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St. Petersburg Times

‘Cow Palace’ attracted music greats

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The block structure was built in 1957, without heat or air conditioning, according to records kept by the Pasco County Property Appraiser’s Office.

It was located in Carver Heights, a predominantly black neighborhood where many people lived hard-scrabble lives.

Scott Place, left, and Al Brown are hoping planned restorations can save the historic Cow Palace in Dade City. (Courtesy of the Chitlin’ Circuit Preservation Society)

And, during the next 20 years, the building attracted performers who would become some of the biggest names in soul-blues and R&B music.

Each of those musicians would travel down Bull Road — still a dirt lane southeast of Dade City. They would go past Ferguson Lake to make their way to the stage, inside the block structure.

It was a venue with a spacious dance floor and ornate Spanish-tiled bar.

And, that’s where bar-goers, who could get rowdy, had the chance to see performances by B.B. King or Ray Charles.

More often than not, people could hear the loud music outside as they passed the open pastures, as they did on the night that James Brown played.

Despite its remote location and wild weekends, this block structure became a juke joint variously known as “Rabbit’s Place,” “Jake’s Lakeside Tavern” and the “Cow Palace.”

It was part of the so-called “Chitlin’ Circuit,” which the National Public Radio defines as “a touring circuit that provided employment for hundreds of black musicians and brought about the birth of Rock ’n’ Roll.”

Glenn Thompson, secretary of the Pasco County Historical Society, said the circuit’s name “derives from the soul food item chitterling” which is made from stewed pig intestines.

Thompson is a big fan of the local Chitlin’ Circuit Preservation Society, co-founded by Scott Place, which is seeking funding to restore and save one of Florida’s historic blues clubs.

“We want to be like the Bradfordville Blues Club in Tallahassee,” Place said. That juke joint was shuttered for nearly 20 years before it reopened in the 1990s.

The dance floor and bar at the Cow Palace as it looked in April 2016.

Place also points to other success stories on the old Chitlin’ Circuit, such as the Jackson House in Tampa, the Manhattan Casino in St. Petersburg and the Cotton Club in Gainesville.

Place, a Dade City blues musician who performs under the name “Howlin’ Buzz,” hopes future generations will have a chance to know more about the Cow Palace and its historic links to stars like King, a relatively unknown artist who brought a Chitlin’ Circuit tour to the Cow Palace in the late 1950s.

Buddy Guy played at the Cow Palace early in his career and was later inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame by Eric Clapton and B.B. King on March 14, 2005.

Writing on his Facebook page, Guy said: “The tone (B.B. King) got out of that guitar, the way he shook his left wrist, the way he squeezed the strings…Man, he came out with that, and it was all new to the whole guitar-playin’ world.”

The Cow Palace attracted stars and fans to a very poor neighborhood.

“There was nothing like that anywhere in Tampa Bay,” recalled George Romagnoli, in a news report published 25 years ago.

First subdivided in 1946 by Stanley Cochrane, the subdivision where the Cow Palace sits likely was named after the renowned botanist George Washington Carver, according to Bill Dayton, a member and former chairman of the Dade City Historic Preservation Advisory Board.

“Maybe he had an admiration for Carver,” Dayton told The St. Petersburg Times in 1998.  “Or maybe he just thought it was an appropriate name for a black subdivision,” Dayton added.

No regularly hosted events have been held at the Cow Palace since the mid-1970s, but a jam session there two years ago drew approximately 100 musicians and guests.

“We found out there was no commercial zoning, and that’s what we need for live entertainment in the future,” Place said.

Even with rezoning issues and the challenges of restoration, Place believes people would stand in line to enter the Cow Palace as they did 50 years ago.

“They would admit as many people as possible (back then). But, there was only one way in — or out,” Place said, with a smile.

To find out more about the Cow Palace and efforts to restore it, email .

Doug Sanders has a penchant for unearthing interesting stories about local history. His sleuthing skills have been developed through his experiences in newspaper and government work. If you have an idea for a future history column, contact Doug at .

Published May 24, 2017

Brick roads preserve a sense of history

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When four people tripped and fell during Dade City’s Church Street Christmas celebration in 2000, the incident triggered an unexpected outcome.

The strollers were enjoying a holiday outing when they stumbled across holes in the street where asphalt paving had worn through to the brick street beneath.

