Shangri-La Springs: Haven for Health

Florida has at least 1,000 artesian springs and my new book, Florida's Healing Waters, documents twenty-two spas that were built adjacent to mineral springs during the Gilded Age. They range from places so popular that entire towns developed around the facilities, such as Green Cove and White Springs, to others so ephemeral that the only evidence they ever existed is in the travel literature of the time, such as Moncrief Spring near Jacksonville. It is also likely that many springs were used for therapeutic bathing by locals, but never commercially developed. And some facilities were enhanced with the addition of water from artesian wells, or "pseudo springs." 

Most of these spring-based spas tended to be in the northern part of Florida where there is a higher concentration of springs. A handful existed in Central Florida, but one of the few that was built in South Florida was the spa at Shangri-La Springs in Lee County. 

The spa originated when Harvie E. Heitman, a prolific businessman and early developer of Southwest Florida’s Lee County, and his brother built Bonita Springs’ Heitman Hotel in 1921 as a built as a place for potential real estate investors to stay. The town of Bonita Springs is said to be named for a sulphur spring on the hotel grounds (the town was previously known by the unremarkable name, Survey.) It is claimed that the spring was sacred to the Calusa Indians who lived in the area hundreds of years ago.

Heitman died in 1922 and the hotel endured several owners and multiple name changes until osteopath Dr. Charles Gnau bought the property in 1962. It was Gnau who saw the potential of the resort as a place of healing centered around the spring. Gnau believed the water of the spring “compared favorably” to the famed waters of the Baden-Baden Spring in Germany. He was ahead of his time, advocating for a holistic approach to health, including eating organic produce and exercising regularly. Gnau built a spring-fed pool with an Indian maiden statue to the property. The next owner, Dr. R.J. Cheatham renamed the resort the Shangri-La Hotel and developed it into an institute of hygiene.

Today the Shangri-La Springs resort is operated as a day spa, hotel, and restaurant, offering locally grown organic food and a variety of spa treatments including massage, reiki, saunas, reflexology, and aromatherapy.

Reclaiming the Sublime on the Ocklawaha River

"Not surprisingly, Picturesque America took the lead in promoting the funeral moss, grotesque trees, and wild chaotic vegetation of the Florida swamps of the Ocklawaha River. For the well-to-do northerners, the boggy, overgrown southern wetlands offered the perfect dark adventure. For these Victorians, taking a boat ride down a swampy southern river was a thrilling escape into the unknown, a peep show of the grotesque, a blending of the realistic and fantastic, which thrilled in a strange and disturbing way. It was the dark side of the picturesque." – From "Souvenirs of the Old South: Northern Tourism and Southern Mythology" by Rebecca Cawood McIntyre

After the Civil War, northern visitors streamed into Florida and a large number of them took steamboats to Silver Springs via the Ocklawaha River. Palatka was a boomtown where travelers transferred to smaller boats suitable for the winding narrow passageways of the what Creek Indians called "ak-lowahe", meaning muddy or crooked river. The trek into the dark, mysterious wilderness was in alignment with Victorian sensibilities of the time, part of their obsession with the sublime, defined for Victorians as a feeling of "inner greatness of the soul" related to the "sense of grandeur that fuels awe and wonder." As a reaction to the Industrial Revolution that was taking place in the cities of the north, Gilded Age travelers sought out the sublime in nature, and the Romantic Movement helped to perpetuate the notion that a connection with nature was healthy for the soul.

Nineteenth-century travel literature helped promote this fantastic riverboat trip and authors Harriett Beecher Stowe and Sidney Lanier both wrote about their pilgrimages to Silver Springs. A superb example of the nineteenth-century hype surrounding the Ocklawaha trip can be found in the words and images of an influential publication know as Picturesque America. The enormous two-volume set was edited by poet and journalist William Cullen Bryant, who wrote about his own trip up the St. Johns River in 1850's "Letters of a Traveler: Notes of Things Seen in Europe and America." There are nine hundred detailed engravings in the Picturesque America volumes and the images of the Ocklawaha were created by artist Harry Fenn, a prominent illustrator of the era. The romantic language and captivating imagery had an enormous effect on tourism and it earned its publisher a million dollars, according to writer Rebecca McIntyre. The result of the publicity can be noted in the sheer volume of tourists coming into the state, then called "strangers." Historian Tracy Revels documented that in 1874 a reporter estimated 50,000 visitors had traveled by steamboat to Silver Springs. There were 74 steamboats servicing the St. Johns River alone!

