Ormond Yacht Club

The Ormond Yacht Club located at 63 North Beach Street, in Ormond Beach, Volusia County, Florida was built over the Halifax River in 1910 and is connected to the river’s western shore by a 147’ walkway. It is a frame vernacular wooden structure and its two stories comprise 1,734 square feet under a medium pitch, hip roof (almost pyramidal). Set against a backdrop of blue water and Ormond Beach’s green tree lined peninsula on the Halifax’s eastern shore, ‘picturesque’ is a word commonly used for the building that overlooks the historic residential area of Ormond Beach. Approximately two hundred homes over 50 years old are within one mile of the Ormond Yacht Club. The building appears virtually unchanged although 16 new aluminum upstairs windows appear similar to the originals and asphalt shingles overlay the original wood roof shingles. Unseen, but in need of repair, is the foundation of concrete piers with wooden posts, some of which are in poor condition. Otherwise, the building is in good to very good condition. A walkway and boathouse once extended beyond the clubhouse but were destroyed by a storm many years ago and never rebuilt.

Originally called New Britain, the city of Ormond Beach was settled in 1873 on the banks of the Halifax River. The community began to develop after the arrival of the Florida East Coast Railway. Many of the early settlers built crude cabins and cottages adjacent to their orange groves. These gave way to more substantial homes and businesses.

The land immediately surrounding the Ormond Yacht Club was the original business district of Ormond, along with stately riverfront residences and orange groves just to the west. Directly across the river was the Ormond Hotel, a favorite stopping point for wealthy winter visitors to Florida, as well as, the Casements (also built in 1910) which later became the winter home of John D. Rockefeller. A few hundred yards along the riverbank to the south was a railroad bridge that brought the winter visitors to the Ormond Hotel. It has since been replaced with an automobile drawbridge and more recently a high rise bridge. The Ormond Yacht Club is located in the heart of what is now the historic district of Ormond Beach, Florida. Except for a few newer residences and commercial buildings, the setting appears much as it did ninety four years ago.

PHYSICAL DESCRIPTION

Exterior

The Ormond Yacht Club is an almost square; two story platform frame structure with a normal pitch hip roof (Photo 1). The building exhibits a modest boxlike shape with emphasis on the horizontal line which made it easy to frame and sheathe. It rests on a foundation of 24 concrete and/or coquina rock piers with wooden posts that suspend the 34’ x 26’ building above the Halifax River (Photo 2). A 147’ pressure treated pine walkway begins on the western shore and adjoins the southern and western sides of the club house (Photo 3). The architecture is likely frame vernacular that favors the Folk National style. Simple in design, the basic structural elements are 2" x 4" and 4" x 4" pine framing; 1" x 8" sheathing covered by hand split cedar shingles (Photo 4) and asphalt roof shingles. The gray, rustic look of shake shingle siding is set off by rough sawn, white painted cypress trim (Photo 5). This trim takes the form of 1" x 10" frieze and base boards, and the stories are separated by a 1" x 8" belt course.

The main, south facing facade of the building has two doors and four 3’ x 5’3" vertical 2/2 windows. The main, south facing door also has a screen door and a metal awning. The upper floor is ringed with sixteen 1/1 single hung aluminum windows with three each on the east and west sides; four on the north and six on the south side (Photo 6). Also, included on the second floor, western face is an old sign proclaiming:

The lower floor has a wider variety of fenestration. Walking up the dock to the building, the west elevation shows, at far left a door that opens to stairs that lead to the second floor (Photo 7). To the right of this door and centered is a large vertical window opening that is flanked by two horizontal, single pane awning windows. The east elevation faces the river and contains a central vertical window group consisting of one large ( 4’ x 5’3" ) 3/3 vertical window sandwiched between two narrow ( 1’4" x 5’3" ) 1/1 windows separated from the main window by mullions. This east facing group is also flanked by two 4’ x 2’4" horizontal awning style windows. Three north side first floor windows are similar to the others described and serve to provide daylight both to the stairs leading to the upstairs and for the small office space adjacent to the east facing reading room.

Much of the glazing in these downstairs windows is damaged or completely gone (due mostly to vandalism) and the openings are covered by shutters or plywood. The original appearance of the exterior has changed little over the years except that the upstairs windows are aluminum, not wood; the current asphalt shingle roof was once wood shingles; and the some of the downstairs windows are boarded, awaiting repair. These changes make little difference in the building’s appearance and were done for reasons of economy (roof, upstairs windows) and security (downstairs windows).

The interior of this 2-story building is also simple and rustic. The lower floor is divided into four rooms. Through the main door on the south side, you enter a 16’ x 19’ room that has housed a pool table since at least 1912 (Photo 8). Straight across the room is a wall that separates the pool room from a bathroom (accessible by a door on the left) and a small office (no access from the pool room). Behind the bathroom are the stairs to the second floor and are entered only from the exterior walkway. There is no ceiling in this room except for the exposed 2" x 6" joists that support the upstairs floor. Turning east leads to an opening from the pool room to the cards/reading/sitting room. This room is 14’ deep and runs the full 26’ width of the building. The east facing window group offers a breathtaking view of the Halifax River and the western shore of the Ormond Beach peninsula. A magnificent, monumental, native coquina rock and masonry fireplace sits at the northern wall of this room (Photo 9). The fourth room is a small office approximately 12’ x 10’.

Much of the interior woodwork is rough sawn cypress and pine and is stained a red mahogany color. While detail in the pool room is simple, the reading room does offer some more sophisticated carpentry including baseboards, wainscot, tongue & groove ceiling and walls including some in a herringbone pattern. There is also some crown molding in this room. The floors are 1" x 8" sub sheathing covered by unfinished 1" x 3" cypress flooring. Some of the foundation piers and floor joists that the downstairs floor rests on have deteriorated and has caused some buckling. Funding and permitting are in place to allow emergency repairs to begin, pending weather conditions and contractor schedules.

The interior of the second floor is accessed from the outside walkway through a door on the western face of the building. The 870 square foot second floor is open, except for a 9’ x 6’ bathroom. The same 1" x 3" flooring as the downstairs is interrupted only by a painted compass wheel. The upstairs has served as a meeting room for the club and for many other organizations over the years. The hand framed hip roof truss system (Photo 10) and the unfinished 2" x 4" walls give this room a rustic cabin-like feel and sixteen upstairs windows frame portraits of water, trees, shoreline and sky in this historic riverside community (Photos 11-13).

The most significant alteration to the building occurred during a metrological event. A pier and boathouse originally extended from the east wall of the building, out to the channel in the Halifax River. A few years after the Ormond Yacht Club was built, the pier and boathouse were destroyed in a storm and never rebuilt.

The overall appearance of the exterior of the Yacht Club building is largely unchanged. The pier out to the Yacht Club has had planks and pilings replaced. The original cedar shake roof has been overlaid with asphalt roof shingles and the upstairs windows have been replaced with aluminum windows that are visually similar to the originals. The interior remains virtually unchanged over the years.