[simms3_redux]

Tampa and Jax are similar in so many ways and share a competitive past together. The unique thing about Tampa was its mafia and old Cuban past (Tampa had a strong family that ran its cigar business and employed thousands of Cubans before Miami even existed). The unique thing about Jacksonville was its industrialist past whereby the likes of William Astor, Alfred duPont, Henry Flagler and countless others called the place home and built the place up. Jacksonville was always about 50% larger than Tampa and so stole all of Tampa's cigar business (think Swisher Brothers, who moved down from PA and started Swisher Cigars, which are still rolled in Jax in a large warehouse). Miami/Palm Beach stole all of Jacksonville's appeal for wealthy northerners by the late teens/early 20s. Orlando was an orange grove and air base until the 1970s and was pretty much irrelevant except for the past 30 years. Tampa metro did not pass Jax until the 60s and I believe South FL didn't pass Jax in population until either the 40s or 50s, but both exploded in the 50s-70s and then SoFLa just kept on going whereas Tampa also began to slow down. Not sure about Tampa's post-20s history, but Jax only became a southern backward city in the 40s and was actually one of the most progressive before. The city totally reversed course in the 40s, 50s and 60s when Alfred duPont's wife's brother, Ed Ball, became mayor and tolled all roads into downtown and wiped out much of the city's building stock so he could build suburbs as friendly favors to his landowning friends. St. Pete has probably the best overall downtown in FL, though it's smaller, but Pinellas County is literally where people come to die and the overall county is scary old and boring and pretty run down.