square-foot commercial and light-industrial center located on Royal Commerce Road. The pair also built Royal Plaza North on Okeechobee Blvd. east of Royal Palm Beach Blvd. as well as many of the free-standing professional offices and shops in the neighborhood commercial zone. ANNEXATIONS BRING MORE HOMES, SHOPPING The annexation of the northwest corner of State Road 7 and Southern Blvd. into the village’s boundaries added the Kmart plaza (now the Village Shoppes) to the growing list of retail/commercial properties and on the village’s eastern edge, and John C. Bills Enterprises built the Royal Palm Beach Business Park, an industrial complex off State Road 7 just north of Counterpoint Estates, a neighborhood of 1,000 homes which was annexed into the village Dec. 16, 1988 and added about 3,500 residents in one day. The village now boasts three Publix supermarkets, one Winn-Dixie, one Albertson’s supermarket, and Super Wal-Mart and Super Target stores, each with full supermarkets attached. Professional offices of all kinds provide the village’s 30,000plus residents with medical, legal, insurance, accounting and other services. A multiplex movie theater opened on SR 7 near the Royal Palm Beach Business Park in the late
1990s. The most dramatic change in the village’s commercial base over the past decade has been the emergence of State Road 7 as the shopping hub of the western communities. While the Mall at Wellington Green is located just south of the village, most leading national retailers have chosen Royal Palm Beach’s portion of SR 7 from just
south of Southern Blvd. to just north of Okeechobee Blvd. to establish local outposts. The nation’s leading home improvement stores Lowe’s and Home Depot operate across the street from each other. Nearby are clothing giants such as TJ Maxx/Marshall’s, Old Navy and SteinMart. Two wholesale clubs, BJ’s and Costco, also now have a village presence, as does
Toys ’R Us, Office Depot, Staples and more. Today, some of the older shopping plazas — such as the Village Shoppes, home to Kmart — are even undergoing redevelopment to modernize for the future. It’s a far cry from the 1960s, when residents wanting more than a convenience store had to head east to Military Trail.
Royal Plaza, located at the corner of Royal Palm Beach Blvd. and Southern Blvd., was the village’s first shopping center. It is shown here under construction in March 1981.
The 1980s saw the construction of several shopping centers, including Village Royale at Okeechobee and Royal Palm Beach boulevards.
1959 - 2009 • Royal Palm Beach 50th Anniversary Souvenir Magazine • Page 35
Royal Palm Beach History THE BOOM YEARS
“Without the roads, you had nothing. That killed us. Okeechobee was about the last major east-west road to be widened. With Okeechobee only two lanes, buyers would back out of the deal.” Residential developer Donald Malasky on building during the boom years.
Rapidly Expanding Village Sets U.S. Growth Record By Barbara Isenberg and Joshua Manning
T
he original developers of Royal Palm Beach envisioned a bustling community when they commenced building the village 50 years ago, but even they may have been surprised at the rapid growth rate that made the community America’s fastest growing during the boom years of the 1980s. According to figures released in November 1990 by the U.S. Census Bureau and the international headquarters of Century 21 Real Estate, Royal Palm Beach’s population exploded by a whopping 247 percent in the period of 1980-88, making it the fastest growing small municipality nationwide. Greenacres wasn’t far behind and ranked eighth among the nation’s fastest growing small communities. The study grouped municipalities into three population categories: small (10,000 to 49,999); medium (50,000 to 99,999); and large (100,000 to 499,999). Century 21, headquartered in Irvine, Calif., was the largest real estate sales organization in the world
at the time the study was done. Century 21’s study, not surprisingly, revealed that more than three quarters of the fastest growing communities were located in the Sun Belt states of California, Florida, Arizona and Texas. Although the U.S. Census Bureau conducts a census only once every 10 years at the beginning of a new decade, Royal Palm Beach and Greenacres officials each paid approximately $20,000 for an official interim census of residents. The interim count was done after officials realized that the previous census had not been complete and tallies were inaccurately low, thereby causing a loss of government revenue to both communities. As a result of the interim census, the village received $225,000 in additional revenues, according to former mayor Sam Lamstein. The boom of the 1980s was set up by plans put forward by Royal Palm Beach Colony Inc. in the 1970s. With the 1970 completion of the extension and paving of Okeechobee Blvd. from State Road 7 to Royal Palm Beach Blvd., the village’s growth continued into the northeast sector of the community in the LaMancha subdivision of 1,600 homesites. Many residential builders, in-
cluding Royal Professional Builders, Palm Beach Golf Estates and LaMancha Builders, built homes there. In May 1979, a Colony subsidiary, Epic Associates Ltd., premiered model single-family homes in the Arbors, an 83-home subdivision adjacent to the Indian Trail Country Club golf course. The homes ranged in price from $73,900 to $83,990 and featured cobblestone driveways. Epic also built two of the three phases of Village Walk, an active adult villa community of 88 units located off Royal Palm Beach Blvd., which sold from the high $70,000s to $90,000s. The village continued to expand with the opening of the Willows First Addition subdivision, located east of the Florida Power & Light easement behind where Royal Palm Beach High School is today. Single-family homes initially priced in the $70,000s lured families to the now quickly growing community. Another Colony company, Royal Palm Beach Real Estate Inc., operated a general real estate office at the company’s headquarters in what is now the Harvin Center on Royal Palm Beach Blvd. The firm did brisk business in village and Acreage lot sales. As Royal Palm Beach broke all
