I've never been in psychotherapy but I've watched all six seasons of the SOPRANOS so I know all I need to know about psychology and so much psychology has to do with dreams. There's one of Tony Soprano's dreams where he thinks he's talking to his therapist, Dr. Melfi, who has her back to him and as she turns around Tony sees that the person in Dr. Melfi's chair and is really HIS OWN MAMA! Boy, that was a scary one because everybody knows TONY'S MAMA is the biggest villain of the whole show! Heck, Rolling Stone named her as the NUMBER 3 GREATEST TV VILLAINS OF ALL TIME! Now my Mama wasn't that bad but when it came to her little boy, ME, getting drunk at the Old Dutch, she could get pretty bad. Let me give you a little background on how my Mama and the OLD DUTCH began to inhabit my dreams so many years ago. I can't recall a time in my life when I didn't know about the Old Dutch. My grandparents probably partied there. I know my parents did and I did. My personal experience began during the week of my 1968 high school graduation. I ended up in the parking lot of the Old Dutch because some guys from Vandy had told us that Joe South was going to perform that night. I didn't make it inside the club that night but one year later Joe South had become a superstar with the success of his GAMES PEOPLE PLAY and during the summer of '69 I finally became a patron of the Old Dutch. (A year at BAMA had taught me all I needed to know about acquiring a fake ID but that's another topic and I don't wanna digress). During the summer of '69, '70 and '71, I'd come home from college, live at my parents' home in Dothan, work some job and save money for another year of college. It was tough to live as you pleased while you were off at college and then have to come home and knuckle under to Mom and Dad, be real conservative with your money and work hard all day, every day. Even a mule don't work all the time and we college kids needed a place on the weekends where we could come to blow off some steam and the Old Dutch fit the bill, especially the Sunday afternoon jam sessions. I got so brazen that after one Sunday afternoon listening to Wilbur Walton, Jr. at a jam session, I drove back home to Dothan in time to have supper with my folks. I don't know what happened at supper but I must have slurred my words and Mama hollered, "Bob, you are just PLAIN DRUNK!", "No, Ma'am, I'm not," I replied, "I've just been on the beach all afternoon and I am very, very tired." "You're not tired," she said,"You're just PLAIN DRUNK!" Well, I excused myself from the table and went to my room. Mama followed me, hollering and screaming. I sat on the edge of my bed and listened to Mama holler until Daddy came in and put his arm around her shoulder and said, "Come on, honey, leave him alone. He's tired." and he and Mama left me and went back to the kitchen. Simple as that. No more trouble. Well what does that have to do with the psychology of dreams? Well, see back then I had this recurring dream where I'd be just about to do something REALLY IMPORTANT in my dream and my Mama would come into the dream and interrupt me. This became a big problem in the world of dreams inside my head. I think the Rolling Stones wrote a song about it called, "I CAN'T GET NO SATISFACTION." Well, after the big OLD DUTCH SUNDAY AFTERNOON JAM SESSION FIGHT IN ROBERT REGISTER'S CHILDHOOD BEDROOM, I had this recurring dream again where I'm doing something REALLY IMPORTANT and then Mama shows up. Right at that moment, Daddy came into my dream and put his arm around her shoulder and he said, "Come on, honey, leave him alone. He's tired."and guess what? I've never had that bad dream again. So, Bingo! At a very young age, my experiences at the Old Dutch helped to free my psyche and to rid myself of a recurring nightmare.
For over 35 years, the OLD DUTCH served the public on Panama City Beach and its story is the story of the building itself, its owners, its managers, its hospitality workers, its patrons, its musicians and a host of other entertainers including emcees, comedians, dancers, acrobats and more. It's the story of three generations begun by our grandparents generation, enjoyed by our parents and finally in it's heyday, the pow-wow grounds for the weekend rebellions of Gulf Coast Baby Boomers.
In the article I wrote about the Old Dutch in Panama City Living Magazine five years ago, I said that the builder of the Old Dutch, Frank S. Burghduff came to the Bay County beaches from Sylvan Beach, N.Y., in 1936.
