Tom Petty's Florida
Childhood Years: The Big Jangle
Alachua Gen. Hospital, Tom Petty's birthplace on Oct. 20, 1950
Tom Petty's first address, the house lived in after being born in 1950
Tom Petty's first address, the house lived in after being born in 1950
Intersection of SW 3rd Ave. and SW 9th St., Gainesville, FL 32601
https://maps.app.goo.gl/s21UXDNnoUZe5wM67
Site of historical marker for Alachua General Hospital, which was once located here. It is where, on Oct. 20, 1950, was born Thomas Earl Petty – or Tom Petty, the Gainesville native and future Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductee.
Son of Katherine Johey “Kitty” (Avery) Petty and Earl Alvin Petty, the Pettys resided then at 1040 NE 9th St., Tom Petty’s first home.
In 2010, the 81-year-old hospital was demolished.
Today the marker is located in Florida Innovation Square at the University of Florida. To learn more about the historic hospital and its marker, go here:
https://www.hmdb.org/m.asp?m=93167
Photo by Shawn Murphy
Tom Petty's first address, the house lived in after being born in 1950
Tom Petty's first address, the house lived in after being born in 1950
Tom Petty's first address, the house lived in after being born in 1950
1040 NE 9th St, Gainesville, FL 32601
https://maps.app.goo.gl/pMUpCux8qgMoKWZ7A
This house, which was built in 1947, is where Earl and Kitty Petty, parents to Tom Petty, lived when Tom was born Oct. 20, 1950. The family moved to the childhood home at 1715 NE 6th Terrace after it was built in 1952.
Should you go here, remember that this is a private home, located in a residential neighborhood, so must be treated with respect for the property owner and neighbors. This includes not trespassing on private property!
Photo by Shawn Murphy
Tom Petty's second home, where he lived in childhood and teen years
Tom Petty's first address, the house lived in after being born in 1950
Tom Petty's second home, where he lived in childhood and teen years
1715 NE 6th Terrace, Gainesville, FL 32609
https://maps.app.goo.gl/jGiFJNDVgT5YxWj29
Childhood home for Tom and Bruce Petty, his younger brother. Built in 1952. (Note that Tom's first house when he was born in 1950 was at 1040 NE 9th St., which was built in 1947.)
It was in this house on the night of Feb. 9, 1964, when 14-year-old Tom Petty, along with 73 million other people, watched The Beatles perform five songs on the Ed Sullivan Show. Tom watched this national broadcast on the Petty family's TV in the living room at the front of the house.
Reflecting back on that night, he would tell Peter Bogdanovich for the 2007 documentary "Runnin' Down a Dream: "It all became clear. This is what I'm gonna do, and this is how you do it."
In 1964, Tom formed his first band, the Sundowners, in the living room. Keith Harben, Tom's neighborhood friend, helped to set up the band's equipment, a practice he continued for the band's duration. Keith recalled to me that one day he was told that he could sing a little bit of a song to see how he was, which was when he was told, "maybe you'd want to be the band manager."
Once the band lineup was set, they would rehearse cover tunes in a backyard shed with carpeted walls. They would eventually perform at high schools and university fraternity houses -- driven there by drummer Dennis Lee's mother in a station wagon. Moreover, for each of the four members, she also sewed stage outfits: pink jackets with ruffled white shirts and tight black pants -- British Invasion-style. And Tom acquired from a Jacksonville wig store a blonde wig that resembled the Beatles' haircuts at the time, which he briefly wore on stage.
In late 1967, at age 16, Tom Petty left the Sundowners to play bass guitar with the Epics, a band that eventually included Tom Leadon on lead guitar.
It was at this house that Tom Leadon met Tom Petty, both of whom would later become members of Mudcrutch. The 14-year-old Leadon, who lived a few blocks away at 412 NE 13th Ave. (with his older brother Bernie, a future member of the Eagles), would walk to Petty's house for near-daily band rehearsals for years.
"I was fascinated with Petty," wrote Leadon, a founding member of Mudcrutch, in an overview of his upbringing in Gainesville and the city's music scene at the time. which you can read in full here: http://www.gainesvillerockhistory.com/TLeadon.htm
In 2019, Tom's first wife, Jane, purchased the house, which has three bedrooms and two bathrooms -- including one that still has pink-tiled walls from when Tom lived here -- for $175,000 following reports that it might be turned into a museum, according to The Gainesville Sun article found here:
"I thought we should have it in the family," said Jane Benyo Petty to a Sun reporter, who noted that eventually it would be passed on to their grandchildren.
