The Old JOSFC Club House is now History!

This building has served us for the last 35 years, and Saturday 3/26/2022 we emptied it out so it could be torn down by the City, as they complete the new Mayport Community Center.    We had a large crew show up to get all of our stuff ( We fishermen don’t have junk, it is valuable STUFF. ) out and moved into both our rented storage room and the storage container that the City provided for us.

I anticipated that we would be working until 1:00 or 2:00 PM at least, but we had a great and large crew show up and we were finished by 10:30 AM!

One cool thing that happened was we got to see the USS ORLECK come in the river.  The USS ORLECK served us from September 1945, before the Korean war, until she was decommissioned in 2000.  The USS Orleck is the most-decorated post-World War II ship and received 14 battle stars and dozens of awards.

  It was exciting to see this grand old fighting ship arrive as we were ending an era of meeting in the old club house.

In 2 and a half hours we went from this to the below photos.

  Below is the history of the JOSFC Club House, 1987 to 2022. Our meeting place for 35 years.

A short history of The “Mayport Community Center”
(AKA) The Jacksonville Offshore Sport Fishing Club’s “Club House”

In 1987 the Jacksonville Offshore Sport Fishing Club ( JOSFC ) acquired the double wide trailer for their club house and were looking for a location to place it.
There was plenty of room at the rear of the Michael B Scanlon Boat Ramp, a City of Jacksonville Park, (AKA) the Mayport Boat Ramp.
After some short negotiations an agreement was reached with the City for the JOSFC to donate the trailer to the city in exchange for the JOSFC being able to use it as their Club House. The JOSFC had first usage of the building for free as the JOSFC is a “Not For Profit Charitable Organization”. The JOSFC had to provide a list of dates we would want to use it and those dates would be locked out on the Parks & Rec. calendar.
The rest of the year the building was able to be rented for other activities by the community. People had to go to Hanna Park rent it, and to get the key. Other Non-Profit organizations could use it for free also, but they still had to go to Hanna Park to do the paperwork and get the key.
The building was placed on the Boat Ramp property in late 1987, and in February 1988 the building was officially donated to the City.
The Building at that time had stairs to the front door. The JOSFC members, with the City’s permission, and at their own expense built the porch and the ramp to make it ADA compliant as well as the roof over most of the porch.
A couple years later, again with the City’s permission, the JOSFC built the Gazebo with the telephone pole for our VHF Antenna, the roof and Scale. All at the JOSFC’s expense.
With the exception of the Air-Conditioners, for the last 30 years the JOSFC members have done all the physical maintenance on the building. In the last 15 years the JOSFC has re-built and upgraded the bathrooms, bought and installed new windows, doors, repaired the porch and railings and re-roofed the trailer.
The JOSFC owns the refrigerator, freezer, and microwave and coffee maker. The JOSFC have also bought and replaced every table and chair in the building as the original 1988 furniture had all broken and worn out. The JOSFC has also obtained the cabinets in the kitchen area and installed them.
In short the Mayport Village Association, and the Mayport Waterfront Partnership would not have had a place to meet without the continued work and money that the JOSFC have invested in the building and community.
For the last 35 years the JOSFC with it’s El Cheapo Sheepshead Tournament ( We are bigger than the Greater Jax Kingfish Tournament, 350 to over 400 boats every year. ) and club activities have been a tremendous economic boost to all of Mayport, Singletons, Safe Harbor, the convenience store, Mayport Marine and the Ferry ( We supported it during the fight to keep it. )
With all that in mind, we hope to continue to support Mayport as a fishing village and its businesses.