A new coast town: White Harbor, Mississippi
By Guest Columnist Eddie Ware, Long Beach Historical Society
In 1894, the Beacon, a popular newspaper in Pass Christian, published an article telling about a new town between Pass Christian and Long Beach.
Several coast townsmen came together to create the town: John Lang of the Pass, James Thomas of Long Beach, F. Elmer of Biloxi, and C. W. Stewart and Pierre Michel, both of New Orleans. (Michel would later become a Long Beach homeowner.) There were also others involved.
The group wanted to see the long stretch of unoccupied beachfront land, as well as the interior to the railroad, between Long Beach and Miltenbergers, gain some new residents. Miltenbergers was a private residence with land extending from the beach all the way back to the railroad (common in the early days), where the trains also made stops. So, they laid it out and platted it as a new town, and named it for a natural harbor in the vicinity, White Harbor.
White Harbor was just that, a large, natural harbor, with plenty of white, glistening sand. It was actually the first port on the coast – and a natural one, at that. Saw mills were close by, including the Heirn sawmill, and schooners often came to White Harbor; anchored out front, and came ashore to purchase lumber, which would be floated out to them.
The railroad wasted no time in following suit, and, to enhance its own interests, built a new station on its rail line known as “White Harbor.” A wide avenue had already been cut from the beach back to the tracks, so the new little town had some very important conveniences early on.
The land of the new town was touted as being some of the finest on the coast for residential use and well-suited for vegetable farming, as well. The lots were offered at lower prices than in the adjoining towns; however, those involved soon became concerned that speculators might try to buy up the lots for resale at higher prices, which might, in turn, delay the settlement. But that didn’t happen.
In time, White Harbor became a populous section, and also for a time, included a Jesuit College.
Harrison County had also approved a road from Pass Christian to White Harbor and declared it to be public in 1897.
In 1908, the tiny town also had some trouble getting telephone service. There was a long list of folks who desired the convenience but did not want to pay for the poles and thought the request for them to do so was unfair and unjust discrimination. Creosoted poles were $5 at the time, and cypress poles were $2. Even when the price dropped to 5 cents a pole, these future customers still balked. They wanted fair play or none at all.
By December of 1909, the Coast Traction Company set up camp at White Harbor in preparation for extending the trolley to Pass Christian. It brought in mules, wagons, scrapers and laborers, and set up tents on the grounds in order to begin the task.
Once, when a search was ongoing for a hit and run driver, one of the officers suggested that he thought the auto involved was from White Harbor, but Marshall Klein reminded him that there were no autos, owned or being used presently, in 1910 in either Long Beach or White Harbor.
An ex-Memphis, Tennessee, resident, W. T. Nettles, resigned from a salaried position in that city just to move to White Harbor. He was well satisfied with his move to the area and was spotted in a Gulfport hardware store, Smith-Todd, buying 75 on- gallon preserve jars. He told those present that he had plans to put up 1,000 cans of tomatoes. His recipe called for one pound of sugar to each pound of tomatoes. His neighbors said it was so delicious, it should be commercialized. (Oh, the power of sugar!)
Gypsies invaded the Coast once and camped out at White Harbor in twenty wagons of the so-called wanderers, who created quite a stir as they passed along on the beach!
The little town was beginning to sound like a paradise, but it was not without problems. It seems the area was somewhat low in the front, getting closer to the water.
It was mentioned once that the town was part of “the Pass,” but a full article in 1916 said it was a suburb of Long Beach. The article actually stated that it was really inaccessible because of a lack of roads and claimed it was now depopulated except for the Hanrahan family, who had children in the Long Beach school system. After the 1915 storm, the Jesuit College in White Harbor was never repaired, either.
Speaking of the 1915 storm, many washouts on the beach resulted from the then-unnamed cyclonic storm, later described as a Category 4 hurricane by modern standards. Talks of a seawall began to surface, and the county thought it best not to replace any roads until something could be done to prevent any further problems. The areas most talked about were between White Harbor and Biloxi: Porter Avenue in Biloxi; the E. J. Bowers residence in Gulfport; Piaggio Villa, which later became the Merry Mansion (on Cowan Road) in Gulfport; Jeff Davis Avenue in Long Beach and, of course, the area around the town of White Harbor.
In 1920, the county was apparently forced to spend $5,000 repairing the roads at Piaggio Villa and White Harbor, with talk of never repairing those two places again without some bulkheads being installed to protect the roads in the future.
