Tampa Grocery Co had four stores in south Tampa when this shot was taken in 1927. Neighborhood grocery stores were an essential part of everyday life in the 1920s. This photo looks like a minor accident scene with the car on the left in the intersection dented and debris strewn in the road. It is interesting to see the track switching or crossing gate tower behind the car, monitoring rail traffic on South Howard at Watrous. It has long since been automated and removed. The crossing was the scene of a fatal accident in 1925, killing the wife of a prominent attorney.

Bern Laxer and his wife Gert purchased a small bar in the grocery building in 1956 and started what would become the widely acclaimed and celebrated Bern’s Steak House. Their operation eventually took the entire block. The white building in the new photo is the back of their restaurant. In 1974, construction of the South Crosstown Expressway began, stretching along the CSX Railway corridor. The overpass for the elevated road is seen here. Now known as the Lee Roy Selmon Expressway, named after a beloved and talented Tampa Bay Buccaneer Pro Bowl Hall of Famer, it opened to traffic in 1976.

 © Chip Weiner. All rights reserved