While most of the passengers on the steamboats cruising up the Ocklawaha were reveling in the sublimity of the experience, others saw dollar signs in the form of the ancient cypress trees that lined the river. As the river was logged out, part of the tour became passing long rafts of floating logs on their way to a mill in Palatka. When the age of railroads dawned, it became easier to reach Silver Springs by train, and a trip up the Ocklawaha became superfluous. Steamboats were replaced by watercraft with internal combustion engines and by the 1920s the Ocklawaha's steamboat era had ended. But Silver Springs grew into the premier midcentury attraction in the state and the pastel-colored, glass bottom boats are now Florida icons.

Postcard showing Silver Springs, probably from the 1950s.

The romantic, sublimity of the river was forgotten and by the 1930s the waterway was seen as an important link in a canal that would bisect the state, provide jobs and stimulate the economy. Serious construction did not start until decades later in 1964, but it was stopped in 1971 because of ecological concerns raised by an environmental group led by Marjorie Harris Carr. The project was officially de-authorized a couple decades later and the state took over and created what is now called the Marjorie Harris Carr Cross Florida Greenway.

Land clearing and controlled fires at Eureka, circa 1960s from the State Archives of Florida.

One of the legacies of the ill-fated project is in an artificial reservoir that has to be drawn down every four years in order to kill the invasive growth that clogs up the 7,500-acre pool. I first visited during the drawdown nine years ago, exploring the area that was smashed by giant crushers and winding through an eerie forest of ghost cypress stumps. During the last drawdown, I had plans to kayak to one of the many springs that are drowned by the tons of water in the reservoir, but a heavy rain "browned out" the springs and I canceled my trip.

Looking for a river's roots

My efforts to get to the "Lost Springs" of the Ocklawaha were almost spoiled again due to heavy winter rainfall, but I decided to forge on, whatever the conditions, as this opportunity might not present itself for four more years. So I arranged a trip with Captain Karen Chadwick of Northstar Charters, my guide nine years ago. On an overcast, late-December day I set out with my brother and his girlfriend's kid, climate change activist Levi Draheim. As we launched from the former steamboat stop at Eureka, clouds threatened, and the river flowed with a strong current from the rainfall of recent days. While it was far from a picture-perfect Florida day, the conditions created a sense of gloom and mystery, the perfect atmosphere to try to imagine how this untamed river might have been viewed through the eyes of Victorian travelers in the nineteenth century.

The steamboat William Howard leaving Eureka Landing from the State Archives of Florida.

Henry Fenn illustration from Picturesque America showing a riverboat on the Ocklawaha at night.

The foreboding atmosphere when we launched was in time replaced by blue skies.
Image by Kilby Photo.

One of our first stops was at the gate of an dam spillway that was never completed, a hideous monument to man's hubris in the pristine wilderness. Looking very much like a dam, it seemed out-of-place in a channel dredged for barges that never came. To me the parts of the waterway that were manmade had a different feeling than the original channel, the conduits carved out by machine were wider, straighter, and felt soulless compared to winding, organic original watercourse. "As we wound along through the dense vegetation, a picture of novel interest presented itself at every turn" notes the writer of Picturesque America.

The never-used dam spillway at Eureka, photo by Kilby Photo.

