This article originally written by Paige Gutierrez with the title "Old Biloxi Piers". Paige is a local Biloxi writer for BNews Monthly, the monthly newsletter of the City of Biloxi. Photographs courtesy of the LHG Image Collection / Local History & Genealogy Department / Harrison County Library System unless otherwise specified.
An intrinsic and essential part of coastal life, piers are paths over the water for work or play, places to dock boats, to fish, to socialize, and to enjoy nature and scenery. Here is a selection of photos of piers in Biloxi in past years.
The photo above is of pier fishermen with their morning’s catch of Spanish mackerel on a postcard from the 1920s, when the abundant sea life of the Mississippi Sound and adjoining waters made the Mississippi coast a tourist destination for anglers. Photo from Lampton Historical Images Collection, MSU.
Working boats crowd a small pier on Biloxi’s Back Bay. The Back Bay neighborhood was one of Biloxi’s waterfront neighborhoods where seafood docks, factories, and workers were concentrated. Photo from MDAH, Randazzo Collection.
Men and boys sitting on facing benches on a pier on Biloxi’s Back Bay, with sailing schooners in the background. Piers often served as gathering places. There is shade, suggesting trees nearby, likely large live oaks growing near the shoreline. Photo from MDAH, Randazzo Collection.
Presidential candidate Jimmy Carter makes a campaign speech from a pier near the foot of Oak Street in East Biloxi, on September 17, 1976, when seafood processing plants lined the east beach waterfront. Across from him is a pier for photographers, and beyond that approximately 2,000 people watch from a shell parking lot. Some hold signs that say “Shrimp Pickers for Carter.” Carter was elected president on November 2, 1976. Photo by The Times-Picayune.
The Biloxi waterfront, early twentieth century, showing numerous piers, many with piles of shells discarded into the water by oyster shuckers. Photo from Biloxi Library Local History and Genealogy Collection.
Men sunbathing on Keesler Field’s enlisted men’s pier, with sail boats and skiffs, 1942. Base officials saw their Back Bay waterfront site as an asset for recreation and fitness and provided for swimming, swimming lessons, boating, sailing regattas, speed boat races, and fishing contests, including an alligator gar tournament. A Keesler News editorial gave instructions on how to safely sunbathe without burning; this advice was especially aimed at “boys from the northern states, who don’t realize the intensity of a Gulf Coast sun until it’s too late.” Photo by Air Force’s Technical Training Command.
Twenty-year-old singer Elvis Presley shared a first kiss with Biloxian June Juanico on a pier in front of the White House Hotel, under a full moon, in June of 1955. The two had met earlier that evening at the Airman’s Club on Keesler Field, where Presley was performing. Source, Elvis in the Twilight of Memory by June Juanico. Photo from City of Biloxi Archives.
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