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4. Port St. Joe Marina340 Marina Dr.
The Port St. Joe Marina was completed in 1999 and consists of 128 wet slips, 79 dry storage areas, a ship store, and a dockside café. Between 1910 and 1963, the marina was a site of a bustling commercial port. Early in the 1900s, a group of businessmen from St. Louis had a vision: harvesting virgin long leaf pine, cutting it at local sawmills and transferring it by a railroad running from Chattahoochee to Port St. Joe, and then shipping it to far off ports in the eastern United States and Europe. At the time cargo was shipped on both sailing ships and steamships. In 1905, Captain Dave Maddox’s father Fred, his uncle Roy, and his grandfather John Wesley were hired to sound along the shore, to find the deepest water for the dock.
Listen to Dave Maddox's description of how they choose the dock location: By 1909, the railroad was completed to St. Joseph Bay and work began on a dock, which was completed in 1910. The Apalachicola Times reported on Christmas Day 1909: “Just think of it! One thousand feet of wharf! And lying at this immense wharf, sailing ships from every nation, and whistling steamers announcing their departure for home ports and lands across the seas!” In April 1910, the Swedish sailing vessel The Henrietta was the first ship to dock and load lumber at the new dock. She was piloted by John Maddox. By 1913 the Calhoun Lumber Company had constructed one of the largest sawmills in Florida adjacent to the railroad and dock. Click on the photos below to view some historic photos of the old railroad and dock
The June 1913 issue of National Waterways—A Magazine of Transportation carried a story by L.H. Dimmitt entitled “Port St. Joe—A Florida Harbor." Dimmitt described Port St. Joe as “where land and sea routes meet.” Port St. Joe was a fine harbor, protected by the St. Joseph Peninsula and relatively safe from hurricanes and high winds. No streams or rivers flowed into the bay to form sand bars or shifting of the channel. In 1929 the bay was the base of operations for the dirigible Los Angeles and its mooring ship Patoka during a cruise to several Southern states. Click on the photos below to view some historic photos of the dock
Captain Dave Maddox recalls the visit of the USS Constitution, known as Old Ironsides, to St. Joseph Bay March 16,17, and 18, 1932. His granddaddy John Maddox piloted the Constitution into port and his father Fred was piloting the tug that was towing it. Considered too young to go along, 11-year-old Dave had to remain on shore. Built in 1794 and one of the original three frigates of the U.S. Navy, the Constitution attracted vast numbers of visitors from surrounding cities and towns while docked at Port St. Joe.
The new Port St. Joe Paper Company docks were completed in 1938 and made of the latest type of sheet pilings driven into the bay’s bottom. The docks and wharves were now capable of simultaneously loading and unloading five of the largest ocean going ships. The Tropic Star, a 9400-ton steamer, was the first ship to tie up at the new docks. During April 1944 the entire flotilla of the Atlantic Fleet accompanied by the Reserve Torpedo Flotilla spent 15 days on the St. Joseph Bay in joint exercises of target practice, maneuvering and naval review. Port St. Joe continued to be a bustling port until 1963 when the Colonial Pipeline was built from Houston through Baton Rouge and Birmingham, Atlanta, and Charlotte to Linden, New Jersey, supplanting an earlier pipeline from Port St. Joe to Chattanooga and ending most of the tanker traffic. Paper continued to be shipped from the port until the paper mill closed in 1998. Today there is no shipping whatsoever from the port at Port St. Joe. Click on the photos below to view marina photos from 1970 through the present
Click on the photos below to view some photos of ships that have used the St. Joe dock and harbordock
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