St. Petersburg waterfront
This painting of the St. Petersburg waterfront as it appeared in the later 1920s was donated to the Museum by the Museums of Florida History Foundation as part of the Museum’s initiative to collect pre-World War II cityscape paintings showing the development of Florida’s cities. The hotel seen in the background is the Soreno Hotel. Built in 1924, it was one of several luxury hotels built in St. Petersburg at the height of the land boom in the mid–1920s. It represents the growth of the city’s waterfront area.
While researching the painting, and the buildings that appear in it, Museum curators learned that there was a connection to the 1992 action movie Lethal Weapon 3, starring Mel Gibson, Danny Glover, and Joe Pesci. Already scheduled for demolition in 1992, the Soreno Hotel was spectacularly blown up for a dramatic scene in the action movie Lethal Weapon 3.
(Painting of the St. Petersburg waterfront, Collection of the Museum of Florida History)