As was often the case on nineteenth-century excursions of the river, the journey up the Ocklawaha was made at night, and the surrounding forest was lit by firelight.  "No imagination can conceive the grotesque and weird forms which constantly force themselves on your notice as the light partially illuminates the limbs of wrecked or half-destroyed trees, which, covered with moss or wrapped in decayed vegetation as a winding sheet, seem huge, unburied monsters..." Although we traveled by day, I observed that the edge of the dense swamp surrounding the river is still lined with amazing trees of different shapes and varieties. One particular "monster" was a huge hollow cypress, accessible only because of the drawdown, still standing because lightning must have damaged it and loggers thought it unworthy of harvesting. Inside it was large enough for several people and holes in the tree made perfect windows. For me, standing in this goliath was one of a highlight of the trip, a moment in which we felt like Hobbits or other creatures of folklore, finding shelter in a magical realm.

The big tree, image by Kilby Photo. 

Perfect in its imperfection, image by Kilby Photo. 

Looking up towards the top of the hollow cypress, image by Kilby Photo.

It's hard for me to imagine cutting one of these mighty trees with just an ax.

Another highlight for us was the opportunity for spectacular bird-watching – my brother, Levi and I are all bird lovers. This portion of the river was chock full of limpkins, ibis, herons, egrets, wood storks, hawks, and a lovely group of Roseate Spoonbills – a rarity I'm told. In Picturesque America, passages are devoted to the water turkey (Anhinga), white crane (egret), and turkey-buzzards that "wait patiently" for the decomposition of an alligator. Gators seemed to be around every turn as we wound our way downriver, and they rarely felt obliged to move as we passed, allowing for spectacular views of these prehistoric-looking animals. Today, we are satisfied to shoot these ubiquitous reptiles with cameras, but Victorian visitors often shot alligators with rifles for sport. Picturesque America tells of the "sudden interruption of a rifle ball" against an alligator's "mailed sides."

Roseate Spoonbills. Image by Kilby Photo.

Great Egret. Image by Kilby Photo.

White Ibis. Image by Kilby Photo.

American Alligator. Image by Rick Kilby.

In some ways, not much has changed since 1872.

One of the more interesting illustrations of the book shows a mailbox nailed to a large cypress tree –  an everyday object incongruous in this wild setting. In addition to the ugly vestiges of the canal project near Eureka, a surprising manmade-object along the river was the home of Dr. Stange, a physician once based in McIntosh, Florida who included Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings among his patients. He tragically drowned in the river, but the ruins of his once beautiful home survive, including the remnants of a swimming pool.  The tile floors and masonry walls are being swallowed up by jungle and the windows now serve as frames for the unchecked wilderness that will soon reclaim this crumbling edifice.

The illustration is titled "A post-office on the Ocklawaha."

The house of Dr. Strange, image by Kilby Photo.

Into the transparent depths

In the nineteenth century, the payoff of any journey up the Ocklawaha was a stop at the magnificent Silver Springs, at that time the largest array of freshwater springs in North America. In Picturesque America, the author marvels at the transparency of the water and drops a pebble wrapped with a piece of white paper to watch it flutter into the depths. We were not so sure if the spring we were visiting would be visible at all with the recent rains, so as we navigated into the narrow spring run, we crossed our fingers. As we pulled into the cove of Cannon Springs, it still possessed that unmistakable blue-green hue present in most of Florida's springs. Levi jumped in immediately and my brother and I soon followed, hovering over the boil and posing for the photos to document our trip to a remarkable lost spring. Although it felt cold initially, the water felt great once we got accustomed to it, and we were welcomed with hot chocolate once we got out. While the spring was not a first magnitude wonder, it still had its own charm, as all Florida springs do. The fact that it is ephemeral, made the visit even more special. The spring was browned out the following day by rainwater released upstream.

Silver Spring from Picturesque America.

The canopied spring run to Cannon Springs, image by Kilby Photo.

Levi and I agree –  the dam is dumb. Image by Kilby Photo.

Levi the fish, image by Kilby Photo.

Cannon Springs, image by Kilby Photo.

