{"id":406351,"date":"2026-09-21T17:10:10","date_gmt":"2026-09-21T17:10:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/406351\/"},"modified":"2026-09-21T17:10:10","modified_gmt":"2026-09-21T17:10:10","slug":"st-pete-celebrates-reopening-of-historic-manhattan-casino","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/406351\/","title":{"rendered":"St. Pete celebrates reopening of historic Manhattan Casino"},"content":{"rendered":"

ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. \u2014 The city of St. Petersburg celebrated the reopening of the historic Manhattan Casino<\/a>\u00a0on Saturday.<\/p>\n

The landmark had been closed since 2022 while undergoing a $5 million renovation. It once served as a cultural hub for the Black community during the Jim Crow era.<\/p>\n

For resident James Oliver, touring the newly renovated building was like walking down memory lane.<\/p>\n

\u201cAs a child at first, I used to have to stand out in the parking lot and listen through the window, no air conditioning,\u201d Oliver said.<\/p>\n

Over time, the 87-year-old said he was eventually able to step inside the event hall. He said it was a safe place in South St. Pete to dance, sing and simply enjoy life during a time when Black people had few places to gather.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen you came here, the whole neighborhood was here with you, and that made a big difference,\u201d Oliver said. \u201cGoing to a place where you know so many people and not others, well, here you knew everybody because most of us were from Jordan Park, which was a housing project just down on 9th. So, coming here was a joy.\u201d<\/p>\n

After several attempts to revive the century-old building, St. Pete Mayor Ken Welch said that $1 million in state funding helped the city breathe new life into it while preserving its history.<\/p>\n

\u201cBut the best way we can honor that history is to fill this building once again,\u201d Welch said. \u201cFill it with music, fill it with celebration, fill it with families, with neighbors, with artist, entrepreneurs and another generation of memories.\u201d<\/p>\n

Moving forward, the Manhattan Casino will be open to the public, hosting community events and milestones.<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd as this community continues to rise, this is going to be a wonderful space that everyone in our community is able to access,\u201d Council Vice Chair Richie Floyd said.<\/p>\n

As for Oliver, he said he is looking forward to seeing more young people step inside.<\/p>\n

\u201cSo many of them are unfamiliar with anything outside of their front door,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

But now, Oliver said they can visit the Manhattan Casino and leave with not only an understanding of its history but also a sense of pride.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. \u2014 The city of St. Petersburg celebrated the reopening of the historic Manhattan Casino\u00a0on Saturday.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":406352,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[23076,767,1011,1013,274,770,1190,2200,115,596,202,204,203,199,201,200,135,278,2032,835],"class_list":["post-406351","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-st-petersburg","tag-alexis-jones","tag-app-community","tag-app-human-interest","tag-app-latest-human-interest-stories","tag-app-top-stories","tag-community-news","tag-human-interest","tag-instagram-bn9","tag-news","tag-pinellas-county","tag-st-pete","tag-st-pete-headlines","tag-st-pete-news","tag-st-petersburg","tag-st-petersburg-headlines","tag-st-petersburg-news","tag-tampa","tag-top-stories","tag-trending-topics","tag-vod"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/406351","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=406351"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/406351\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/406352"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=406351"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=406351"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=406351"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}