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Looking Back: More classic photos, postcards and ads from Naples

Now it's Riverside Park. Back in 1959, the postmark date of this postcard sent to friends back in Fredonia, N.Y., it was Imperial River Court in downtown Bonita Springs. The Liles Hotel, bottom left, has been rescued and refurbished as a civic meeting place.

Courtesy Dorothy Dronkers

Now it's Riverside Park. Back in 1959, the postmark date of this postcard sent to friends back in Fredonia, N.Y., it was Imperial River Court in downtown Bonita Springs. The Liles Hotel, bottom left, has been rescued and refurbished as a civic meeting place.

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  • The Stewart Motel, also known as the Royal Palm Motel, at First Avenue North in Naples gave way to Enterprise Office Center, a complex of condos, shops and offices. A Daily News reader provided the photograph. Readers with local memorabilia to share are encouraged to upload photos, videos and stories at naplesnews.com/participate.
  • Motel Stewart, 70 N. Tamiami Trail, was owned and operated by Ethel and Art Arvigo. A Daily News reader provided this postcard, dated 1977, when the in-season room rate was $25 per day and the courtyard pool seems to have been frequented by fashion models.
  • This is the Isles of Capri Marina and Motel, circa 1960s. Dick and Kay Larson of East Naples owned and operated it from 1962 to 1966. It would evolve into Jim & Eydie’s restaurant, taking over the gas station and beer/bait shop at right, later Backwater Nick’s restaurant.
  • Isles of Capri Marina and Motel owner Dick Larson, left, in this May 1963 fishing photo, with Waldo Morgan, center, who built the hotel-marina, and friend Bob Carter. They caught those snook off the beach at Coconut Island in less than an hour using live shrimp as bait.
  • Nice catch. Can you guess the name of the boy in this 1956 photo? He is former Bonita Springs Fire Chief Dan Gourley, then age 5. This 350-pound goliath grouper was caught using a mullet as bait off Bonita Beach. Gourley says the massive fish was caught off the beach and hauled to what is now called Riverside Park by Rehard's wrecker service. In the photo is Gourley's late father and mother, Wendell and Ellen. FYI, the bridge in the background is what today separates the park from the upcoming Imperial Landing project downtown. The bridge spans the Imperial River at Old 41 Road — at the time known as U.S. 41. Photo courtesy Dan Gourley and the Bonita Springs Historical Society.
  • Let's go to the beach — and get some shade from the rays! This is how it was done at the Naples Pier in the early days of Naples, according to a 1950 postcard shared by Paul Stevens.
  • Here is a seldom-seen scene from Naples' olden days. The post card, shared by Paul Stevens of Naples, shows the Bayshore Hotel, looking west from today's Naples City Dock at 12th Avenue South. The hotel opened in 1921 and burned down in 1934. The city water tower came down in the 1960s. The water tower in the background belonged to the Naples Hotel, where the Plaza on Third Street is today. The Dock restaurant would be at center, right.
  • The postcard is undated, but it looks at least 50 years old. The scene is the Rexall Store, were Naples Fifth Avenue Pharmacy operated at Fifth and Eighth Street, a block west of U.S. 41, until 2006. Now, it's Rossopomodoro Italian restaurant.
  • Golden Lion Inn — Longtime Collier County resident and history buff Alvin Lederer shares this undated postcard of the Golden Lion Inn. 'It was the Holiday Inn in the Everglades,' he writes. 'Now the National Park Service uses it as a rangers headquarters. During the days of pot smuggling, the Golden Lion was a busy place with DEA agents in three-piece suits trying to catch locals selling their haul in the lounge. I am told it was quite comical.'
  • It wasn't that long ago, but Muldoon's pizza parlors have faded from local memory. The sign on the front of the Fourth Avenue South shop at left says Muldoon's opened here in 1972. No such clues are on the location at right along U.S. 41 East at the Lely Shopping Center. The shops lasted about 20 years. The downtown Naples site now is Ciao restaurant and the Lely site is a Quiznos.
  • The last of Naples' fabled concrete street markers as it appeared until 2003 at the former home of Preston and Margaret Tuttle. Street markers, as they were called in the late 1940s, once lined the streets and avenues of Naples. According to Doris Reynolds' book, 'When Peacocks Were Roasted and Mullet Was Fried,' there would be many 'firsts' for Margaret Tuttle. In 1929, she was the first girl to graduate from Naples High School. She and Preston were the first couple to be married in the First United Methodist Church. She was also the first woman mechanic to work for Florida Power & Light. Margaret died in 2005 at the age of 95
  • Local postcards to family and friends back home used to feature life's simpler pleasures. This undated souvenir shows shuffleboard action at the former Keewaydin Club, south of Naples' Port Royal and Gordon Pass. It was a winter retreat for the low-key rich and famous from 1935 to 1995; now it is an enclave of luxury megahomes, still accessible only by boat.