Before Jane purchased this home in 2019 so that it would remain in the Petty family, superfans Kevin Beauchamp from California and Joanne Davis from New York were interested in purchasing Tom Petty's childhood home, getting it recognized as an historical landmark, and turning it into a museum. To make this financially and logistically possible, they had worked with Jeff Goldstein, a producer of the Rose Community-produced Mudcrutch shows in and around Gainesville in the early 1970s and today the president of the Gainesville Music History Foundation. To learn more about this effort, read this Gainesville Sun article:
Should you go here, remember that this is a private home, located in a residential neighborhood, so must be treated with respect for the property owner and neighbors. This includes not trespassing on private property! And be sure not to be like the unknown knucklehead who stole the mailbox in 2019!
Photo by Shawn Murphy
Neighborhood childhood play places for Tom Petty and friends
Sidney Lanier Elementary School, Tom Petty's first school, mural site
Tom Petty's second home, where he lived in childhood and teen years
550 NE 16th Ave, Gainesville, FL 32601
https://maps.app.goo.gl/pGtfJJXN8d9YLUnA9
St. Patrick Interparish School is flanked by Tom Petty's childhood roots in Gainesville. Before the school opened in March 1960, this land was a heavily wooded piece of property adjacent to St. Patrick Catholic Church on NE 16th Avenue. On the other side of the wooded lot, due east, was the childhood home of Tom Petty at 1715 NE 6th Terrace. There in the 1950s Tom as a young child would play with his neighborhood friend Keith Harben. From a long list of childhood games, here at the Petty family home they would, on any given day, play marbles, or wage battles with small plastic “Army men,” or toss a Frisbee. Or, before the school was constructed, they might go west and venture into these woods and play “Cowboys and Indians,” a game popular with children during the 1950s. After, they might cross NE 16th Avenue, due south of the woods, to play in Northeast Park, which in 2018 was renamed Tom Petty Park – thanks in large part to efforts made by Tom’s friend Keith.
Thank you to Keith Harben for giving me the grand tour and sharing his childhood memories.
Should you go here, remember that this is a residential neighborhood, so must be treated with respect for the property owners and neighbors.
Photo of map courtesy of Google Maps
Sidney Lanier Elementary School, Tom Petty's first school, mural site
Sidney Lanier Elementary School, Tom Petty's first school, mural site
Sidney Lanier Elementary School, Tom Petty's first school, mural site
312 NW 16th Ave, Gainesville, FL 32601
https://maps.app.goo.gl/cpbBWuSzKAPiaERh7
Sidney Lanier Elementary School was Tom Petty’s first school.
Today it is the site of a mural in his honor, which was painted by Gainesville artist Jesus Martinez and his wife, according to this report by WUFT, Gainesville's NPR station:
Note that today this is a school for children with special needs. You cannot just walk onto the school property. The mural is located on the end of one of the buildings, facing east. There is a fence along NW 2nd Street. You can take a photograph from the sidewalk alongside the fence.
Photo by Shawn Murphy
Howard W. Bishop Middle School, where Tom Petty joined first band
Sidney Lanier Elementary School, Tom Petty's first school, mural site
Sidney Lanier Elementary School, Tom Petty's first school, mural site
1901 NE 9th St, Gainesville, FL 32609
https://maps.app.goo.gl/Sbh7kbXHbQfQzVjd8
Howard W. Bishop Middle School was Tom Petty’s junior high school, which was built in 1962.
It is where Tom attended grades 7-9. Tom Petty's childhood friend Keith Harben recalls that he and Tom planted grass in front of the school, a job that came about through a friend of theirs whose father was the principal.
Mike Boulware told me that the friend was John Hendrix, who was also in Boy Scout Troop 84, Falcon Patrol, with Petty and Harben, as well as attending Howard Bishop together. The father was Sam Hendrix, principal at Howard Bishop.
While more inclined to music than sports, he gave it a shot for a year, despite his dislike of team sports. As Petty told Paul Zollo for the 2005 book Conversations with Tom Petty, he was more interested in the long-haired crowd gravitating toward arts and music than the short-haired crowd obsessed by team sports.