growth records, opportunities for entrepreneurs seemed limitless and developers from Florida and beyond flocked to town. One project of condominium and villa-style multi-family homes paired developers from Pennsylvania and Ohio for a joint venture. The Trails at Royal Palm Beach, located off Okeechobee Blvd., was marketed to investors as well as resident buyers. Hoping to cash in on a hot market, investors purchased two-bedroom units priced around $50,000, which in turn were put into a rental pool and offered for annual lease. According to project developer Donald Malasky, he and partner Richard Nernberg were shown available properties in Royal Palm Beach and Wellington. The pair settled on the approximately 15-acre tract in 1980 and broke ground on the project in 1981. Although around 230 units were to be built, Malasky and Nernberg quit after building about 182 condos. Malasky believes he would have been able to finish the project if Okeechobee Blvd. had been widened from I-95 west to the village, an improvement that came several years later. “Without the roads, you had nothing. That killed us. Okeechobee was about the last major
Page 36 • Royal Palm Beach 50th Anniversary Souvenir Magazine • 1959 - 2009
east-west road to be widened. With Okeechobee only two lanes, buyers would back out of the deal,” Malasky recalled when interviewed in the 1990s. With the eastern half of the village quickly being built, attention turned to the area west of Royal Palm Beach Blvd. Levitt Homes, a New York-based builder, commenced its Strathmore Gate and Strathmore Gate West projects of two and three-bedroom villa-style attached residences priced in the $50,000s and $60,000s, which attracted retirees. Indian Trail Villas and Lantern Walk off Royal Palm Beach Blvd. offered additional choices in multi-family dwellings aimed mainly at retirees and “snow birds.” South of H.L. Johnson Elementary School, neighborhoods like Huntington Woods and Royal Pines Estates beckoned young families seeking affordable single-family homes and a nearby school. The entire village was expanding at an astonishing rate — and that was before Royal Palm Beach added 1,000 homes in one day with the Dec. 6, 1988 annexation of Counterpoint Estates, built in several phases by U.S. Homes, Levitt Homes, M/I Homes and Ryan Homes.
1959 - 2009 • Royal Palm Beach 50th Anniversary Souvenir Magazine • Page 37
Royal Palm Beach History A LOCAL LANDMARK
“Because of his dedication both on and off the job, residents and village staff decided to honor him by dedicating the building in his name.” Rob Hill on naming the building in honor of Kevin Harvin, a corrections officer who died at age 24 in a traffic accident.
The Harvin Center: One Old Building’s Unique History By Georgia Jacoviello
T
he Kevin M. Harvin Center is a familiar sight to anyone who regularly drives along Royal Palm Beach Blvd. Longtime village residents have seen the many changes that have occurred at the site over the years, both inside and out. The building, constructed in 1969, was originally used as a sales center for early community developer Royal Palm Beach Colony Inc. In 1983, the company donated the land to the Village of Royal Palm Beach, and village officials signed a ten-year lease with the county, offering the land for a small public library branch. When a larger public library branch was completed on Civic Center Way in 1994, then-mayor Tony Masilotti favored using the facility as a community service center. With state, county and federal funding, along with free manpower provided by the Florida Department of Corrections, the Village of Royal Palm Beach began the process of giving residents a place to go for help. The building was renovated under the direction of longtime village employee Rob Hill in 1996 at a cost of about $265,000, most of it grant money. Hill, now RPB’s director of community development, said it was possible as long as the village promised to use it to house community service groups. “We gutted it and created a custom build-out to meet the requirements for the YWCA and the Head Start programs,” Hill said. “We thought it was very necessary to be able to offer our residents services that were much needed in the community on all levels. We wanted to do all we could to improve the quality of life for our senior citizens and children.” The project gained national attention at the time due to the creativity of the partnerships. “Using this approach, we were not only able to improve village
services, but also to reduce costs with the cooperation of our government, village employees and our residents,” Hill said. “It was a lot of work done with a lot of heart.” Hill said one of the first projects the village undertook in the newly renovated center was to draft some senior volunteers to organize the village’s records using the second floor space. “They were quite good at getting such a tedious job done,” Hill said. “And I think they really enjoyed helping the village staff. I know we all appreciated their hard work.” Parks & Recreation Director Lou Recchio said that after the renovations were complete, the building became home to many different clubs, organizations and community help programs, such as Women, Infants & Children, Jewish Family Services and the Coalition for Independent Living. The YWCA and the Head Start programs, which provide child development while meeting the daycare needs of qualified families at minimal cost or free of charge, allows low-income families to go to work knowing their children are safe. Those programs are still located on the building’s lower level, but the senior center, which offers daily meals for the elderly as well as a “Meals-on-Wheels” program for shut-ins, recently moved to the Royal Palm Beach Cultural Center. “We now plan to do some minor renovations and use the upstairs area to rent out to clubs for meetings and the community for parties and other various events,” Recchio said. The venue housed many important programs over the years but did not have a name until February 1998 when it was christened the Kevin M. Harvin Center, after a Department of Corrections employee who died at the young age of 24 in a tragic automobile accident three years earlier. Harvin and his parents Remar, then director of the Palm Beach County Department of Housing &
(Above) The building, once Royal Palm Beach Colony Inc.’s sales center, as it appeared before Royal Palm Beach’s 1996 renovation. (Below) The Kevin M. Harvin Center as it appears today.
