By Savannah Whaley
After retiring from his pivotal role helping spearhead Miami’s resurgence as the associate vice president of cultural tourism for the Greater Miami Convention & Visitors Bureau from 1998 – 2018, George T. Neary has returned to the Miami Design Preservation League (MDPL) where he first walked through the door as a volunteer 34 years ago.
In the following years between 1991 – 1998, Neary served as MDPL’s executive director pioneering the preservation and marketing of the Art Deco District. The energetic and untiring Neary took up that post again in April on an interim basis as the nonprofit brings a new leader onboard.
Few people know more about Miami’s history or have done more to create its present as a world-class destination. When Neary arrived in 1991, Miami Beach had seen its fortunes come in and out with the tide.
“Our unusual art deco architecture has captured the world over and over again,” Neary explained. “It was built from ‘29 to ’42 and it was the vacation center of America. Then, Miami Beach had the largest concentration of sleeping quarters [for training] in World War II and the men and women came back to make it the honeymoon capital. Things started to change. Jumbo jet airliners meant that you could fly anyplace. You could easily go from Miami Beach to Cuba. Then Cuba changed so there was no more gambling and Las Vegas was developed. Little by little, Miami Beach began to decline.”
That was the scene when Neary arrived from New York City but he saw the potential.
“A friend of mine had bought a historic building on South Beach by Lawrence Murray Dixon, one of the famous architects, and wanted someone to manage it and asked me to come down and try it out,” Neary recalled. “We had come to a few New Year’s Eves at Miami Beach and it was just amazing. I could feel the bubbling, that something was happening here.”
MDPL’s founder Barbara Baer Capitman had passed away the previous year and Neary became the perfect cheerleader to save this historic district with the largest collection of art deco architecture in the world.
“We had commissioners who lived here their whole lives that walked by these dilapidated buildings and thought they were just junk,” Neary marveled. “I had fourth graders tour the district and paint the buildings in watercolor. They came to the commission meeting and showed their paintings. The commissioners would say, ‘Oh, that’s the Breakwater.’ Then they saw a painting of a high rise and nobody knew where it was. They were shocked at how much they learned from those fourth graders of what they took for granted.”
Neary believed that a vibrant historical district could be an economic engine for Miami Beach.
“When I was here, this was ‘91 to ’98, they had not built a new hotel in over 30 years,” Neary said as he recalled a dilapidated and forgotten Miami Beach. “Lowe’s Hotel was the first convention center hotel, some distance from the actual convention center, but it served a purpose to show the world that you could invest in Miami Beach and it was safe.”
Neary’s marketing efforts led to the Society of American Travel Writers to bestow its Phoenix Award to MDPL in 1996 for reviving tourism in Miami Beach through the use of historic preservation. As a founding board member of the Greater Miami Gay & Lesbian Chamber of Commerce, the Mayor’s LGBT Business Enhancement Committee, and Miami Beach Pride Committee, he points to one important tourism sector for that success.
“Now the underground, if you want to call the gay and lesbian movement, is what really brought Miami Beach back,” Neary stated. “It was the gay clubs like Warsaw, Torpedo and a number of other clubs in Miami Beach that became world famous. Suddenly gays and lesbians began to come here and look around and say, ‘Look at these stained glass windows, look at these friezes and the tile work and terrazzo floors.’ Gays and lesbians are the ones that have the vision to make sure things weren’t destroyed and demolished understanding it is better to have these buildings than another high rise.”
Tourists weren’t the only ones taking notice as celebrities including Madonna and Prince began to flock here and bring international media attention with them. The sites of their exploits and those of others are among the highlights of the South Beach Scandals tour, which joins the Gay and Lesbian Walking Tour as two of the many popular tours MDPL offers.
Neary is once again fighting to save the architecture as state law has preempted local zoning laws pushing the danger level to the district all the way up to 10.
“It’s very difficult,” Neary acknowledged. “We’re meeting with people right now who are in the process of developing plans to destroy and knock down a historic area and create a high rise right on the ocean. One of the things we’re fortunate in America is that we have volunteerism and we have community activism. A lot of countries do not have that. Luckily, it’s a part of our DNA.”
Neary retains his optimism for the future. For one, he’s building a new life and celebrating his one year anniversary with his husband, Alberto Sanchez. He also is enthusiastic about new opportunities offered by MDPL.
“The 49th Art Deco Weekend is coming up January 9-11,” Neary previewed. “Working with the City we’ve created an outdoor gallery called the Galleria at 12th Street and Ocean Drive. There are 34 museum quality panels that showcase the 100th anniversary of art deco in the United States and beyond. We also put a beautiful art deco swing there for people to take their Instagram moments. So, something old is new again and it’s so exciting to walk by and see hundreds of tourists reading the panels.”
Noting Miami Beach has changed one million percent since his arrival, Neary will continue to work to make sure the vibrant scene continues to thrive.
“So many people come up and say, ‘What can I do? What can I do?’ They’re horrified at the prospect of losing this world famous district,” Neary said. “We’re going to get more aggressive about inviting people to become members because as the saying goes, there’s safety in numbers.”