“...I wasn’t athletic and didn’t have any interest in sports at all,” Petty told Zanes. “I knew the name of no baseball player; I didn’t give a shit. Never watched sports. I liked to play (sports) with my friends, but I didn’t like the idea of organized sports. It just wasn’t for me. There was nothing wrong with it. It just wasn’t for me. And I was this skinny little kid, and I didn’t fit into that whole football mentality of the South” (pgs. 22-23).
Despite this, Petty was on the football team while in the ninth grade. He wore a uniform with the No. 62, while Harben wore No. 7 (or 71, as the team photo if obscured). Keith shared with me a photograph showing them suited up. Keith’s father took the photo, which you can find in this website's Photo Gallery here:
https://tompettytrail.com/photo-gallery
“It may be hard to think about Tom Petty playing football, but he was no wimp,” Keith told me. “We played a lot of football with friends in the neighborhood.”
This school, attended during Petty's formative, coming-of-age years, also becomes a cornerstone for his career as a musician and lyricist.
This is the site of Tom Petty's first concert with the Sundowners in the school cafeteria in 1964, for which we may have Cindy Crawford (not the actress) to thank here. 14-year-old Tom, who had a crush on Cindy and was looking to impress, quickly assembled the band when she asked him whether he knew a band that could perform at the school dance. He bluffed and said "yes," then grabbed his bass guitar and immediately started forming a band with his friends.
About this middle school crush, Tom Petty recalled it to Warren Zanes for the 2015 book Petty: The Biography.
"I found this one beautiful girl, Cindy, the prettiest girl there, and she showed some interest in me," Petty said. "I probably made more of it than she did, probably thought it was more real than she did. I imagine every guy she met wanted to take her out. But I still remember the day that it hit me that we weren't an item like I thought we were. It was traumatic for me. I remember the walk home, just feeling ... I got my heart broken." (pg. 30)
Cindy Crawford would re-emerge in Petty’s life years later. In 1968 after flunking out of art school in Tampa and no longer working at the funeral home in St. Petersburg, Tom returned to Gainesville where one night he tried LSD for the first time at a get-together of friends, reunited with Cindy, and laid the foundation for lyrics he would pen years later.
When Cindy showed up at this gathering, Tom, who was in an enlightened state of mind and still had her on his mind, chatted her up.
“It was greater than great, a huge night for me,” Petty told Zanes (pg. 46).
That night the gathering’s attendees would smoke cigarettes on the apartment roof and venture out to an area west of town where I-75 construction was ongoing. There, below a highway overpass, they gleefully tried to outdo one another by skipping stones across a small pool of water. They then headed back to town and partied through the night.
While any chance of Tom and Cindy becoming an item was dashed in the morning when she told him, “you and me isn’t going to happen” (Zanes, pg. 47), the night did become a lyrical catalyst for a song on the 1979 “Damn the Torpedoes” album by Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers.
“When I wrote ‘Even the Losers’ years later, that night came back. I obsessed over her so much. She is probably in a lot of songs.” (Zanes, pg. 47) You can see that night in Tom Petty’s lyrics:
“Well, it was nearly summer we sat on your roof
Yeah, we smoked cigarettes and we stared at the moon
And I showed you stars you never could see
Babe, it couldn’t have been that easy to forget about me
Baby, time meant nothing anything seemed real
Yeah, you could kiss like fire and you made me feel
Like every word you said was meant to be
It couldn’t have been that easy to forget about me…
Two cars parked on the overpass
Rocks hit the water like broken glass
I should of known right then it was too good to last
God, it’s such a drag when you live in the past
Baby, even the losers
Get lucky sometimes
Even the losers
Keep a little bit of pride”
Here you can listen to the song:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Ue4_MWwKY8
Years, later, Tom wrote "The Best of Everything" for the 1985 album "Southern Accents" by Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers. The song reportedly was about Cindy -- looking back, two decades on. Here is part of that lyric:
"So listen, honey
Wherever you are tonight
I wish you the best of everything in the world
And honey, I hope you found
Whatever you were looking for"
Here you can listen to the song:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hySGRNEKYN0
Marsha Danielson, a platonic friend of Tom's from his neighborhood, recalled for me various memories she has of walking to and from this middle school with Tom Petty.