Looking back at it, I have no idea where I came up with that "Sylvan Beach, N.Y." as Burghduff's northern home. He definitely had connections to the eastern shore of Oneida Lake where Sylvan Beach is located. When Burghduff arrived in Bay County, he was married to the former Etta Skaden of Canastota, N.Y. Sylvan Beach on Oneida Lake is less than ten miles from Canastota. Etta died in 1939 at a Dothan hospital and she's buried in Greenwood Cemetery. There are no birth or death dates on the Burghduff grave markers. "Husband and Pal" is carved on Frank's and "Wife and Pal" is carved on Etta's. As for Burghduff arriving in 1936. I ain't so sure where I came up with that either. I'm pretty sure I considered Burghduff's public statement published in the News-Herald on Monday, January 12 and Tuesday, January 13, 1942. In this denial of his being a Nazi spy, Burghduff wrote, "I came to Panama City seven years ago and liked the city so much I returned one year later and built the Old Dutch Tavern on the Coastal Highway west of Panama City." That puts Burgduff's arrival in Panama City as January of 1935 and his return to the beaches as 1936. There are a few other clues about Burghduff's arrival in Florida. A "For Sale" want ad for the Old Dutch printed in January of 1944 claimed that the tavern had been "established 8 years." That comes out as 1936. A November '48 St. Pete newspaper article,announced that Frank was opening a sandwich shop in Largo. The article stated, "Burghduff is a veteran hotel man, having spent 40 years in business for himself. He retired in 1942 and has been making his home at Madeira Beach for several years. Fifteen years have been spent in Florida." So that statement puts him in Florida all the way back to '33. The part about "veteran hotel man" is interesting. In June 1940 Frank ran a want ad that said "Hotel,- New, Built only two years; also one of the finest night clubs" . In the same ad he also stated, "Will sell in 60 days on account of death in family." This was nine months after Etta's death. Could the hotel have been the Sea Breeze?This old hotel, the first to have hot and cold running water on the beach, had been Frank's headquarters on the beach. An March 1940 want-ad Frank ran to sell his 19 and a half foot long house trailer states that the trailer was parked at the Sea Breeze and Frank implied that he could be contacted there. Bill Holloway who owned the Sea Breeze had been a pall bearer at Etta Burghduff's funeral and in June of 1940, the News-Herald reported that Frank had hosted a birthday party for Mrs. Bill Holloway at the Sea Breeze. Is it possible that the Holloway family has more details about the Burghduffs?
In my 2013 PANAMA CITY LIVING article I wrote: "
When you walked into the barroom of The Old Dutch, you felt as if you’d just stepped into a rustic Florida roadhouse time capsule lifted out of some Forties film noir classic. The bare cypress log walls were covered with various clocks, curios and stuffed hunting and fishing trophies; all crowned with a high ceiling of exposed rough cypress beams. As you entered you faced a huge stone fireplace, constructed from 113 tons of rock that could burn logs five feet long. The anchor of the old 160 ft. coastal freighter, Tarpon, sunk off Phillips Inlet in 1937, stood mounted on the mantelpiece. To the left was the unpolished bar made of cypress lumber and blackened by the tobacco and whiskey it had dispensed since 1940."
(picture of the mantle and fireplace)
You can make out the painting of the Old Dutch scroll on the mantle of the fireplace.
Even though this fireplace was demolished in 1976, it was constructed about the same time as the large fireplaces at the Camp Helen Lodge so clues as to the Old Dutch fireplace's construction might still be found in structures still standing in Bay County.
(picture of the painting of the Old Dutch scroll)
This now hangs in the Stiles' beachhouse. Notice that Burghduff is misspelled.
The location of the steamship Tarpon's anchor is unknown.
(want ad for the Old Dutch bar)
In August of 1981, this want ad appeared in a Pensacola paper so there is hope that one day the Old Dutch's original bar will be located
Burghduff was also early officer in the Gulf Coast Scenic Highway Association and as secretary he announced in an article in the May 12, 1941 News-Herald that a dog fly eradication program would be brought before a meeting of the group. A search of the Internet revealed this 1941 letter written by USDA entomologist Walter White to his wife. White had been transferred to Panama City to work on the dog fly eradication program and he writes his wife:
August 18, 1941 "Sunday night I drove to the Old Dutch Tavern for a steak. It was fair and I met Mr. Bergdorf who had a collection of heads and skins from Alaska. I found that he had spent about the same amount of time up there as you and I. He went north from Fairbanks to Point Barrow. I drove back by Panama City Beach and listened to Mr. Weir toot his trumpet. He isn’t as good as Walter White thinks he is." http://walterandina.com/archives/tag/entomology.html
So here we learn where Burghduff may have collected his "hundreds of curios from all over the world." Burghduff's Old Dutch advertisements announced, "Don't fail to bring your friends to see the $10,000 exhibit of curios from all over the world free of charge."
The blackouts and gasoline rationing of WWII hurt Frank's business but as early as June of 1940, Burghduff was running want ads putting the Old Dutch up for sale. In 1944, he and Hotel Dixie-Sherman owner Cliff Stiles struck a deal.
