TAMPA, Fla – Ybor City is known for its history, and now that history will be in boldface type.
The developers behind the Gasworx project announced on Tuesday that three of their buildings will honor three crucial aspects of Ybor City’s past that made Tampa what it is today.
READ: $13M makeover set to transform St. Pete’s historic Palladium Theater
“The port that was created by downtown Tampa in the early 1900s, would not have been successful without the labor of the Longshoremen or the stevedores,” said Rodney Kite-Powell of the Tampa Bay History Center.
And now the stevedores will be someplace they never imagined: the marquee of a new apartment building overlooking the port where they loaded and unloaded goods.Â
The backstory:
Their union (at the time) insisted on good wages, which in turn pumped money into the newly-bustling city’s economy. Once again, they’re an engine for something new.
MORE: Historic Anna Maria Island cottage makes its way to new location
“By recognizing their accomplishments and by recognizing who came before us, you really get a much better sense of the city that you’re in,” said Kite-Powell.
The Stevedore is one of three new buildings that Gasworx developers are naming after what made Ybor City complete.
There would be no Ybor without Cuban immigrants, and indeed, it was the Olivette that brought them here.Â
The Olivette’s 10 stories of apartments and stores is named for a ship that brought those eager for a new life to Tampa, which, thanks to them, would one day be called the Cigar City.
READ: Efforts underway to revive Crystal River Historic Cemetery from decades of flooding, neglect
“That brought people literally from Cuba and Key West to Tampa to make Tampa grow from a small fishing village in 1880 to really a city by 1900,” said Kite-Powell.
Big picture view:
Gasworx will be a smorgasbord of buildings that developers hope will seamlessly link Ybor City with downtown, and also provide its 5,000 residents with a market, green space and a streetcar stop.Â
But what good is the new development if it isn’t anchored in Tampa’s past?
“You see the brick pavers, you see the roosters, and it’s just so much flavor to it,” said developer Graham Tyrell of Kettler Florida. “So clearly from day one, when we started designing buildings, we were really looking at that and telling our design team, hey, we want this to feel like it belongs.”
Cubans have always felt at home here, given Ybor is where José Martà organized support for uprisings in Cuba. Luisa Capetillo was an activist who worked as a lectore, perhaps the only female one, who read pamphlets to cigar rollers while they worked.Â
MORE: Shrimpers for life: A Tampa legacy on the line
What’s next:
Her name will grace a third building.
“They read news in the morning, and they read works of fiction in the afternoon,” said Kite-Powell, “and they were really the intellectual leaders of Ybor City in West Tampa.”
The buildings are slated to open throughout the next several years.
The Source: Information for this story was gathered by FOX 13 reporter Evan Axelbank.