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By Penny Fletcher
penny@observernews.net
Gibsonton-- The landmark heavy rubber Giant’s Boot that stood for decades on U.S. 41 at the south side of the Alafia River Bridge in Gibsonton gradually wore away and is no more.
The Giant’s Camp, once a thriving restaurant, cabins, small RV park, bait shop and marina, closed one business at a time as its owners became too ill to care for it.
Now, the closed restaurant and cabin area will be torn down and a cleaned-up green space will be created that will eventually house a monument to Al Tomaini, the “giant” for which the place was named.
Mosaic Company of Riverview, a world-wide supplier of phosphate-based fertilizers, maintains its home office just the other side of the bridge. Because its land adjoins the Giant’s Camp, the company was approached by Signature Realty about the possible purchase of the 3.1 acres, said Mosaic’s spokeswoman, Chris Smith.
“We liked the idea because the land would make a good entrance into our education center,” Smith said. “We owned property on both sides so it was a good fit.”
The next step will include removal of the closed-up buildings and general cleaning of the area. Long-term, there will be something erected as a memorial to Mr. Tomaini.
“We plan to meet with the citizens’ group and find out what they would like to see. A safety fence will be erected during the work,” Smith added.
The camp was founded in 1951 by the late Al and Jeanie Tomaini, who had moved to Gibsonton in the mid 1930s. The couple continued to travel with sideshows until the early ‘50s, said their daughter, Judy Tomaini Rock, who until recently, operated a monument business on the south side of the property.
Rock has written extensively about her parents’ old-fashioned show business life, most of which can be read at www.sideshowworld.com by clicking on “The Judy Tomaini Rock Series,” on the left side of the first page.
“My parents retired from the traveling sideshows around 1951, when the shows were at the top. My dad had good sight into the future and saw it was time to get out,” she writes in one of her memoirs. “Back then, along with the ‘freaks,’ a word my mother hated, instead of having one person do 10 acts, they had 10 people, each doing an outstanding act. They were the cream of the crop.”
Her mother, Jeanie Tomaini, had no legs and her father, Al, was 8-foot-4½-inches tall, said Judy Rock in a recent telephone interview. “I have a sister, Patti, who lives out west. We were both adopted.”
According to Al and Jeanie’s granddaughter, Tina, who is taking care of her grandparents’ estate, the couple married Sept. 28, 1936. Al died in 1962 and Jeanie died in 1999. “Then, my mother had to stop the monument business in 2003 due to back injuries,” Tina Tomaini said.
But she continued writing stories about the old Show Town days.
In one chapter of her series, Rock writes, “What I am getting at is that the ‘freaks’ were just like everyone else. People. Everyone was treated the same, my parents included. They were just doing a job, like everyone else…over the years we have seen them die off, not to be replaced. Mother’s passing has been a great loss to many people, ones that knew her well, and those that just knew of her. She always had time for her fans right up until the end.”
Carol Phillips, speaking for the Concerned Citizens of Gibsonton Area Inc., said she has been involved with a project to memorialize the Tomainis for more than a year.
“This is a big part of our community identity,” she said. “The Giant’s Camp is a long tradition. We (Concerned Citizens) want to have a monument and Mosaic has agreed to give us space for it on the land they just bought, but we haven’t decided what we want to do yet.”
Meanwhile, the Concerned Citizens group is searching to see if there is another boot. Al Tomaini was chief of the original Gibsonton Volunteer Fire Department and some think the huge boot that stood on a stone frame following his death until about a year ago may have been one of a pair.
“I think there was only that one,” said Judy Rock. “I seem to remember him coming in with it after doing some kind of a commercial -- maybe for a tire (and rubber) company.”
Judy Rock has contributed to two documentaries about Gibsonton’s history.
The community, home of the International Independent Showmen’s Club, is the winter residence of many traveling showmen and women and still has special zoning ordinances to accommodate their animals and equipment.
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