A sublime sink

Sublime is not a word that most of us use often in our present-day vocabulary; we tend to gravitate to over-the-top terms such as awesome, spectacular, and mega-everything. A few, however, seem comfortable talking about a sense of spirituality that can be found when experiencing the natural world. In my mind, there is little doubt that the Ocklawaha River is a special place, and that we need to reverse the damage caused by our attempts to channelize this wild waterway. Those who want to preserve the dam and maintain the status quo believe that the reservoir has created a paradise for bass fishing. But as a child, my father and I went undertook many fishing trips on the undammed portion of the Ocklawaha near the St. John River and we met with plenty of success. And we were not alone – I remember wave after wave of bass boats speeding down the river to their favorite fishing holes.

Perhaps what is needed to reclaim the river is a paradigm shift towards the values of the Victorians who sought out the mysterious and sublime. An inwardly focused approach, based less on external thrills and more on the journey of the spirit, could have an enormous effect on this part of Florida. The soul of a river waits to be released.

Author Bill Belleville writes of yearning for an opportunity to "sink into gator time," which he describes as an appreciation of the "long natural continuum" that our wildlife enjoyed in the time before man. "Sinking," describes Belleville, is an act that that requires the "timeless patience of a reptile to be so deep inside nature that you become blissfully unaware of all else." If you should have the opportunity to float down the untamed Ocklawaha River, I wish you a good "sink."

Image by Kilby Photo. 

Image by Kilby Photo. 

Image by Kilby Photo.

Image by Kilby Photo. 

Revisiting Warm Mineral Springs

I have a mental wish list of ideal places where I’d like to give presentations and Warm Mineral Springs is at the top of my list. My reasoning is that the North Port, FL spring incorporates two aspects of Florida history that interest me the most – the myth of the fountain of youth and the practice of taking the water at mineral springs. Florida has over 1,000 freshwater springs, all of which are unique and have their own magic. But there is nothing quite like Warm Mineral Springs. The spring's geology and archeology separate it from other Florida springs, but it has an interesting history and exciting future as well.

The spring's remote location, in southwest Florida, meant it missed Florida's Golden Age of Bathing in the late 19th century. Much of that part of the state was considered dangerous Indian territory at the same time steamboats were traveling up and down the St. Johns River delivering patrons to elegant spring-based spas. Englishman F. Trench Townsend visited the spring on a hunting and fishing trip and published an account of his journey called "Wild Life in Florida" in 1875. His rustic camp along the Myakka River is a dramatic contrast to the Victorian splendor of the accommodations at springs on the opposite side of the state. He wrote of the spring “To the taste, the water was salt and sulphurous, peculiarly nasty and offering a strong contrast to its marvelously clear and tempting appearance.” The author attempted to bathe in the spring but spied "the scaly body" of an alligator on the opposite bank, and changed his mind.

The spring was utilized by settlers in the area for years and a 1922 ad claims it to be the best place in Florida for the "right man to build a hotel, sanitarium, and city," noting that its medical waters were especially potent for curing skin diseases. The "right man", turned out to be the right woman, when Philadelphia millionaire George K. Brown purchased the spring for his wife Lillian in 1923. It is likely that the Browns knew of the property because of George's brother, Franklin Quimby Brown, who at the age of 29 became president of the Florida Southern Railroad. Brown's railroad was absorbed by tycoon Henry Plant in 1896, and after Plant's death in 1899, it was Brown who arranged for Plant's luxurious Tampa Bay Hotel to be sold to the City of Tampa. Despite Lillian Brown's wish to develop the property surrounding the spring, as evidenced by a classified ad she placed in 1924 soliciting investors, she did little to enhance the site during her ownership. 

By 1950, it was apparent new owners had big plans for the springs, now dubbed the "original Fountain of Youth," and by 1954 lots surrounding the spring could be purchased for just $25 down and $7.50 per month! The facilities that are present today were developed in 1959 in time for the state's Quadricentennial celebration and they were recently added to the National Historic Register of Places due to the outstanding architectural design by Jack West. The spring was added to the register in 1977.

