On weekdays and Jaguars game days, thousands of cars stream past a Downtown building that a late LaVilla businessman saved from destruction and transformed into a folk-art version of the Smithsonian Institution.
On Nov. 12, the Jacksonville City Council took action aimed at preserving the building and a newer one next door for years to come.
On two 17-0 votes, Council gave final approval to ordinances providing historic protection to The Whetstonian Building at 801 N. Jefferson St. and the Atlanta Life Insurance Co. Building at 821 N. Jefferson St.
The actions came on ordinances 2024-0771 and 2024-0772 with no comments by Council members, who had previously held public hearings on the legislation in which no one spoke in opposition. Council members Rory Diamond and Nick Howland were not present for the vote, with both arriving later.
Walter Whetstone used the buildings to display his collection of secondhand and discarded antiques, artifacts and art, which he assembled over decades from curbsides, thrift shops, yard sales and other sources.
Taking a cue from the Smithsonian Institution, which is named for founding donor James Smithson, Whetstone called his collection the Whetstonian.
The legislation requires that any alterations, additions, new construction, relocation and demolition that would be visible from the public right-of-way would be subject to approval by the Jacksonville Historic Preservation Commission.
The city Planning and Development Department said the buildings had historic value preceding Whetstone’s ownership.
The report identified the structures as among the last remaining buildings from LaVilla’s days as a vibrant commercial and cultural area, which ended in the 1990s when the neighborhood was largely razed in the name of urban redevelopment.
Businesses that operated in the building at 801 N. Jefferson St. through the 1970s included grocery stores, restaurants, a pharmacy, a TV shop and an investment company. By the late 1980s, the building had been condemned and was slated for demolition when Whetstone bought it.
The Atlantic Life Insurance Co. Building was built in 1965 from a design by Jacksonville architect Emilio Zeller III. A former slave, Alonzo Herndon, founded the Atlanta Life Insurance Co. in 1922.
Whetstone, a Jacksonville native, purchased the buildings in 1998. He had risen from being a Western Union bicycle messenger in his youth to a career as a Gulf Life Insurance Co. agent that culminated in an induction into the company’s hall of fame.