Jumping Off
Ichetucknee bridge, Lake City, Florida 1967
Happy Birthday David
Do you know anything about
A Robert Lee and some other crazy person jumping off the Beach Blvd Bridge .....at night ? Asking for a friend :) Mike Ferrara
1963, I think, after a Hi-Y meeting, It was his idea. I didn’t think we were going to actually jump. My heart was in my throat when Robert leaped of the 35 foot high bridge. I knew I had to follow or forever be shamed at school. So I did. Butch Garvin shone an 8 cell flashlight on us from the boat ramp. We wore shoes but were not smart enough to wear gloves for the oyster shells on the bank.
Why would anyone jump off of a perfectly good bridge? Because it’s there, of course. Especially when you’re young and stupid.
I remember jumping off of the roof of our one story house in Druid Hill in 1957, in the 4th grade. I jumped off Pete Tyndall’s 2nd story deck twice during a party just to get attention in 1965. It’s no wonder my back is in poor condition in my old age. It’s a wonder it has held up as well as it has.
Mike Marvin and Tommie Frazer, and I’m sure others had jumped off the McCormick bridge before Robert Lee and me. Mike and Tommy were reported to have walked around the top ledge of the Prudential building in downtown Jacksonville. My senior year at Fletcher 64/65, we jumped off the bridge numerous times, as did Malcolm Marvin and Freddie Frazer. We made it a ritual to jump off after any track meets in town. Coach Poppel would ask us how come our uniforms were wet and muddy since it hadn’t rained. Rusty Johnston was a willing participant in these jumps. The bridge tender would come out and yell at us. It was a drawbridge. We jumped off 3 times some nights, 5 was the record. We never got busted by the cops.
After I rejoined the lifesaving corps in 1993, we jumped off the new pier at 4th Avenue North many times for “training”. the most fun was being in the water and watching the girlz’ hair fly up as they descended.
I jumped off the Nuuanu falls on Oahu a few times, I think it was only 20’ or so. NAS Jax has a 10 meter (30 feet) platform that we jumped off when we trained there. I dove off of it once, and only once. My head hurt for a few days. Kingsley Lake had a high platform but i don’t remember ever jumping off of it.
Kingsley Lake
Another version
Jumping Off Bridges
(and other things)
In the Spring of 1964, at Fletcher High School, Robert Lee, a senior, was telling his buddies he was going to jump off the McCormick bridge over the Intracoastal Waterway, on Beach Boulevard. I didn't think he was really going to do it, so I told him I would go along.
I think it was a school night, after a Hi-Y meeting, that about 30 of us boys drove to the boat ramp and parking lot near the bridge I remember Butch Garvin had a big flashlight, probably a 6 or 8 d-cell, it was long. Robert and I climbed up the embankment on the east side of the bridge and walked out to the middle on the north side. I thought we would have a laugh and walk back down. To my surprise and dismay, Robert leaped off the railing and hit the water about a second and a half later. The bridge was only about 35 feet or so above the water, but it was pretty intimidating to me.
I realized I would be labeled a "chicken" and would never hear the end of it if I didn't jump too. I took a deep breath and followed Robert into the water. I tried to keep my feet together and my arms straight over my head to lessen the impact. I went about 10 feet or so under the surface and swam over to the embankment where everyone had parked. We wore tennis shoes as the embankment was covered with barnacles and oyster shells.
My senior year some of my friends and I jumped off the bridge a few more times. We jumped off three times in a row one night. Malcolm Marvin and Freddy Frazer held the record of 5 times in one night. The bridge keeper (it was a drawbridge) would come out and yell at us, but he never called the police.
We jumped off the pier at 6th Avenue South in Jacksonville Beach numerous times. We jumped off the current pier at 4th Avenue North a few times as training for the lifeguards, but the City made us quit for liability reasons. During Hurricane Dora, Bob Rozear and I jumped off the south side of the south pier after getting swept through the pilings on a 10 foot wave. Miraculously, neither one of us hit a piling. We went out body surfing in front of the lifeguard station, couldn't get outside, and then couldn't get back in soon enough to avoid the pier, the north to south current was running so strong. The pier was closed, but we walked around the pavilion on a railing and jumped into the back of a wave on the south side. We caught the next one in and walked back to the station. We figured we deserved at least one wave for what we went through.
We jumped off the Jacksonville Beach pier at 6th Avenue South, numerous times. It was built in 1959 and burned down under mysterious circumstances, after Hurricane Floyd destroyed most of it past the pavilion. It was privately owned by Rhonda Bone's family.
I jumped off a construction pier (it was a temporary pier for building a drainage pipe) in Newport Beach, California, just south of Huntington Beach in the early 70's. It was about 7 am and I was the only one there.The waves were 6 to 8 feet and had good form. Jumping off the end of the pier saved me from a brutal paddle out. I caught a wave, dropped in, and made a right bottom turn, and started down the line. It was a nice right and I was flying. I looked down the line and saw it starting to close out as it got nearer to shore. I initiated a kick out which seemed to take forever. the white water was coming at me and it seemed like I was in slow motion. When I hit the lip, I went about 10 feet in the air and fell on the back side of the wave. The wave was so big, it just seemed like I was going slow. I rode the white water in, walked back out the pier and caught one more wave. By then some more surfers had arrived, and I called it a day. I don't remember ever jumping off the Huntington Beach pier, although I lived 2 blocks away on Main Street part of the time I lived in California.
I jumped off Nuuanu Falls on Oahu a few times. Seems like it was 20 feet or so.
I jumped off the 10 meter platform at NAS Jax pool several times. I tried diving off it once and got a big head ache.
I jumped off the Ichetucknee bridge near Lake City when we went tubing with the E Phi girls from Lake City.
I jumped off the bulkhead at Seagate Avenue in Neptune Beach in 1965 with John and Chip Wolfe to rescue an exchange student who had gone swimming in a Northeaster. It was high tide and the waves were crashing against the bulkhead over the rocks. We were called out of Fletcher High to respond. I was afraid to jump off the bulkhead because I didn't know where the rocks were. John Wolfe jumped off and didn't get hurt, so I jumped off in the same spot. We cross chested our victim and brought him in up the ramp.
I also jumped off of decks, roof tops, and out of trees, which is probably why my back is not in such good shape today, According to my chiropractor, Casey Morris, running also was hard on my disks.
12/19/2012