The Warm Minerals Springs/Little Salt Spring Archeological Society graciously paid for me to stay in the Warm Mineral Springs Motel, (future post coming), so I had the opportunity to visit the spring early the next morning after my presentation. The spring didn't open until 9 a.m., so after breakfast, I walked the road between the motel in the spring for exercise. It was misty and damp, and the fog-obscured road helped create a mysterious atmosphere. On the walk back I noticed kids waiting by the road for the school bus, each with their own electronic devices, in their own introverted bubbles that prevented any social interaction with each other.

By the time I got to the spring shortly after nine, the regulars were streaming in, and the steaming spring was peaceful and serene. I waded into the water, circling the ancient cenote in the shallow, wading portion of the spring and made a clockwise circuit, taking photos and observing the other bathers. Like on my first visit, I observed that many of the visitors to the spring spoke Russian, Polish, or some other Eastern European dialect. In stark comparison to the children waiting silently for the school buses, there was a great deal of verbal interaction between the mostly-elderly bathers, and it was clear that the social aspect is an important part of the bathing tradition. After about an hour, I left the water, changed clothes and returned to Orlando.

The facilities were, for the most part, unchanged since my first visit in 2011. There was a refreshing absence of branding and marketing, a sharp contrast from my visit eight years earlier. The space occupied by the Evergreen Cafe is now headquarters for lifeguards and some of the new-age artwork has been removed from the park. The gift shop was sparsely stocked and I saw no bottled spring water for sale this time. The price to take the waters, $20 for a non-resident, seemed consistent with the price I paid to bathe on my first visit.

I learned a great deal about the spring from my new friends in the Archeological Society, and I gathered that there was a sense of cautious optimism with the master plan to upgrade the facilities there. The plans include a trail system and an outdoor amphitheater. The City of Northport also paid for a survey of the architecture and have seemed to decide it is worth preserving. It is possible the Cyclorama may even be restored, a subject which I'll delve into in a future post. 

When I think of Florida's springs, I picture amazing pristine natural resources – cerulean jewels hidden deep in the woods of north Florida. Many springs are better known as recreational resources – county and state parks that attract swimmers, divers, picnickers, and fun-loving Floridians. A few are historical sites such as Suwannee and White springs in North Florida. But beyond the one-of-a-kind archeology, geology, and architecture, Warm Mineral Springs is a cultural resource, the closest thing we have in Florida to taking the waters at a mineral spring in Europe. I imagine that the conversations and rituals that occur in Budapest's famed Széchenyi Thermal Baths are not all that different from the ones that occur on a daily basis in North Port. Studies have shown that one of the most important components of longevity and happiness is social interaction. From what I've seen the folks taking the waters at Warm Mineral Springs get as much from connecting with each other as they do from the minerals in the water. Perhaps it is the Real Fountain of Youth.

Note: I will explore Warm Mineral Springs history in my book "Florida's Healing Waters" to be released in Fall 2020. Stay tuned for details. 

Hunting for Relics of a Golden Age

Union County Historical Society

Five years after "Finding the Fountain of Youth" was published, I am fortunate enough to still have speaking events, most recently at the Matheson History Museum in Gainesville. Since this talk coincided with the start of Spring Break, it seemed like an excellent opportunity for some spring hunting. Lately I'm not hunting for beautiful cerulean swimming holes, but rather the vestiges of what I call "Florida's Golden Age of Bathing." That refers to the era after the Civil War when invalids and tourists poured into the state looking for restoration and relaxation in dozens of spring-side spas.

Union County Historical Society

The first stop on my tour of forgotten springs was Worthington Springs, about a half hour north of Gainesville. I knew from Jane Keeler's excellent post on the Desolation Florida blog that there was not much to see from the Union County spring's glory days as a destination for tourists, picnickers, and the infirm. Sadly, Chastain-Seay Park, where the Worthington Springs Hotel and the spring-fed bathing pool once stood, was closed due to high waters and the only evidence of the site's history was photographs posted outside the park's boundaries.

The Tampa Tribune from June 27, 1910 describes the property as an "ideal place" for outings and vacation stays:

"The Spring is magnificent and strongly impregnated with sulphur, affords ample bathing facilities and under the able management of Ira Lamb is kept in a first class manner. There is no reason why any one should go elsewhere for an outing when all the requirements are here. No mosquitoes, fine shade right in the midst of where melons, vegetables, chickens, fresh milk and all else to make (l)ife pleasant are found in abundance."