Community Development, and Anne worked tirelessly to improve the quality of life for children and senior citizens in the village, and community officials felt having Harvin’s name on the new center
fit well with the many family-oriented services it was designed to offer. “Officer Harvin also supervised the inmate crew from the Loxahatchee Road Prison that did much
Page 38 • Royal Palm Beach 50th Anniversary Souvenir Magazine • 1959 - 2009
of the work on the center,” Hill added. “Because of his dedication both on and off the job, residents and village staff decided to honor him by dedicating the building in his name.”
Royal Palm Beach History A LAST LOOK BACK
One Final Glimpse At Royal Palm Beach’s Early Days
W
hen we finished putting together the history sections for this special 50th anniversary magazine, we found more fascinating images than we could possibly publish. Before we turn the page to look at Royal Palm Beach today, here’s one final look back at the early days...
(Above) Royal Palm Beach’s two founding fathers, Arthur Desser (left) of Lefcourt Realty and Sam Friedland of Royal Palm Beach Colony. (Below) Members of the first Junior Police Patrol stand in front of village hall. (Back row, L-R) Roger Levesque, Todd Stacey, Bill Kachman, Billy Persson and Ricky Vera; (front) Don Persson and Ceslie Adams, daughter of TV star Don Adams.
(Above) Early marketing brochures invite buyers to “enjoy Florida... the carefree way” and visit “Royal Palm Beach: The City Planned for Florida Living.” (Left) This 1960 advertisement from the Lake Worth Herald promises “dramatic new homes for only $200 down.” (Left) The village newsletter from November 1962 announces the near completion of the village’s first golf course. The Mark Mahannah-designed course eventually came to be known as the Tradition Golf Course. It is currently being redeveloped by the village into a large park. (Below) This vintage patch shows the old village logo.
1959 - 2009 • Royal Palm Beach 50th Anniversary Souvenir Magazine • Page 39
Page 40 • Royal Palm Beach 50th Anniversary Souvenir Magazine • 1959 - 2009
Royal Palm Beach Today FACTS & FIGURES
Useful Reference Information About The Village Today
T
he Village of Royal Palm Beach was legally incorporated June 30, 1959. It has a council-manager form of government. The mayor is elected by the voters, as are four council members. The council selects a vice mayor annually.
FIRE/RESCUE In 1999, the Royal Palm Beach Fire Department was merged into Palm Beach County Fire-Rescue. There are two stations inside the village: Station #28, located just south of Okeechobee Blvd. on Royal Palm Beach Blvd. (790-6105), and Station #29, located at State Road 7 and Belvedere Road inside Counterpoint Estates (790-6067). They responded to 3,339 calls last year. The stations are run by Battalion Chief Nigel Baker (790-6101, ext. 2).
ROADS & UTILITIES There are 120 miles of streets within the Village of Royal Palm Beach. Palm Beach County Water Utilities provides water and sewer service within the village.
POLICE In October 2006, the Royal Palm Beach Police Department was merged into the Palm Beach County Sheriff’s Office and became PBSO District 9. The District 9 office is located at 11498 Okeechobee Blvd. It is run by Capt. Eric Coleman. The main switchboard is (561) 790-5180.
www.royalpalmbeach.com
ELECTED OFFICIALS The current village council includes: Mayor David Lodwick — Elected to the council in 1994, he was appointed mayor in November 1998 after the election of Tony Masilotti to the County Commission and elected to the position in March 1999. He works in insurance. Vice Mayor Matty Mattioli — Elected to the council in 1994, he resigned to run for mayor in March 1999 but was reappointed to the position in April 1999. He works in real estate. Councilman Fred Pinto — Elected to the council in March 2003 to fill an open seat vacated by the retirement of Vivian Ferrin. He is a corporate businessman/manager. Councilman David Swift — First elected to the council in 1988, he served until 1990. He served on the council again from 1991 to 1993. His current time on the council started in 1994. He works for the South Florida Water Management District. Councilwoman Martha Webster — First living in the Village of Royal Palm Beach from 1979 to 1981, she and her family returned to the village in 1998. She was elected to the council in January 2008.
David Farber
recent annexations have blurred the borders somewhat, the general boundary lines are: State Road 7 to the east; 40th Street North to the north; Folsom Road to the west; and Southern Blvd. to the south. Neighboring communities include: Wellington, suburban West Palm Beach, Loxahatchee Groves and The Acreage.
The Seal of the Village of Royal Palm Beach
VILLAGE MANAGER The current village manager of Royal Palm Beach is David Farber. Formerly village manager for the City of Greenacres, Farber was hired by the council in 1995. He is responsible for running all the day-to-day operations for the Village of Royal Palm Beach. The village offices are located at 1050 Royal Palm Beach Blvd. Main phone number: 7905100.
