Vintage St. Pete: The Fountain of Youth

They came, it was said, to sip, gulp and guzzle the foul-smelling water as it trickled from the primitive spigots. For three-quarters of a century, St. Petersburg’s downtown Fountain of Youth produced what some claimed was a magical elixir that all but cured the infirmities of the aged – the lame could walk, the nearly-blind saw clearly, those without energy were suddenly filled with youthful vigor (or “pep,” in the parlance of the times).

“I have been drinking it for two or three months, been carrying it half a mile or more every day. Haven’t got anything else to do, so come down to the well every day for a jugful or two, it helps my kidney, and I believe it has helped my rheumatism.”

• “An old gentleman,” St. Petersburg Times, March 3, 1916

Vintage newspaper articles are filled with tales of people filling bottles, pails and tubs with the sulfurous stuff. In 1925, it was reported, a woman inquired at the downtown freight office about the cost of shipping an entire boxcar of Fountain of Youth water up north.

Particularly in the early decades of the 20^th century, the oft-told tale of Spanish explorer Juan Ponce de Leon, and his quest for the water that could turn back time, was a major factor in luring winter visitors to Florida. Come for the climate, stay for the tonic.

(In truth, de Leon’s 16^th century expeditions weren’t launched in search of some youth-giving wellspring. He was looking for gold, and slaves, and for new lands to claim in the name of his king.)

St. Petersburg was one of numerous Florida cities with a Fountain of Youth attraction. In all locations, Ponce de Leon was appropriated as chief pitchman.

“Any spring in Florida that at some point is marketed commercially claims to be the Fountain of Youth,” declares Rick Kilby, author of Finding the Fountain of Youth: Ponce de Leon and Florida’s Magical Waters. “Because it’s low-hanging fruit. It’s an easy thing to say.” The story of the Fountain of Youth, he adds, has been called “Florida’s foundation myth.”

Although it could be missed in the blink of an eye, St. Petersburg’s Fountain of Youth, or what remains of it, exists today as a tiny “park” at the intersection of 1^st Street and 4^th Avenue S., tucked into the northwestern corner of the Mahaffey Theater parking lot. 

This is the third location for the city-owned site. In all its earlier iterations, it was connected to an underground Artesian well (hence the rotten-egg smell, from the hydrogen sulfide produced when low-oxygen bacteria gets into underground sulfur deposits); the well was capped off in 1988, when the concrete and tile structure was taken apart, for the last time, and the network of underground pipes running under the Al Lang outfield disconnected. Today’s push-button fountain standing on a plain pedestal is connected to a city water line.

Going back in time

The central figure in the Fountain of Youth story is Edwin H. Tomlinson, a wealthy northerner who moved to St. Petersburg in 1896. Among his philanthropic deeds, he built St. Peter’s Episcopal Church and Augusta Memorial (later Mound Park Hospital, even later Bayfront Medical Center). He helped create the George Washington Birthday Parade, which evolved into the long-running Festival of States.

Tomlinson built the Domestic Science and Manual Training School, a vocational school that became known, in later years, as the Tomlinson Adult Learning Center. He gave money to numerous city schools and educational programs. And he owned the city’s first automobile.

As his career had been in mining and oil drilling, it’s perhaps not surprising that he drilled an exploratory hole into the Tampa Bay bottom. Tomlinson, like Ponce de Leon, wasn’t looking for the Fountain of Youth.

1885 At the the American Medical Society convention in New Orleans, Dr. W. C. Van Bibber of Baltimore praises the healthy climate of the Pinellas peninsula. The rest of the country takes notice.

1901 E.H. Tomlinson builds a 600-foot pier in Tampa Bay for his widowed father, Peter, to fish from, across from the family home on Third Avenue (the Tomlinson family also owns 200 feet of waterfront). He has a small cabin-like structure constructed on the pier head for Dad to sit and run his line through a hole in the floor. To give Dad fresh water, Tomlinson has a well dug to 176 feet. (There is some dispute as to the exact location of Tomlinson’s original well – in some historical accounts, it was dug halfway down the length of the rickety wooden pier; others insist Tomlinson dug at the very base of the pier, on dry land (before there was a seawall). Some images seem to depict a small pumphouse where the pier meets the land; still others don’t. And a fire insurance schematic, on file at the Library of Congress, depicts the Artesian well all the way out and adjacent to the pier head.

1908 Dr. Jesse Conrad, a visitor from Ohio, buys the pier from Tomlison for $2,800, taking advantage of the flowing, mineral-rich fresh water, he turns the pier head structure into a bath house and health spa, and re-names it the Fountain of Youth Pier. He fashions an elaborate sign out of willow branches at the entrance. Tomlinson, meanwhile, is an outspoken advocate for making improvements to the waterfront: dredging a harbor in between the existing piers, with a deep water entrance channel for vessels, and for the construction of a seawall using the trunks of cabbage palm trees.

Dr. Conrad’s Fountain of Youth Pier. Image: Public domain.

1911 (March) The city buys the pier from Conrad for $5,000. He is permitted to continue running his bathhouse and self-proclaimed “health resort” until April 1, 1912.

1913 The Fountain of Youth bathhouse, 600 feet out into the bay, is destroyed by fire in the early morning hours of Jan. 12. Because of the distance, the city fire department is unable to render aid.