This company logo is frequently found on the brick streets in Dade City. In 1933, the Southern Clay Manufacturing Company had contracts with Miami, Jacksonville, St. Augustine and St. Petersburg. At least 80,000 bricks were made daily for streets. The company also made fire and chemical bricks, clay sewer pipe, various construction bricks and telephone line conduit. (Photos courtesy of Doug Sanders)
This company logo is frequently found on the brick streets in Dade City. In 1933, the Southern Clay Manufacturing Company had contracts with Miami, Jacksonville, St. Augustine and St. Petersburg. At least 80,000 bricks were made daily for streets. The company also made fire and chemical bricks, clay sewer pipe, various construction bricks and telephone line conduit.
(Photos courtesy of Doug Sanders)

The city’s director of public works, Ron Ferguson, reported at a January 2001 City Commission meeting that no one was injured.

But, what to do about the holes in the street?

According to records obtained from Angie Guy, Dade City’s city clerk, a consensus was reached.
The city’s historic preservation advisory board recommended that city crews “strip asphalt from Church Avenue” and make repairs with salvaged brick and new brick, if necessary, “to significantly enhance historic preservation in Dade City.”

The City Commission agreed to the brick restoration “after considerable discussion and on recommendation of staff.”

Removing the asphalt without damaging the bricks would prove to be no easy task, according to a St. Petersburg Times report from some 16 years ago.

“With all the work that has to be done just on a daily basis, we did not think we could do it,” Ferguson told the newspaper.

On April 5, 2001, the city started a “pilot program” with five city employees, a Bobcat Skill loader, a Caterpillar backhoe, a 10-yard dump truck, and some improvised hand tools.

In his progress report to the City Commission, Ferguson indicated that a 2-inch layer of asphalt had been cleared on Church Avenue from Eighth Street to 17th Street.

Work was done “after 9:30 a.m., to allow school traffic time to leave the area,” Ferguson’s report said.

Stanley Burnside, born in 1920, and his father Archie Burnside, served a combined total of 17 terms as the Pasco County Clerk of the Circuit Court. The younger Burnside graduated from Pasco High School in 1937.
Stanley Burnside, born in 1920, and his father Archie Burnside, served a combined total of 17 terms as the Pasco County Clerk of the Circuit Court. The younger Burnside graduated from Pasco High School in 1937.

Additional equipment was needed to clean “fine pieces of crushed asphalt and dirt” by using a tractor equipped with a water tank and the city’s street sweeper.

It cost a total of $4,133.78 to expose the layer of red bricks that had been laid more than 70 years ago.

Each one of the bricks was from the Southern Clay Manufacturing Company, in Robbins, Tennessee.

Ninety-six-year-old Stanley Burnside lives near Church Avenue, which is the only street in Pasco County designated a national historic site.

To him, the brick streets bring back memories of a different era when people were riding in Model-T Fords and Warren G. Harding was the 29th President of the United States.

On a recent Sunday afternoon, Burnside agreed to walk the two blocks from his townhome in downtown Dade City to the corner of 12th Street and Meridian Avenue.

Standing at the same spot as he did in 1927, he is photographed with Rodney B. Cox Elementary School over his right shoulder.

“I was 7 years old, but I still remember them laying down the brick by hand,” Burnside recalled.

From Meridian Avenue heading north, the brickwork was laid without any mortar and was headed straight to what was then the Dade City Grammar School, at the far end of 12th Street.

Burnside often walks past this same corner on his daily walks, which sometimes gives him time to think about the brick streets in Dade City.

“You might say they last forever,” says Burnside, who celebrated his 96th birthday on May 23.

Over the years, maintaining the brick streets has posed its share of challenges.

City Manager Ben Bolan described some of them in a 1988 interview with The Tampa Tribune.

Because of the difficulty in finding skilled labor to do the maintenance work, Bolan recommended that Fifth Street and 10th Street be repaved, due to sections of those brick streets being uneven, creating a potential hazard, if drivers didn’t slow down.

But, the consensus of the City Commission was the same then as it was for Church Avenue.

“(The Commission’s) general philosophy is that there will never be another brick street paved over in Dade City,” Bolan was quoted by the newspaper 28 years ago.

And, to this day, there hasn’t been.

Doug Sanders has a penchant for unearthing interesting stories about local history. His sleuthing skills have been developed through his experiences in newspaper and government work. If you have an idea for a future history column, contact Doug at