POPULATION The population of the Village of Royal Palm Beach as of the 2000 census was 21,523 living in 8,083 housing units, with a median age of 37. In 2008, the population was estimated at 31,567 residents living in 12,430 housing units. The average household income is $68,175. The population is up from 15,532 in 1990 and 3,423 in 1980. There are 21,490 registered voters. GEOGRAPHY The Village of Royal Palm Beach encompasses 11.3 square miles wholly within Palm Beach County, Florida. Although
VILLAGE BUDGET For the 2008-09 Fiscal Year, the Village of Royal Palm Beach has a total budget of $64,473,045. Of that money, $21,773,206 is in the General Fund, used for day-to-day operations. A total of $4,871,687 was raised from ad valorem taxes on property. This represents a millage rate of $1.9700 per $1,000 of assessed value. Royal Palm Beach has an estimated taxable property value of $2.6 billion. VILLAGE STAFF The Village of Royal Palm Beach is staffed by 130 fulltime and part-time employees. OTHER REPRESENTATIVES The Village of Royal Palm Beach is represented by Sen. Bill Nelson (561-514-0189) and Sen. Mel Martinez (407254-2573) in the United States Senate; Rep. Tom Rooney (202-225-5792), Rep. Alcee Hastings (561-684-0565) and Rep. Ron Klein (561-651-7594) in the United States House of Representatives; Rep. Mark Pafford (561-682-0156) in the Florida State House; Sen. Ken Pruitt (561-747-1166) and Sen. Jeff Atwater (561-625-5101) in the Florida State Senate; Commissioner Jess Santamaria (561-355-6300) on the Palm Beach County Commission; and Dr. Sandra Richmond (561-434-8000) on the Palm Beach County School Board. SCHOOLS Royal Palm Beach is served by five public schools: Crestwood Middle School, 64 Sparrow Drive, 753-5000. There are 1,261 students at the school. The school opened in 1983. The principal is Stephanie Nance. Cypress Trails Elementary School, 133 Park Road North, 904-9000. Built in 1989, the school has 879 students. The principal is Gale Fulford. H.L. Johnson Elementary School, 1000 Crestwood Blvd., 904-9300. There are 920 students at the school. The school opened in 1984. The principal is Sharon Hench. Royal Palm Beach Elementary School, 11911 Okeechobee Blvd., 784-4140. There are 775 students at the school, which opened in 2002. The principal is Suzanne Watson. Royal Palm Beach High School, 10600 Okeechobee Blvd., 753-4000. Completed in 1997, the school currently has 2,235 students. The principal is Guarn Sims.
LIBRARY The Royal Palm Beach branch of the Palm Beach County Library System is located at 500 Civic Center Way, 7906030. Open six days a week, closed Sunday. The original branch opened in 1983 on Royal Palm Beach Blvd. It moved to the current 8,000-square-foot location in 1994. The library is currently closed temporarily for a major expansion project. PARKS & RECREATION The Royal Palm Beach Recreation Department, located at 100 Sweet Bay Lane, off Sparrow Drive (790-5124), offers over 200 programs serving more than 3,000 children. The department also runs 140 acres of parks and green spaces including the Royal Palm Beach Cultural Center (7905149). A girls softball complex opened in 2002. Veterans Park on Royal Palm Beach Blvd. near Sparrow Drive was completed in 2003. Royal Palm Beach is also home to one large county park, Seminole Palms Park, located off Southern Blvd. at Lamstein Lane. That park has several ball fields and the Calypso Bay Waterpark. There are 36 acres of undeveloped recreation space. In 2005, the village purchased the 159 acres of the former Tradition Golf Course and is working to develop a large new park project on the land. PUBLIC TRANSPORTATION Royal Palm Beach is served by several Palm Tran buses. For more information about the Palm Tran busing system, call 841-4BUS. BUSINESS & COMMERCE There are 688 acres of commercial zoning and 346 acres of industrial zoning in the village. There are more than 1,400 licensed businesses located in the village. Major shopping plazas include: Royal Plaza, Crestwood Square, Albertson’s Center, the Village Shoppes, the Target Center, Western Plaza, Royal Plaza North, Crossroads shopping center, Village Royale shopping center, Waterway Plaza, the Regal Center, the Commons at Royal Palm Beach, Coral Sky Plaza, Lowe’s Plaza, Wal-Mart/Sawgrass Plaza, Bellgate Plaza, Cypress Key and Southern Palm Crossing.