"Tommy met me as we walked to Howard Bishop Junior High," she said. "Tommy was in ninth grade; I was in eighth. About one block's distance north of the school, we stopped to talk about the show. Tommy already had the album 'Meet the Beatles'. He said sarcastically to me, 'So I suppose your favorite Beatle is Paul McCartney.' I said, 'No, my favorite Beatle is George Harrison.' He was clearly surprised and asked me why. I said, 'Because I think he is most into the music.' Tommy thought about that and then said, 'I think so, too.'"
Marsha also recalled two instances that showed what a kind soul Tom Petty was.
She said: "Tommy carried my books between classes, not because I was his girlfriend -- we were just friends. He did it because he was a gentleman and thought it was the nice thing to do."
And she recalled the following to me about Tom's calming effect: "At the end of my first class of Geometry, the teacher cited the Pythagorean Theory. As I walked out the door, looking like a deer in the headlights, Tommy was waiting for me. He asked me what was wrong. I told him what the teacher just said, and Tommy laughed. He told me not to let it scare me, that geometry is just a game with puzzles. You get clues to figure out the rest of the shape, and when you finish the puzzle, you win. I never again had math anxiety and realized I could apply his words to everything in life."
Photo by Shawn Murphy
Glen Springs Pool in 'Dreamville,' Tom Petty's childhood memories
2424 NW 23rd Blvd, Gainesville, FL 32605
https://maps.app.goo.gl/2RGxYqsNcnGShtSe7
While today you will find Elks Lodge No. 990 at this address, hidden behind the building is the former Glen Springs Pool, which closed in 1970. Tom Petty's mom, Kitty, would bring him here during his childhood. It is part of the "Dreamville" song lyric from the 2002 album "The Last DJ" -- although one could wonder whether the year-round 72-degree water was so cold it turns lips blue:
"Ridin' with my mama
To Glen Springs Pool
The water was cold
My lips were blue
There was rock and roll
Across the dial
When I think of her
It makes me smile
Like it was Dreamville
A long time ago
A million miles away
All the trees were green
In Dreamville"
Today the staff of the Elks Lodge does its best with limited resources to maintain the historic pool, which was built in stages, starting in the late 1920s. Members of the Elks Lodge clean the pool periodically throughout the year, as a sense of pride, they said. After a heavy rain washed sand from nearby development into the spring pool, they tediously removed all of the sand from this pool. In different sections of the pool today you can find turtles, fish and crawfish.
Photo by Shawn Murphy
Tom Petty Park, where Tom Petty spent much of his childhood
Tom Petty Park, 501 NE 16th Ave., Gainesville, FL 32609
https://maps.app.goo.gl/KEgkJ4pBPSxtWKeZ9
Former Northeast Park is where Tommy Petty and friends played as children. It was renamed Tom Petty Park on Oct. 20, 2018, what would have been Tom's 68th birthday. The City of Gainesville videorecorded the unveiling ceremony, which you can watch here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nbwl5tVZ9go
Tom Petty Park also includes three named recreational facilities: the Petty Pitch Parks, which has three baseball fields with dugout benches inscribed with Tom Petty’s name; Tom Petty Dog Park, which has two enclosed areas for small and large canines to play off-leash; and Petty Points Court, tennis and racquetball courts.
The park is also the site of the Tom Petty Historical Marker, unveiled Oct. 13, 2024. To learn more about the dedication ceremony attendees for the state of Florida marker, see this Visit Gainesville page:
https://www.visitgainesville.com/event/dedication-ceremony-for-the-tom-petty-state-historic-marker/
Photo by Shawn Murphy
Tom Petty State Historical Marker, erected in his honor in 2024
Tom Petty State Historical Marker, erected in his honor in 2024
Tom Petty Park, 1224 NE 5 Terrace, Gainesville, FL 32601
https://maps.app.goo.gl/f4AjiZ9637YUCkgp7
Tom Petty Park is the site of the Tom Petty Historical Marker, which was unveiled Oct. 13, 2024. The state of Florida marker is located on the south side of the park, near the Tom Petty Dog Park, at the intersection of NE 13th Avenue and NE 5th Terrace.
