Pacific Building, boom-time skyscraper

The site of lavish real estate offices when it opened, Miami’s once-elegant Pacific Building ended its life as a high-rise hobo jungle. The 15-story building at 327 NE First Ave. was started in 1924 as the Realty Board Building. Badly damaged in the hurricane of 1926, it nevertheless survived until being razed to make room for a downtown campus of Miami-Dade Junior College. As wreckers and county officials spent the summer of 1970 arguing how the old landmark would be leveled (dynamite was ruled out) the down, the out and the luckless enjoyed a few more months of high-rise, low-cost living.

 

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