1959 - 2009 • Royal Palm Beach 50th Anniversary Souvenir Magazine • Page 41
Royal Palm Beach Today VILLAGE DIRECTORY
Royal Palm Beach Departments And Phone Numbers ADMINISTRATION 1050 Royal Palm Beach Blvd., RPB, FL 33411 (561) 790-5100 Main Number - Fax: (561) 790-5174 CLERK’S OFFICE 790-5102 Diane DiSanto, Village Clerk 790-5100 Robin Cronk, Secretary 790-5101 Jacqueline Shimhue-Davy, Secretary MANAGER’S OFFICE David Farber, Village Manager 790-5103 Kathleen Drahos, Executive Secretary Fax: 791-7087 COMMUNITY DEVELOPMENT 1050 Royal Palm Beach Blvd., RPB 790-5128 Main Number - Fax: 790-5129 Josephine Melnick, Permit Technician 790-5144 Inspections (Automated) 790-5183 Stephanie Langston, Building Secretary 790-5108 Robert Hill, Director of Community Development 790-1242 Todd Wax, Building Code Administrator 790-5178 Linda Morris, Business Tax Receipts Data Entry Clerk CODE ENFORCEMENT 790-5138 Lou Hosford, Secretary 790-5139 Lynda Walker, Code Enforcement Supervisor 790-5142 Gail McClain, Code Enforcement Inspector 790-5134 Maryanne Beam, Code Enforcement Inspector 790-7094 Denna Foley, Code Enforcement CULTURAL CENTER 151 Civic Center Way, RPB 790-5149 Main Number - Fax: 753-1138 Carlos Morales, Facility Supervisor Beverly Atkins, Secretary INFORMATION SERVICES 790-7078 Marina Quintero, IS Manager 790-5143 Randy Brown, IS Specialist 790-5176 Ralph DiGiacomo, IS Specialist
FINANCE DEPARTMENT 1050 Royal Palm Beach Blvd., Fax: 790-5174 790-5112 Stanley Hochman, Finance Director 790-5111 Stephanie Wulff, Accounts Payable 790-5113 Lori Padgett, Finance Analyst 790-5194 Judy Espey, Purchasing Specialist 790-5195 Peggye Kujanpaa, Assistant Finance Director 790-5117 Rookmin Ramsaran, Payroll Specialist HUMAN RESOURCES 790-5116 Monika Bowles, Director 790-5120 Pat Steinborn, Secretary PALM BEACH COUNTY FIRE-RESCUE Station #28 (Battalion Command) 1040 Royal Palm Beach Blvd., RPB 790-6105 Main Number (Dial 911 for emergencies) Fax: 790-6104 Nigel Baker, Battalion Chief Station #29 (Counterpoint Station) 10055 Belvedere Road, RPB 790-6067 Main Number PARKS & RECREATION 100 Sweet Bay Lane, RPB 790-5124 Main Number - Fax: 791-7079 Eva Hernandez, Secretary 753-1228 Lou Recchio, Director 753-1241 Jo Ann Rowe, Assistant Recreation Director 790-5125 Sheryl Sawyer, Program Supervisor 790-5198 Mike Mikolaichik, Program Supervisor
ELECTED OFFICIALS Elected officials can be reached at 790-5100 MAYOR DAVID LODWICK VICE MAYOR MATTY MATTIOLI COUNCILMAN FRED PINTO COUNCILMAN DAVID SWIFT COUNCILWOMAN MARTHA WEBSTER
Page 42 • Royal Palm Beach 50th Anniversary Souvenir Magazine • 1959 - 2009
PARKS DEPARTMENT 10996 Okeechobee Blvd., RPB 790-3408 Connie Foster, Parks Supervisor 790-3844 Greg Dockery PLANNING & ENGINEERING DEPARTMENT 1050 Royal Palm Beach Blvd., Fax: 790-5174 790-5162 Ray Liggins, Asst. Village Manager/Village Engineer 790-5103 Kathleen Drahos, Executive Secretary 790-5161 Chris Marsh, Project Manager 790-5121 Winston Blake, Construction Coordinator 790-2612 Jeff Sullivan, GIS Coordinator 790-5163 Brett Johnson, Project Engineer 790-5131 Chris Wax, Planning Secretary 753-1233 Kevin Erwin, Development Review Coordinator 753-1120 Bradford O’Brien, Senior Planner PUBLIC SAFETY Palm Beach County Sheriff’s Office Royal Palm Beach Substation (District 9) 11498 Okeechobee Blvd. Royal Palm Beach, FL 33411 904-8250 Administration 904-8272 Captain Eric Coleman 904-8284 Candi Price, Administrative Assistant to Capt. Coleman 904-8251 Lieutenant David Combs 904-8252 Records 904-8241 Diane Smith, Community Affairs 790-5180 Dispatch PUBLIC WORKS 10996 Okeechobee Blvd., RPB 790-5123 Paul Webster, Director Fax: 791-7075 790-5122 Carol Saunders, Secretary 790-5158 Mechanic Shop 790-5199 Supervisor’s Office/Roads and Bridges 753-1226 Facilities Superintendent WATER & WASTEWATER UTILITIES Now run by Palm Beach County Water Utilities Call Customer Service at 790-4600
1959 - 2009 • Royal Palm Beach 50th Anniversary Souvenir Magazine • Page 43
Royal Palm Beach Today COMMUNITY PARKS
Major New Royal Palm Beach Park Project Underway
R
oyal Palm Beach is home to an impressive array of parks. The community has one of the highest parkland-per-capita ratios in South Florida. In recent years, the village has built the Vivian A. Ferrin Memorial Park girls softball complex and the Veterans Park facility along Royal Palm Beach Blvd. Planning is underway for a major new park facility on the site of the old Tradition Golf Course to be called Royal Palm Beach Commons.