Speakers for the marker unveiling were: Harvey Ward, mayor of Gainesville; Jeff Goldstein, president, chair and founder of the Gainesville Music History Foundation; Melanie Barr, a Gainesville historian and co-director of the Gainesville Music History Foundation; Mike Boulware, co-director of the Gainesville Music History Foundation; and Bruce Petty, Tom Petty’s brother.
Danny Roberts, an original member of Mudcrutch, was a guest speaker. He talked about the Jeff Goldstein-promoted farewell to Gainesville concert in 1974 at Westside Park that raised the gas money for the band to drive to California with the dream of making it big.
Note that Westside Park is located 3.5 miles west of here (1001 NW 34th St.). You can learn more about this Mudcrutch concert site and navigate to it by going to the this section of Trail Stops on this website:
https://tompettytrail.com/teen%2B-years
And Roberts talked about the Church Studio recordings in Tulsa for Shelter Records, which yielded songs that were on the first Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers album in 1976, after Mudcrutch had disbanded.
To learn more about the Church Studio recordings, go here:
https://thechurchstudio.com/tom-pettys-journey-at-the-church-studio/
Bruce Petty, the final speaker, got emotional while talking about "Tommy," who was "a good brother."
"I miss my brother every day," Bruce said before immediately sobbing, bending over to brace himself with hands on knees. Standing up, he continued, "I wish we were together every day, sipping another beer, listening to music."
He reminisced about family reunions at which their children and grandchildren were all together. And he talked about Tom's legacy.
"His music continues to touch people," he said. "Everywhere I go, I hear his music," listing places he had recently heard Tom Petty's music played or performed. "His music really touches people. It's such a great legacy that he can leave us all this amazing music that will carry on forever -- and I can't ask for anything better than that."
To watch the full marker dedication ceremony, captured by Vicki Bordeaux, on Facebook, go here:
https://www.facebook.com/100000037907570/videos/866195695637143/
Or on YouTube, go here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lvOwqVn4o7k
Photo of front of marker by Shawn Murphy
Tom Petty Pitch Parks, located in Tom Petty's childhood park
Tom Petty State Historical Marker, erected in his honor in 2024
Tom Petty Park, 501 NE 16th Ave., Gainesville, FL 32609
https://maps.app.goo.gl/k2kRXR4JeQMyhoK16
On the NE 16th Avenue side (the north side) of Tom Petty Park is the site of Petty Pitch Parks: three baseball fields with dugout benches inscribed with Tom Petty’s name.
Formerly called Northeast Park, this is where Tom and friends played as children. It was renamed Tom Petty Park on Oct. 20, 2018, what would have been Tom's 68th birthday. The City of Gainesville videorecorded the unveiling ceremony, which can be seen here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nbwl5tVZ9go
The park is also the site of Tom Petty State Historical Marker, which was unveiled and dedicated on Oct. 13, 2024, near the Tom Petty Dog Park, at the intersection of NE 13th Avenue and NE 5th Terrace. To learn more about the marker dedication ceremony, see this Visit Gainesville page: https://www.visitgainesville.com/event/dedication-ceremony-for-the-tom-petty-state-historic-marker/
Photo by Shawn Murphy
Tom Petty Dog Park, a place for dogs on the run, just don't tell Spike
Tom Petty Dog Park, a place for dogs on the run, just don't tell Spike
Tom Petty Park, 1224 NE 5 Terrace, Gainesville, FL 32601
https://maps.app.goo.gl/rUdFeU9gHuK5q2DS7
Tom Petty Dog Park, which has two enclosed areas for small and large canines to play off-leash, is located in Tom Petty Park, the former Northeast Park where Tommy Petty and friends played as children. It was renamed Tom Petty Park on Oct. 20, 2018, what would have been Tom's 68th birthday. The City of Gainesville videorecorded the unveiling ceremony, which you can watch here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nbwl5tVZ9go
The park is also the site of the Tom Petty Historical Marker, unveiled Oct. 13, 2024. To learn more about the dedication ceremony attendees for the state of Florida marker, see this Visit Gainesville page:
https://www.visitgainesville.com/event/dedication-ceremony-for-the-tom-petty-state-historic-marker/
The state of Florida marker is on the south side of the park, near the Tom Petty Dog Park, at the intersection of NE 13th Avenue and NE 5th Terrace.
