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Gulfport park now groovy, not 'gross'
By ANGEL BEDINGHAUS ZENT GULFPORT -- Stephanie Wood, a Seminole Little League softball player for seven years, was sure they were in the wrong place. She's had plenty of at-bats in Tomlinson Lake Park, and the fields never looked like this. Stephanie, a Seminole High School junior, had even forewarned her mom, who was driving to the park for the first time. "I told her this place is gross and it's not going to be any fun," she said. "But then we got here, and it's all nice." Gulfport renovated the park during the Little League off-season -- an $800,000 project that includes a new softball field next to the concession stand and a renovated baseball field, a paved walkway along the park's perimeter, a larger pond for better drainage, and decorative lighting. The tennis courts became a skateboard park, and a toddler playground sprouted on the old John Race field. Grants and Penny for Pinellas money paid for it all. "This place blows Seminole (fields) away," said Seminole parent Brett Phillips, who has been driving his daughter to games in Gulfport for a few years. He always had the feeling the whole area was unsafe but now realized, as he looked around, the park "brought the neighborhood down." The city reopened Tomlinson Lake Park in January in time for the new season. The fields were dedicated and named for Lum Atkinson, a father of three girls who started volunteering for the league in 1957. He served as coach, league president and umpire. He worked the fields and concession stand just like everyone else. He took a break from the league until his grown daughter came to him with her son and said, "Daddy, you wanted a boy to play ball. Here he is." Atkinson went on and coached another generation of kids. Atkinson retired after 39 years with Florida Power. He is no longer involved with the league but can still be found at the ball fields most game nights. Atkinson thought the rededication of the fields should have recognized the original people who formed the league. Of those, the only one Atkinson knew was still alive was Nathan White, who had since moved to Spring Hill. "So I went up and talked to him and told him and he said, 'If anything, longevity should earn it. You've been there a long time,' " Atkinson said. "I'm very honored, my family is very excited and it does mean a lot." At the ceremony, Atkinson had a list of the kids who had graduated from the program. "They went all the way from college professor to fisherman, which is the life of Gulfport," Atkinson said. "There's a couple that had run into the law, I didn't mention them, but they're still the boys that played for me. The kids kept me in it, and my family." Jill Vines, community services director, said that except for installing a scorekeeper's table and public artwork, the park is finished. Everyone, she said, seems very satisfied with it. Nat and Priscilla Kidder of Gulfport, the parents of four children, have been coming to games at Tomlinson on and off for the past nine years. But last year, Priscilla said she decided to skip T-ball because of the condition of the park. "It was so dirty," Mrs. Kidder said. "All the kids would come home filthy because there was nothing but dirt for the kids to be in." But on a recent Saturday morning, they were in the new stands, again watching one of their children at bat. Mrs. Kidder said that while one child is playing baseball, the others can "feed the ducks, they can go on the skateboard thing, they can walk around, and they aren't playing in dirt." Neighborhood kids Katisha Diab, 12, and Becky King-Lusco, 10, said they make a day out of being at the park. They'll spend the morning riding the ramps at the skate park, then go home and change for their afternoon softball game, then finish the day with more skating. The girls think more variety in ramp sizes and swings for bigger kids would improve the park, but mom Suzanne King would like a pay phone installed so kids can call for help in an emergency. Senior girls coach Chuck Fitch has been coaching softball in Gulfport for 17 years. When the players returned this season, he said they were shocked. "That clay infield is the nicest clay infield I've ever been on, and I've been on quite a few softball fields over many years," Fitch said. "One thing nice about it is that field drains very well." When other leagues get rained out, Gulfport can still play. "It's just a beautiful field, a beautiful complex -- the whole park is beautiful," Fitch said. Before Wood and her teammates left Tomlinson Park after the season's first matchup with Gulfport senior girls, they would have another surprise. Gulfport beat them 7-3. "Not one girl on that team has ever beat Seminole, and some of those girls have been playing since they were 8, and now they're 16," Fitch said. It was also his first win against Seminole as a coach. "I know my girls take a lot of pride going out on that field because they realize they have probably the nicest field in District 5," he said. Genesis is mysterious GULFPORT -- No one knows the history of Tomlinson Lake Park for sure. City Clerk Louise Spence said their records show it dates before the city's incorporation in 1910, but how it was created or for whom it was named are not clear. A "Map of the Terminus of the St. Petersburg & Gulf Ry" is on display at the Gulfport Historical Society Museum and is dated 1905. Town historian Lynne Brown believes it was a promotional map for Veteran's City. Tomlinson, Chase and Hoyt parks are all marked on the map. Spence said records show that Alonzo A. Hoyt, a minister, Civil War veteran and land developer at the time, donated property for his park. Capt. J.P. Chase was a partner and promoter of Veteran's City and also a Civil War veteran, but records do not show how the park was established. Nothing is known about Tomlinson Park, but because of the time period, it's highly likely the park was named for Edwin H. Tomlinson. He served in the Civil War but is best remembered for his philanthropy in St. Petersburg at the turn of the 20th century. He started a vocational school in 1901, built St. Peter's Cathedral and the city's first hospital, provided money for a celebration that would become the Festival of States, and built the open-air post office. According to Lum Atkinson, Little League came to Tomlinson Park in the early 1950s. Teams were playing in Hoyt Park, but the league needed space for the younger boys. Atkinson said they petitioned the City Council for permission to expand into Tomlinson Park. Eventually, they had two fields and a concession stand.
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