• Bob Marcello Baseball Complex at Willows Park (20.3 acres), Okeechobee Blvd.: Eight lighted baseball fields, basketball court, two lighted tennis courts, three restrooms, four concession facilities, two tot lots, jogging trail and three pavilions. • Bobbie Jo Lauter Park (2.2 acres), Sandpiper Ave.: Paved walkways, two picnic pavilions, a playscape, benches and bike racks. • Camellia Park (10 acres), Camellia Park Drive: Three softball fields (one lighted), six tennis courts, tot lot, pavilion, restroom
facilities, four bocce ball courts and one sand volleyball court. • Crestwood Park (4.5 acres), Madison Green: Paved walking path, two picnic pavilions with seating for 16 each, two basketball courts and a dog park divided for large and small dogs. • Earth Day Park (1.5 acres), Riviera Ave.: Passive park with large pavilion and park benches. • Grandview Linear Park (2.0 acres), Grandview Way: Park benches and walkway. • Homeplace Park (1.6 acres): T-ball field, picnic pavilion, fishing dock, dog park, playscape and one basketball court. • H.L. Johnson Park (8 acres), Royal Palm Beach Blvd.: Exercise/nature trail and park benches. • Lakeside Challenger Park (4.8 acres), Royal Palm Beach Blvd.: Passive park with a gazebo, fishing dock, restroom facility and park benches. • Lindsay Ewing Park (3 acres), Linnet Lane: One cricket field, one multipurpose field and a restroom/ pavilion facility. • Moonlight Park (.56 acres), Moonlight Way: Playscape, gazebo with picnic tables and park benches. • Penzance Park (.5 acre), Pen-
zance Lane: Tot lot, park benches and fishing dock. • Pippin Park (1.9 acres), Pippin Lane: One sand volleyball court, picnic pavilion, playground equipment and fishing dock. • Preservation Park (65 acres), 100 Sweet Bay Lane: 33,000square-foot recreation center with a gymnasium, seven multi-purpose rooms and a weight room. Preservation Park also contains a lighted roller-hockey rink, remote-control car racetrack, six lighted soccer/ football fields with a concession, playground equipment, four lighted basketball courts, a walkway, bike trail and small pavilion just south of the recreation center. • Royal Palm Beach Cultural Center (7.5 acres), 151 Civic Center Way: 10,000-square-foot building with a large auditorium, including staging areas and multipurpose rooms. • Todd A. Robiner Park (6 acres), Las Palmas Ave.: A tot lot, four sand volleyball courts, two basketball courts, picnic pavilion, restroom facility with an outside shower, fishing dock and the “Bark Park” dog park. • Veterans Park (5.7 acres), Royal Palm Beach Blvd.: Playscape and swings, interactive fountain, cafe, market building, amphi-
The 33,000-square-foot Royal Palm Beach Recreation Center, which opened in 1994, is located in Preservation Park on Sweet Bay Lane. theatre, walking trail, waterfall, two picnic pavilions with grills and seating for 50 each, eight gazebos with seating for 16 each, bocce court, outdoor classroom and two restroom facilities. • Village Hall Park (16.5 acres): Civic buildings and exercise course. • Vivian A. Ferrin Memorial Park (7.5 acres), Okeechobee
Page 44 • Royal Palm Beach 50th Anniversary Souvenir Magazine • 1959 - 2009
Blvd. at Folsom Road: A threefield lighted softball complex with a restroom/concession facility and a walking trail. • Westland Trail (8 acres), Crestwood Blvd.: Located on the east side of Crestwood Blvd. between Okeechobee and Southern boulevards, the quarter-mile jogging trail includes a boardwalk, picnic pavilion and barbecue grill.
1959 - 2009 • Royal Palm Beach 50th Anniversary Souvenir Magazine • Page 45
Royal Palm Beach Tomorrow PREDICTING THE FUTURE
“Our focus has been essentially to make Royal Palm Beach a better Royal Palm Beach, and we’re not going to try to be anything else.” Mayor David Lodwick on the village’s future.
Mayor David Lodwick
Focus Will Be On Getting Better, Not Bigger
I
don’t see any big changes for the future of Royal Palm Beach. We will continue to improve on what we have — a great, family-oriented community.
Mayor David Lodwick
With the village almost built out, we’re not going to grow any bigger. I expect we will remain about the same size. Since I don’t see us
doing more annexation in the future, our focus will be on getting better, not bigger. We will continue to make improvements to our road system and continue to work with the county and the cities around us to make sure that the rest of the county develops in a way that’s friendly to our village. I think people will continue to see the merits of Royal Palm Beach as
a great place to raise a family, and buy older homes and fix them up. We will continue to maintain our great parks and schools, and Royal Palm Beach will remain a great place to either raise a family or retire. We are a community for middle-income families and will remain so. Certainly, many things have changed over the last 50 years. When you try to look at the next 50
years, none of us would have dreamed about the impact of the Internet or that people would be able to work at home. Over the last ten years, our focus has been essentially to make Royal Palm Beach a better Royal Palm Beach, and we’re not going to try to be anything else. We just want to be the best that we can be, and I think that will carry through as we continue forward.
Vice Mayor Matty Mattioli
More Amenities Without Raising Taxes
I
heard about Royal Palm Beach, so I came to Florida and found a nice, quiet town. It reminded me of Mayberry. I never really liked the big metropolitan areas, and Royal Palm Beach was like the small town where I was raised. I moved here 29 years ago from Pennsylvania.