  • It's still there. Though downsized today, the Royal Palm Hammock fuel outpost remains at U.S. 41 East — called Tamiami Trail and Route 94 here — and State Route 92, 17 miles south of Naples. A side building that has hosted restaurants and shops would be off the right side of this undated postcard scene.
  • This vintage 1961 aerial photo of Naples is striking for what is there — the City Dock and adjoining low-rise buildings near today's Dock Restaurant site at Crayton Cove. It is striking for what is not there — just about everything else that is there today, especially The Cove Inn (at lower right), condos and megahomes. That's Aqualane Shores in the upper left. Courtesy of Art Ullmann of Naples.
  • A scene from a 1976 sales brochure for Naples' Port Royal shows a classic backyard. Note the size and vintage of the boat, and the scale of the home across the water. A comparable scene today would likely be through a giant pool cage at a much larger yacht and several megahomes. Brochure courtesy of Al Bruggemeyer.
  • Alvin Lederer, a longtime Naples resident and history buff, shares this vintage postcard looking south at Naples Pier. His copy is postmarked 1956 — four years before Hurricane Donna and the start of Naples and Collier County's boom era. Readers with local memorabilia to share are encouraged to upload photos, videos and stories at naplesnews.com/participate.
  • Here is a truly classic photo of the heart of Naples. Though the photo is undated, development dates of visible landmarks lead us to believe it was made in 1959 or 1960. This view looks south from above today's Park Shore neighborhood. That is The Moorings and Coquina Sands, in order, heading south toward the Naples Beach Hotel and Golf Club grounds, with Old Naples, Aqualane Shores, Naples Bay and Royal Habor among other landmarks. The inlet at right is, of course, Doctors Pass.
  • Naples' beachfront in 1956 — What? No high-rises? No mega-houses? No big streets? What kind of place is this? It is the core of Naples' beachfront in 1956 — four years before Hurricane Donna. That is the Haldeman House at center, bottom. Naples Pier would be below and to the left of that. That is the landmark Naples Hotel at center and slightly left. Old-timers can find lots more among the details — the Quonset hut movie theater, for example. Published March 12, 2006
  • This rare and spacious northeasterly vista of Naples Bay, with Naples Municipal Airport in the background, is from 1969. Long before the big-time development of today, the area of Tin City is at upper left. The old Boat Haven, now the site of Naples Bay Resort, is at upper right. There is plenty more to 'see' that wasn't there at the time. Photo courtesy of Art Ullmann of Naples.
  • Can you guess the identity of this scene from Collier County in 1970? It looks south from the intersection of today's Airport-Pulling Road (heading into the horizon) and Immokalee Road. Today, this scene is laden with homes and stores, including Sam's Club, Green Tree Center and Piper's Crossing. That was the Naples Dinner Theatre at bottom right. Photo courtesy of Art Ullmann of Naples.
  • Thank goodness for Art Ullmann's generosity and sense of history. The retired Naples businessman, who once bought an office building vacated by a surveying company that kept meticulous aerial/photographic records, provides this 1948 vista looking north at Naples as it was taking shape. The pristine condition of both sides of Naples Bay and the Gordon Pass will be of special interest to those who study this classic photo. Note the Keewaydin Club, lower left.
  • Minutes away from Naples' exclusive Port Royal neighborhood, says the 1967 property sales brochure, are waters loaded with fighting fish such as tarpon (left inset) and snook (right inset).
  • The Enchanting Shores mobile home park in East Naples is the centerpiece of this aerial dated 1974. U.S. 41 East was two lanes. That's Naples Bay in the distance to the west.
  • Old U.S. 41 and railroad tracks came through the heart of Bonita Springs in 1968. A river, the Imperial, runs through it too, horizontally, above center. Photo courtesy of Art Ullmann of Naples. Readers with local memorabilia to share are encouraged to upload photos, videos and stories at naplesnews.com/participate.
  • Bonita Beach, 1976 — A photograph from the archives of the Daily News shows Bonita's beach in March 1976. The view offers a much smaller-town look than readers will find there today. The photograph was used in the Daily News' former annual Visitors Edition.
  • 'Noted horsewoman' is how Gulfshore Life described Lois O. Kerckhoff of Naples, formerly of St. Louis, in the magazine's 1970-74 anthology edition. A profile of Kerckhoff and her home, which was decorated with international flair as a 'harmonious whole,' noted her success with orchids. 'I talk to them,' she confided.
  • The goal of $110,000 was big money in those days — 1963. Naples civic leaders and bankers chart the progress of a fund drive to build the Central Avenue library, then still three years from its grand opening. From left are Eugene Turner, Mamie Tooke and Ben Parks. Collier County News/Daily News file photo. Readers with local memorabilia to share are encouraged to upload photos, videos and stories at naplesnews.com/participate.
