Fort Homer Hesterly Armory
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Fort Homer W. Hesterly National Guard Armory
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| Location | Tampa, Florida |
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| Coordinates | 27°56′58″N 82°29′02″W / 27.949525°N 82.484016°W |
| NRHP Reference # | 13000852 |
| Added to NRHP | October 23, 2013 |
Fort Homer W. Hesterly is a historic building at 522 North Howard Avenue (Tampa) in the West Tampa section of Tampa, Florida. The building and adjacent support structures were originally constructed as a U.S. military facility to house units of both the Florida Army National Guard and the U.S. Army Reserve. The armory was built in the 1930s under Franklin Delano Roosevelt's New Deal and dedicated the day after the Pearl Harbor attack.
After sixty years of service, and with the facility becoming obsolete for military purposes, Florida National Guard and U.S. Army Reserve officials announced plans to replace the armory on December 1, 2001. A new 216,424-square-foot (20,106.4 m2) joint reserve facility to be built at Gateway Center in Pinellas Park was planned as a replacement of three existing outdated and overcrowded facilities, including Fort Hesterly, the J.F. Campbell National Guard Armory in Clearwater, and the Lovejoy U.S. Army Reserve Center in Tampa. Construction of the new $53.5 million project began in 2002, and was expected to be completed by the spring of 2003, with the House Appropriations Committee originally allocating $45 million for the project. The new facility, eventually named the C.W. "Bill" Young Armed Forces Reserve Center, opened in February 2005.
An art deco style building, it took ten years to find an occupant for the Hesterly Armory, once a premiere entertainment venue in addition to its military role. It is now home to the Tampa Jewish Community Center & Federation. Performers have included Elvis Presley, U.S. President John F. Kennedy, Martin Luther King, Jr., Tom Jones, The Animals, James Brown, Buddy Holly, Andy Griffith, Allman Brothers, Tempests, Pink Floyd, the Doors and The Ramones. Many graduations and weddings have been held at the Fort. The National Guard used the armory until 2005.
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