1913 (July) Construction on a new bathhouse, two-thirds of the way out on the city-owned pier, begins. The city’s designated builder, H.W. Plunkett, will also run additional pipes and faucets from the Artesian well to the edge of 1^st Street for public use; as part of waterfront beautification efforts, he will build a fountain there, “similar to the one in Williams Park,” directly in front of the new, $35,000 West Coast Inn. Plunkett is offered a 10-year option on the new pier bathhouse, which he will operate as part of the West Coast Inn business. The public can continue to use the pier. Construction on a waterfront seawall begins.

1914 Dr. C.W Hargens, owner of the West Coast Inn, announces additional efforts to beautify the waterfront area, described by the Times as “an unsightly stretch of beach sand.” Hargens is laying in sidewalks, hedges and flowering plants, the newspaper reports. “The intention to make the hotel and the property surrounding the hotel one of the points of interest in this city.”

This undated photo postcard likely dates from the years 1913-1917. There is a seawall visible, but the incoming tide has washed over it. Beautification efforts to the area have begun.

1916 In June, it’s announced that the city’s parks board intends to build a permanent concrete house over the spring, “which already is a very popular place.” (This never happens.) The Times  describes the fancy new bubbling mineral well as a social gathering spot, where people fill portable containers from sunup until sundown, talking excitedly to one another about the various ills the water has tamed (“I wonder where the good Lord has stored all this good water,” said a kind faced old lady. “I’m thankful to Him that there was enough left for me”).

1917 Peter Tomlinson dies; at 93, he was believed to be the oldest man in the city. Beautification efforts continue around the shore fountain, with city workers planting Bermuda grass, water oak trees and flowering plants, and installing concrete walkways in and out of the fountain area. A 25-foot Carolina laurel cherry tree, dug up in now-developing Roser Park, is trucked to the site and planted. A row of palm trees is planted along the waterfront. It’s reported in July that the old Tomlinson Pier, aka the Fountain of Youth Pier, is in bad shape, has been condemned by the city and will soon be torn down.

1919 Hurricane winds and high tides rip out large sections of the already-dilapidated pier. The nearby Railroad Pier, and the Municipal Pier, have sustained little damage. Still, the City now says, the Fountain of Youth Pier will be rebuilt.

1921 All three city piers are destroyed by a devastating hurricane Oct. 25, along with the privately-owned Braaf Pier. All piping from the Artesian well’s natural flow is lost, but city workers, “armed with grab hooks, periscopes and diving suits” are able to locate it and re-connect the water to the Fountain of Youth park on shore.

1924 On March 25, Babe Ruth hits a record 624-foot home run from Waterfront Park to the front porch (or the second story, depending on the account) of the West Coast Inn, across 1st Street. Ruth’s New York Yankees are playing a spring training game against the Boston Braves.

Postcard image, likely early 1940s.

1946 City Council moves to relocate the fountain 300 feet south to accommodate the upcoming expansion of Waterfront Park into Al Lang Field. The new “sunken” park is given an octagonal design, with concrete benches in a half-circle, with a four-foot statue of Ponce de Leon mounted on the centrally-located fountain pedestal.

1955 “Said one oldster: A woman came here on crutches the other day. You could tell she was in awful pain, that one. There was a man here said he knew what the water could do. First thing you know, he had her shoe off and her foot under the water and was pinching her ankle until she hollered. Then all of a sudden she jumped up, threw away her crutches and started dancing around. Water must have done it. Has 32 minerals, they say.” St. Petersburg Times, Sept. 6.

1970s. The Bayfront Center is visible in the background. Photo: St. Petersburg Museum of History.

1963 Construction of the massive Bayfront Center entertainment and convention complex begins immediately behind the fountain park. The St. Pete Petersburg Woman’s Club raises funds to “spruce it up,” including the replacement of the oft-vandalized de Leon statue with that of a nameless water nymph holding an urn.

1973 A study by Dr. Ross Cameron of the Pinellas County Health Department reveals that water from the Fountain of Youth spring contains elevated levels (15 parts per billion) of lithium, a mineral used to treat mood disorders, high blood pressure, anxiety and other issues, lending (a little) credence to the stories about the water’s medicinal power (most regional water supplies, Cameron says, have 5 to 10 parts per billion of lithium).

1977 The Times declares the little fountain park “wino-free,” and reports that the fountain hasn’t been vandalized since the Ponce statue was replaced by the maiden with the urn. Because of mineral buildup in the pipes and the pump motor, however, the fountain is frequently closed for cleaning and repairs.

1988 With additional modifications to Al Lang Field, and the Bayfront Center parking lot (the Bayfront’s small, attached theater had been re-named for the Mahaffey family in 1987), the park is moved yet again, to its present location. The etched concrete “Fountain of Youth” sign, which had been part of the structure, is laid in the grass adjacent to the new Mahaffey Theater driveway, an apparent afterthought. The old well is capped, the pumps removed, and the new, push-button fountain begins dispensing regular city water.

2004 The Bayfront Center arena is demolished, leaving the Mahaffey Theater a free-standing facility.

2011 The Dali Museum (which had operated in a different location since 1982) moves into a new building on the south section of the old arena site.

2025 According to the city’s Parks and Recreation website, the Fountain of Youth – which version is not specified – is an “historic landmark.”

It does not, however, appear on St. Pete’s official Register of Historic Places.

2025: The bare-bones, barely remembered Fountain of Youth, near the Mahaffey Theater entrance on 1st Street S. The etched-script sign on the grass had been embedded in the stone wall of the previous fountain. Photos by Bill DeYoung.