  • How many familiar names and faces can you glean from this Daily News photo and caption published in 1962 — or was it 1963? 'Guests of honor at the Naples Jaycee dinner last night were these members of the Jaycee Little League baseball team which placed second in the league after a slow start. They are from left, front row: Billie Sorber, Ben Parks, Harold Cross, Bobby Marshall, Kevin Ginos; second row, Mark Henning, Nicky Koch, Tony Hunter, Mike Watkins, Jackie Sorber; Third row, Henry Watkins III, Lance Stahlman, and Don Hunter; rear row, Ken Saad, manager, almost hidden, H.D. Watkins Jr., co-manager; and Marvin Cecil, Jaycee president. Not present for the picture were Dirk Elferdink and Chris Provenzano.'
  • Those were the days — when matchbooks were hot modes of advertising for restaurants and bars. Now, most eateries and bars either ban or drastically restrict smoking, making matchbooks obsolete — or the targets of collectors such as Muffy Gill of Naples. How many readers know where these places were and what is in their places today? Which one is a bank? Which one is Carrabba's? Upload local memorabilia — photos, videos and stories — at naplesnews.com/participate.
  • Built in 1924 and shuttered since 1998, Bonita Springs' Shangri-La has the city's namesake natural waters on its grounds. This undated postcard says on the back: 'An exquisite, year-round, vacation and health resort. The ideal place for vacationing, fasting, health rejuvenation, weight control, delightful vegetarian-hygienic meals. Pool. Boating. Gulf beaches.'
  • Now it's Riverside Park. Back in 1959, the postmark date of this postcard sent to friends back in Fredonia, N.Y., it was Imperial River Court in downtown Bonita Springs. The Liles Hotel, bottom left, has been rescued and refurbished as a civic meeting place.
  • Although still there with the same name, the look and atmosphere of the Edgewater Beach Hotel on Gulfshore Boulevard have been upgraded since this ad in a 1966 Naples Guide magazine.
  • In 1966, this was the standard of luxury living in Naples — a brand new home on Naples Bay, as shown in this ad from Naples Guide magazine.
  • These prices are no longer there. Neither is the dealership, whose site at U.S. 41 and Seventh Avenue North in Naples is now Ric's Cafe & Grill. This ad is from an April 1958 edition of the Collier County News, the predecessor of the Daily News. Readers with local memorabilia to share are encouraged to upload photos, videos and stories at naplesnews.com/participate.
  • Tomatoes for 19 cents a pound? Steak for $1.89 a pound? The Christmas season bargains were found in Bonita Springs' pioneer grocery store — 30 years ago. From the files of the Bonita Banner. Readers with local memorabilia to share are encouraged to upload photos, video and stories at naplesnews.com/participate.
  • Dinner for $3? You are way too late to make these reservations. The ad is from the 1956 Collier County News, a predecessor of the Naples Daily News. The dining spot is now part of the Naples Community Hospital campus. Readers with local memorabilia to share are encouraged to upload photos, videos and stories at naplesnews.com/participate.
  • The year: 1970. The ad is from Look magazine. The winner of a sweepstakes sponsored by Pine-Sol household cleaner wins a '$25,000 Fairways luxury condominium apartment home directly on the golf course in Lehigh Acres — one of Florida's finest year-round vacation communities. Two bedrooms, two baths — everything for easy living ...' Courtesy of Bonnie Veenschoten.
  • How's the real estate market? In 1966, when this ad from The Naples Guide visitors pamphlet was published, it was probably considered red hot and very expensive. It's all relative, isn't it?
  • Such deals — 40 years ago. This real estate ad is from the February 1966 edition of the Naples Guide, which catered to tourists and prospective homebuyers.
  • Three-bedroom beachfront home advertised for $188,000. Longtime Naples resident Dorothy Caruthers made her office on Fifth Avenue South as far back as the early 1970s.
  • Two-bedroom Pierre Club condo priced at $42,500. Such deals. And such service. Longtime Naples resident Dorothy Caruthers made her office on Fifth Avenue South as far back as the early 1970s.
  • What an ad! But the look is so dated. Longtime Naples resident Dorothy Caruthers made her office on Fifth Avenue South as far back as the early 1970s.
  • Some of the information hasn't changed. Collier County still has 1,994 square miles and Naples is still 110 miles from Miami. But most of the other data changed dramatically since this snapshot of local factoids was published in the 1994 Visitor's Edition of the Daily News. The county population now is over 300,000, and voter registration is up to near 186,000. Clipping courtesy of John C. Martin of Naples

These historical photos were published in 2006 in the Sunday Perspective section of the Naples Daily News.

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