While you are at the Tom Petty Dog Park, watching the dogs run around, you might listen to "Dogs on the Run," a song from the 1985 album "Southern Accents" by Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers. While the lyrics topically have nothing to do with canines, it still feels like an appropriate song to hear while here. You can listen to the song here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JV5F1C2NLdI
Part of the song lyrics are as follows:
"I fell overboard and washed up on a beach,
Let the waves and sand roll over me.
I was helped to the home of a young bleached blonde,
Who said, 'Honey, I discovered early in life
There's ways of getting anything I want.'
Yeah, some of us are different,
It's just something in our blood.
There's no need for explanations,
We're just dogs on the run.
It's just dogs on the run."
Photo by Shawn Murphy
Petty Points Court, where racquet games are played in Tom Petty Park
Tom Petty Dog Park, a place for dogs on the run, just don't tell Spike
Tom Petty Park, 501 NE 16th Ave, Gainesville, FL 32601
https://maps.app.goo.gl/L7J7dHUBg45QsBZj9
Petty Points Court, which has several tennis and racquetball courts, is located in Tom Petty Park, the former Northeast Park is where Tommy Petty and friends played as children. It was renamed Tom Petty Park on Oct. 20, 2018, what would have been Tom's 68th birthday. The City of Gainesville videorecorded the unveiling ceremony, which you can watch here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nbwl5tVZ9go
Tom Petty Park also includes these named recreational facilities: the Petty Pitch Parks, which has three baseball fields with dugout benches inscribed with Tom Petty’s name, and Tom Petty Dog Park, which has two enclosed areas for small and large canines to play off-leash.
The park is also the site of the Tom Petty Historical Marker, unveiled Oct. 13, 2024. To learn more about the dedication ceremony attendees for the state of Florida marker, see this Visit Gainesville page: https://www.visitgainesville.com/event/dedication-ceremony-for-the-tom-petty-state-historic-marker/
Photo by Shawn Murphy
Burt Ames Scout Camp, home to Petty's Troop 84, Falcon Patrol
Boy Scout Camp Echockotee, where Petty and tentmate were homesick
Boy Scout Camp Echockotee, where Petty and tentmate were homesick
100-198 NE 4th Ave, Gainesville, FL 32601
https://maps.app.goo.gl/QRc44BaQ3yPgKzqt6
The Burt Ames Scout Cabin is where neighborhood childhood friends Tom Petty and Keith Harben were campmates at overnight mini-retreats for their Boy Scout Troop 84, Falcon Patrol.
It is likely that Tom Petty recalled these childhood years when he and the Heartbreakers performed “You Are My Sunshine” during the band’s 20-night residency at The Fillmore in San Francisco in 1997, which was included in the “Live at the Fillmore 1997” box set released in 2022. Petty introduces the song, “Here’s a song I learned at camp."
To hear the band's rendition of the song, go here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OSSjlreHKos
The website for the Burt Ames Scout Cabin lets us know that Troop 84 is still available for boys ranging in age from 6 to 12, as noted here:
Photo by Shawn Murphy
Boy Scout Camp Echockotee, where Petty and tentmate were homesick
Boy Scout Camp Echockotee, where Petty and tentmate were homesick
Boy Scout Camp Echockotee, where Petty and tentmate were homesick
2513 Doctors Lake Dr, Orange Park, FL 32073
https://maps.app.goo.gl/qc2gWcsHCURNb7oh7
This Orange Park, Florida, property on Doctors Lake, an offshoot of the St. John's River, is owned by the Boys Scouts of America. It was once the location of a two-week summer Boy Scout retreat at Camp Echockotee attended by two young children who were neighborhood friends from Gainesville. Their names were Tom Petty and Keith Harben, who were representing Troop 84, Falcon Patrol. They stayed together in a tent with cots. The boys had been warned to be aware of rabid racoons. One night, as Keith recounted to me, he and Tom started screaming when they thought one of these racoons had made its way into their tent. It turned out to be a stray dog, about which they had a good laugh. Keith also recalled how homesick they were -- and how thrilled they were when their moms visited them one day.