The availability of open spaces will decrease once the population reaches 35,000 people and the town gets built out, but I don’t see any mass annexations. Therefore, there won’t be much change after RPB is built out. Population will definitely grow, and there will be slightly less vast open space. What the Royal Palm Beach Village Council is doing now is encouraging builders to build fewer houses on the same amount
of land. While we can’t stop people from building, we can ask them to reduce the density in order to keep the small community feel. Another thing Royal Palm Beach has succeeded in is its attempt to keep commercialization restricted to the outer perimeters, reducing inner density. We fought hard to have the Western Parkway built. I will continue to fight, even in the courts, to have Roebuck Road extended and insist that the City of West Palm
Beach live up to its agreement of many years ago. I will continue to offer to the residents all the amenities possible without raising taxes, especially the development of Royal Palm Beach Commons Park, formerly the Tradition Golf Course. This will provide many recreational facilities not found anywhere else in the area. Infrastructure contracts should be let very soon and construction should begin this summer.
Vice Mayor Matty Mattioli
Councilman Fred Pinto
I
Still A Great Place To Raise Your Family
t is very difficult to project what the Village of Royal Palm Beach will be like by the time its 100th anniversary arrives in 2059. Perhaps a good starting point is to look at the village today, as others see it from the outside.
Councilman Fred Pinto
In 2008, the Village of Royal Palm Beach was selected by Family Circle magazine as one of the ten best towns for families, according to their national survey. Their announcement stated that Royal Palm
Beach made its annual list for the best places to live and raise kids in a survey of 1,850 communities with populations between 15,000 and 150,000 people. The magazine ranked the towns based on their schools, affordable homes and “green” initiatives. Royal Palm Beach received recognition for choosing to build a park instead of homes on the old Tradition Golf Course. The village bought the course, renamed it Royal Palm Beach Commons Park, and developed a plan that features a lake for fishing, kayaking and a special golf course for beginning golfers
and a youth golf academy. This project will take several years to complete and require third-party partnerships. The Village Commons initiative, along with the completion for Roebuck Road, the connection of the State Road 7 extension to Northlake Blvd., and the final buildout of Royal Palm Beach will usher in the first ten of the next 50 years. Although the process of controlling growth may continue to be a theme of future elected officials, there will be growth in the surrounding areas of the village. The many outcomes that will result from this growth will be
the potential of an Okeechobee Blvd./State Road 7 overpass being built some time between 2028 and 2035. The availability of water will become a big issue for everyone across Florida as part of the growth management debate that may require some expensive solutions. Over the next 50 years, I believe Royal Palm Beach will make some key contributions to several professions, producing ten Major League Baseball players, 12 medical doctors, six LPGA professionals, four PGA professionals, five National Football League players and 250 lawyers!
Councilwoman Martha Webster
F
Our Diversity Will Remain Our Strength
ifty years after the incorporation of Royal Palm Beach, the village has transformed itself from a leisurely snowbird golf gathering into a thriving family-centered community recently recognized by Family Circle magazine as one of the “10 Best Towns for Families.” Fortunately, many of the initial part-time residents are still an important part of our lifestyle, contrib-
uting an energy that sets the pace for many younger families and single residents. We are diverse in age, race, philosophy, religion, politics and education. Our housing has gotten larger and perhaps closer, our roads busier and connecting in all directions, business and services are also closer and more varied. So where shall we be in 50 more years? The future Royal Palm Beach should strive to retain its unique brand, putting both the identity and needs of its citizens at the forefront of all its planning activities. I would
like to envision a revitalization of our housing stock. Royal Palm Beach has in its original areas wellsized lots with unique custom homes that are prime palates for creative renovators. A diverse network of active and passive parks has been built with waterways and pedestrian/bike trails that will connect centers of activity such as government, recreation and business areas. The continued coordination of different modes of transportation and concentric planning will assist in expanding mass transit systems, reducing the need
for transecting roads through neighborhoods, and the encouragement of neighborhood enclaves increasing community safety and integrity. The village has been a good steward of its finances and infrastructure. A quality future depends on remaining fiscally prudent. What does this vision not include? Overhead wires! Happy 50th birthday to all the residents of Royal Palm Beach, wishing the best to young and old who choose to live and grow with us.
Page 46 • Royal Palm Beach 50th Anniversary Souvenir Magazine • 1959 - 2009
Councilwoman Martha Webster
1959 - 2009 • Royal Palm Beach 50th Anniversary Souvenir Magazine • Page 47
Royal Palm Beach Tomorrow PREDICTING THE FUTURE
“We will only become bigger and better with time. I can’t wait to see how our town progresses as time flies by.” Royal Palm Beach High School Class of 2009 valedictorian Lauren Vivar on the future of the village.
