This place was a local landmark and hangout in Bonita Springs for over 50 years.
If you ever drove from Naples to Fort Myers on Highway 41 (like to McDonalds for French Fries, or the Edison commute, or maybe even the "Bee Hive" on Friday night) this is one sight that you couldn’t miss right on the Tamiami Trail.
The shake roof was orange and the stem & leaves on the top were green to resemble an . . . .
Judging by the cars in the photo it looks like this was taken in the late 50’s.
In later years it had become a tavern and game room. Sadly it was torn down in 1992.
photo credit: Jenny McLenon-Lindsey and USF Libraries Digitization Center
Not that ol’ Seagate Homeboy had any personal history there, but there was just this one time in 1970 . . .
The early 70's Dome was one of the great places to get your ass whipped returning to East Naples fired up from watching the pro wrestling matches at the National Guard Armory in Ft. Myers (the best ringside tickets purchased a week ahead of time at the Arcade Cigar Store, downtown Ft. Myers). The Dome was not a place I ever noticed in the daytime. It always appeared at night after midnight. I must have pulled my grandmama's Dodge Dart with the plastic orchid on the arial into the Dome's dirt and gravel parking lot a hundred times and never knew until now that the roof was an orange.
ReplyDeleteThe original roof was orange. I recall seeing it as in the above picture when I was a little kid.
ReplyDeleteI also remember it being silver for a while, maybe when I was doing the Edison commute in the late 60s.
Sometime after that it was painted orange again and was looking rather rough before its demise.
10:07 a.m. PDT
Bad a shape as the pool tables were always in, a lot of big money games got played in the Dome. Farm owners from Immokalee would show up and be cleaned out by road players on the way to Miami or Tampa, and by Pete from the Bindlestiff. And the Dome was a definitive booze ranch. No matter how beat and dirty the place got, the beer was ALWAYS ice cold and the call brands the real thing in clean heavy cocktail glasses.
ReplyDelete"Tennessee Pete" was one bad *$$ pool player. I worked with him at the "Stiff" and he would take on all comers. "Slack Jack" (er . . .no slack), from the "Viking" and happy hour at "The Hearth" was known for makin' folks wallets thin too.
ReplyDeleteLet's not forget ol' "Ralph" from the "Viking Tavern" and the "Village Inn". He would dollar you to death while the whole time you thought he was too drunk to play.
Other notable shooters of MY day were Neill Davis (R.I.P) and Skip Gage (R.I.P.).
5:22 p.m. PDT
Seagate, Maybe you can id an East Naples pool player and stock car driver for me. I used to see him playing the front table at Brookside Billiards in the late 60s and early to mid 70s. His nickname may have been Red. That's a big maybe, though. He was over six feet tall,wiry like a Fife, short red/brown hair (never went hippy). Good stick. At the track I remember him driving cars painted shades of pea green.
ReplyDeleteMy brother just told me that there was another pool shooter out of Brookside billiards who went out on the road, last name of Pickles. Present day, Glen Olson, out of Blue Point Avenue, Royal Harbor, whose dad ran track security at the Collier County stock car track, is a gifted pool player. He plays the pro tourneys, was sponsored for a while by the Seminoles, and has wins against guys like Grady Mathews.
ReplyDeleteSorry I can't help you with Brookside table #1. I learned to play pool on "Doc" Barrett's snooker table out in Seagate, before I became a Bindlestiff, Viking Tavern, and Bullpen kinda guy.
ReplyDeleteI can name drop some of the stock car guys from "back in the day" though, O.B. Osceola, Bob Diefenthaler, Red Ison, Don Blakenship, Bill Engle, Bill Bigley, Skip Brehm, Felo Ison, Frank Pisarski, and many others that have escaped my feeble brain in the last 40 plus years.
Hey, is Glen Olson any relation to Officer Walter Olson of the old NPD?
10:37 p.m. PST
Walter Olson was Glenn's dad. Walter was NPD and later ran his own Olson Security Service. In the late 60's Walter raced a black and yellow car at the track. He also ran for sheriff at least 1,000 times.
ReplyDelete