Photo courtesy of Florida Memory, State Library and Archives of Florida
Alachua County govt. building, where Tom's mom worked
Boy Scout Camp Echockotee, where Petty and tentmate were homesick
The Duckpond, where Tom Petty caught crawfish and fed ducks
22 SE 1st St, Gainesville, FL 32601
https://maps.app.goo.gl/qBEHC2GtScN3RMuSA
Tom Petty’s mother, Katherine “Kitty” (Avery) Petty, worked here for many years in this Alachua County government building in downtown Gainesville.
“My mom worked in the tax collector’s office in Gainesville selling car registrations and license plates,” Petty told Paul Zollo for the 2005 book Conversations with Tom Petty. “She worked there quite a long time” (pg. 7).
Today in this downtown Gainesville government complex you will still find the Alachua County Tax Collector’s office and the Driver License and Motor Vehicles Service Center, along with other county administrative offices. Directly across SE 1st Street is Bo Diddley Plaza. You can see this Tom Petty Trail stop on this page for the Bo Diddley Sidetrail:
https://tompettytrail.com/bo-diddley-sidetrail
On the next block south of here – just 300 feet away – is Lillian’s Music Store (112 SE 1st St.). While today this is a bar called Lillian’s Music Store, it once was an actual music store frequented by Tom Petty in his youth, during the years his mom was working in the nearby government building. Lillian’s Music Store is named in the Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers’ song “Dreamville,” from the 2002 album “The Last DJ” with this lyric:
“Goin’ down to Lillian’s Music Store
To buy a black diamond string
Gonna wind it up on my guitar
Gonna make that silver sing
Like it was Dreamville
A long time ago
A million miles away
All the trees were green
In Dreamville”
You can listen to the song here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ViczcWEHgaY
Keith Harben, who was Tom Petty’s lifelong friend and lived in Tom’s neighborhood through their childhood and teen years, recalled to me that he was with Tom when he purchased from the store a set of black diamond strings, which were hung on the wall to the left as you walked through the front door. Keith noted that Kitty Petty, on her way to work downtown, drove them to Lillian’s Music Store that day. After getting the guitar strings, Tom and Keith walked the mile and a half back home.
Tom would later strum these strings on his acoustic guitar. And much later would pen the nostalgic song lyrics.
You can see the Tom Petty Trail stop for Lillian’s Music Store on this page: https://tompettytrail.com/lyrical-threads-vol-1
Photo by Shawn Murphy
The Duckpond, where Tom Petty caught crawfish and fed ducks
Jernigan’s Motion Picture Service, owned by Elvis-introduction uncle
The Duckpond, where Tom Petty caught crawfish and fed ducks
Duck pond, Duckpond neighborhood, Gainesville, FL 32601(alongside NE Blvd., between NE 6th Ave. and NE 5th Ave.)
https://maps.app.goo.gl/3c8hgrJPYgojXqjK9
The Sweetwater Branch Creek in Gainesville, which runs alongside Northeast Boulevard, broadens into a duck pond for a block, between Northeast 6th Avenue and Northeast 5th Avenue. It is here, at the duck pond in Gainesville’s Duckpond neighborhood, where Tom Petty went as a child. There he would try to catch crawfish with Keith Harben, a good friend from his neighborhood. Or he would be there on a family outing, playing with his younger brother, Bruce, or feeding the ducks with his cousins.
Thanks to Keith, I was able to watch a home movie that was given to him by the Darnell twin sisters, Sadie and Norma, Tom Petty’s cousins (their mother, Lottie, was the sister of Tom’s mother, Kitty). In the color video, you can see 1950s-era cars parked along the tree-lined street while the children gleefully feed the ducks – a lovely time capsule of that family moment. After seeing that video, I went there and stood alongside the duck pond and replayed that home movie in my mind.
I found the Petty-Darnell home movies to be even more moving because I recalled having read a 2005 article in The Gainesville Sun about when the Darnell sisters showed them to the Petty family while visiting their home in California in the early 2000s, and how that nostalgic experience was so emotional for them.