RPBHS Students Ponder What’s In Store For The Village By Kristina Webb
A
s they received their diplomas on May 18, Royal Palm Beach High School’s Class of 2009 had more than their own futures in mind. The 50th anniversary of the village was just around the corner, which led many students to speculate on where the village might be headed over the next 50 years. After living in Royal Palm Beach for five years, Erin Guzik believes the village will continue to grow at an ever-increasing rate. “I think we’re growing and expanding, and I think it’s a beautiful place as it is, so it’s only going to get prettier,” Guzik said. “It is growing, and you can see all the new developments, and I think it’s still going to be very oriented toward children with the parks.” The newly minted graduates agreed that the village will remain a great place to raise children and will continue to expand the parks and recreation programs that have made Royal Palm Beach so welcoming to families. Matt Richardson believes that with an influx of more young families into the village, there will also be more family-owned businesses. “It’s really a nice town to live in and grow up in and raise a family,” Richardson said. “There are always opportunities out there for other businesses, small family-owned businesses. That’s what we need.” Katie Nadau is heading to nursing school at Palm Beach Community College, and having grown up in Royal Palm Beach, she knows that the village has had its struggles as well. Nadau said that Royal Palm Beach High School has seen some trouble, but with “a set principal and set rules” it can achieve great things. When asked about the village in
50 years, Nadau said, “I really think it will get better with time.” Annarose Dellatto, best friends with Nadau, agreed that Royal Palm Beach will continue to expand. Both she and Nadau have lived in the village their entire lives. “In 50 years, I think it’s going to be really crowded, and it’s going to be like New York City eventually,” Dellatto said. “Have you seen all the construction?” Tyler Smith will be attending Methodist University in North Carolina to study history. “Royal Palm Beach will become an elite place to live, with high-priced houses,” he predicted. “We already have very high-priced everything around here. Seeing how basically all the land around us is getting developed, I’m pretty sure everything around here will have some kind of building on every corner.” But Smith also anticipates that Royal Palm Beach will continue to add on to the many existing parks to continue to appeal to families. “If we have more kids living around here, I’m sure they’ll expand more parks and get more kids active,” he said. Stephanie Lopez has been accepted to the prestigious Florida Atlantic University Harriet L. Wilkes Honors College, where she will study international relations. Lopez has lived in Royal Palm Beach for 14 years and enjoyed her time at Royal Palm Beach High School. “The good thing about Royal Palm Beach is that it’s really tight knit; everybody knows everybody, so it’s like a little family,” she said. Lopez agrees with the other students that the village will continue to get larger, but cautioned that the future can be unpredictable. “It’s going to be very unpredictable,” she said, “because I can remember years ago when Southern was complete construction. I’ve seen [State Road 7] expand. I’ve seen Southern turn into an I-95… It’s unpredictable,
really; I can’t imagine it.” Royal Palm Beach High School’s valedictorian for the Class of 2009 is Lauren Vivar. Vivar, who will attend the University of Florida to study elementary education, is another graduate who has lived in the village her entire life and has seen the many changes that have come about in just the past decade. “I’ve grown up in what used to be a small town but now continues to grow,” Vivar said. “I still remember when Southern was a two-lane road. Now we have flyovers.” Vivar said that she looks forward to what the future holds for the village. “In 50 years, I see even more industrialization in Royal Palm Beach,” she said. “We will only become bigger and better with time. I can’t wait to see how our town progresses as time flies by.” Bigger can be beautiful, said Vivar’s close friend Elaine Sayre. “I believe the Village of Royal Palm Beach will be expanding ever more with shops and homes, but will become more beautiful at the same time,” said Sayre, who will miss her home when she heads off to college. “The village is lively with concerts, holiday activities, family activities and new shops, which make the village family-centered and not distanced and cold like other places can seem. I see the village to be just as lively and familyfriendly, if not more vivacious, in another 50 years.” Sayre, like many of her peers, clearly remembers a time when the village was much smaller, and throughout her life has seen it grow. “I was here when there was no Super Wal-Mart, Super Target was a regular Target across the street from Kmart, there was no Royal Palm Beach High School or Royal Palm Beach Elementary School, there was no Southern overpass, no Madison Green, and [State Road 7] was not a five-lane street. The village has been expanding slowly but surely,
(Above) Seventeenyear-old Elaine Sayre stands in front of a mural of Royal Palm Beach High School’s mascot. Sayre will be graduating with the Class of 2010 and is looking forward to her final year at RPBHS. (Left) Annarose Dellatto (lef t) and Katie Nadau, both 18, have been friends for eight years, and both have lived in Royal Palm Beach for their entire lives. and I feel it will continue to be growing.” With all the expansion, Sayre is looking forward to the artistic growth of the village as well. “While it’s growing, detail and expression will be expanding as well,” she said. “Look at the newer neighborhoods: Madison Green, Bella Terra and PortoSol. They are brand new, but made so beautifully. Their entrances are attractive and make outsiders and locals want to fulfill their curiosity and desire to see the place, and maybe even purchase a home.” As new families begin to move in, Sayre expects that there will be
many new additions to the village’s wide array of family-friendly options. “They added on to village hall, and now people sit out by the lake and enjoy the scenery,” she said. “Playful children and watchful mothers spend their afternoons and weekdays at Veterans Park, running around on the playground, having parties in the pavilions and splashing in the fountains.” Sayre sees great things for the future for Royal Palm Beach. “The village has been expanding the 20 years I’ve known it; why would it not keep expanding?” she said. “We will have more growth, but it will be grand and inviting.”
OUR FUTURE... Royal Palm Beach High School’s Class Of 2009
Page 48 • Royal Palm Beach 50th Anniversary Souvenir Magazine • 1959 - 2009
IMAGE COURTESY BOB KNIGHT PHOTO
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