The home movie combines color footage from various Petty-Darnell family get-togethers while its soundtrack is the songs of Tom Petty, namely “Wildflowers” and “Southern Accents.” Shot in the mid-to-late 1950s or very early 1960s, it shows the Darnell and Petty children celebrating a birthday on a front lawn, pushing one another in a motorless go-cart along a street, and enjoying a day at the beach. (See related Tom Petty Trail stop for Daytona Beach here: https://tompettytrail.com/lyrical-threads-vol-1) We also see children hunting for Easter eggs, including a slightly older-looking Tom, who has his hair spiked like Elvis Presley, with whom he became obsessed after meeting him on a film set in the summer of 1961, an introduction made possible by his uncle, Earl Jernigan. (See related Tom Petty Trail stop for Ocala here: https://tompettytrail.com/buried-treasure)
The home movie is edited in a way so that we see spiky-haired Tom, while on his quest for Easter eggs, standing aside his mother, Kitty, who is seated, while we hear the heart-wrenching “Southern Accents” lyric in which the song’s narrator describes a vision of seeing his deceased mother, standing with him “for just a minute”:
“There’s a dream I keep having
Where my mama comes to me
And kneels down over by the window and says a prayer for me”
“Upon seeing the scene, the room fell still, Sadie Darnell said,” according to the report in the Sun. “The rock star in the Malibu mansion was genuinely overwhelmed. ‘It was just a really warm moment,’ she recalled. ‘It just felt right.’”
To read this account from the Sun, go here:
https://www.gainesville.com/story/news/2005/10/30/book-explores-petty-s-area/31464775007/
Or here:
https://www.thepettyarchives.com/archives/newspapers/2000s/2005-10-30-gainesvillesun
In this Sun article, Tom Petty expresses to the reporter his nostalgia for his Gainesville hometown.
“I remember a lot about Gainesville, such a lovely place to grow up. Just incredible growing up there.” Petty is quoted as saying. “It was really special there. It was so great. Sometimes I have this fantasy of buying one of those houses by the Duck Pond and moving there. I loved it there. I really did.”
Photo by Shawn Murphy
Jernigan’s Motion Picture Service, owned by Elvis-introduction uncle
Jernigan’s Motion Picture Service, owned by Elvis-introduction uncle
Jernigan’s Motion Picture Service, owned by Elvis-introduction uncle
3019 NE 20th Way, Gainesville, FL 32609
https://maps.app.goo.gl/vcpuCgarfYSR2BDo8
One of Tom Petty’s uncles, Earl Jernigan, ran for decades a successful film production business here out of a nondescript building in the northeast quadrant of Gainesville (3019 NE 20th Way). The company, Jernigan’s Motion Picture Service, took on many videography projects over its 49 years in business, including to help scout filming locations for Hollywood movies – one of which was “Follow That Dream,” which starred Elvis Presley. The movie was shot on location throughout Florida, including downtown Ocala at the then-named Commercial Bank & Trust Co. (203 East Silver Springs Blvd.), where 10-year-old Petty met Presley – and sparked his interest in living a musical life.
Uncle Jernigan, as he was called, invited Tom to go to Ocala one day in the summer of 1961 to watch filming and to meet Elvis. When Jernigan introduced Tom to him, Elvis briefly nodded and shook his little hand. Tom stood still, stunned and speechless, yet smiling. Petty told Warren Zanes for the 2015 book Petty: The Biography: “I caught the fever that day, and I never got rid of it. That’s what kicked off my love of music. And I never thought much about rock ‘n’ roll until that moment.”
Earl Jernigan, who died in 1998, ran Jernigan’s Motion Picture Service from 1938 to 1987. He helped Hollywood when it came to Florida, but from 1958 to 1961 he also did the underwater camerawork for TV’s “Sea Hunt,” which was filmed in Silver Springs. And he helped document life in Gainesville for half a century; in doing so, Jernigan helped document its history. He even produced local newsreels that were shown before movies shown at the Florida Theater at 233 West University Ave., a place where Tom Petty and his childhood friend Keith Harben would go on Saturdays. Expanding his business from motion pictures to video, Jernigan recorded video of events in the city and on the campus of the University of Florida, many of which were sought by TV stations across Florida. His final production was “The Gainesville Movie Album,” a retrospective of six decades of Gainesville’s history. Two DVD copies now reside in the special collections at Alachua County regional library, 401 East University Ave.
To learn more about Earl Jernigan, who died in 1998, read this Gainesville Sun article:
https://www.gainesville.com/story/news/2004/05/26/lights-camera-history/31666625007/
A special thanks to Phil Chiocchio and Erik Emerson for helping to provide leads on this location.
Photo by Scott W. Smith, courtesy of Screenwriting from Iowa blog