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Courtesy Matheson History Museum

After making a few photographs of the signs outside the park, my wife and I headed to Taylor County, home of Hampton Springs. The site of a former resort hotel and spa is now a county park, and it has recently received much attention after the County decided to fill in the spring pool. The County Commission quickly reversed their decision after residents protested the loss of a favorite swimming hole. I talked to the County Administrator who was caught off guard by the vocal reaction, but seemed to see an opportunity in the outpouring of energy from advocates of the spring. This was my second visit to the spring – my first stop was after a talk in Tallahassee on a cold day in 2014. There was no one in the park that day as I poked around as a "polar vortex" threatened the state capital with potential snow flurries and the park was slightly erie and very quiet. I could see evidence of vandalism then, and the problem has persisted, contributing to the county's initial decision to fill in the spring pool, although the main reason was to minimize liability.

Image of Hampton Springs from my 2014 visit

Filling in the spring, courtesy J.T. Davis

Page from a 1920s promotion booklet from the State Archives of Florida.
Note the semi-circular area in the photo on the right. 

This appears to be the semi-circular area pictured above.

This shallow pool is between the semi-circular area and the deeper pool.

What appeared to be the indication of high mineral content in the water of the spring pool.

Water flowing into the recently restored spring pool.

On this visit the park was again quiet and I could see evidence of where heavy machinery had removed the concrete debris and gravel used to fill the spring. The main pool was full of algae-laced spring water on my first visit, but it was mostly dry this time, allowing me the opportunity to descend the stairs and survey the pool. The smell of sulphur permeated the air and there was evidence of minerals deposits from the flowing spring water, which made a miniature waterfall as it flowed down the side of the pool. Taylor County cobbled together a series of grants in the early 2000s so that this historic site could be surveyed and partially restored. Their foresight has created an opportunity for future generations to learn about an era when visitors arrived via train to take the waters, hunt, fish, golf, and participate in other leisure activities, all while staying in a luxurious hotel. Beyond maintaining a swimming hole for locals, preserving the remnants of this site create a glimpse into a time when "taking the waters" at Florida springs provided the foundation for today's tourist economy.

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Houses at sulphur springs – Newport Springs, 1924 from the State Archives of Florida

Newport Springs between 1920 and 1939 from the State Archives of Florida

People gathered at springs – Newport Springs, 1926 from the State Archives of Florida

Newport Springs 2018

Traveling west on U.S. 98 into the state's Big Bend region, our next stop was Newport Springs, in the tiny unincorporated village of Newport, Florida. According to 1998 article in the Tallahassee Democrat, this out-of-the-way location boasted a flourishing hotel as early as 1850, and guests arrived by train and mule-drawn wagons. Today the spring is still located just off the unpaved Plank Road, but is surrounded with a menacing fence marked with no trespassing signs. It was a bit disappointing that we couldn't get closer to the water, but it is good to know the watering hole still exists, unlike the pool at Worthington Springs.

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Text near the bottom of the sign reads “A Florida Learn and Serve Project." Learn and Serve America (LSA) was a program of the Corporation for National and Community Service. Created under the National and Community Service Act of 1990, LSA distributed grants in support of service-learning in order to simultaneously enrich the education of young people, demonstrate the value of youth as assets to their communities, and stimulate the use of service-learning as a strategy to meet unmet community needs. The federal appropriation for Fiscal Year 2011, signed on April 15, 2011, eliminated funding for the Learn & Serve America program which provided funds for the Florida Learn & Serve program. This sign is a remnant of that program.

The final stop on our journey was Panacea Springs located in a roadside park just across from the Wakulla Welcome Center in the unincorporated town of Panacea. A large sign marks the spot where about half dozen small mineral springs still trickle into different size basins. According to Bulletin No. 31, the State of Florida's definitive report on springs, the site was home to a 125-guest hotel and some 20 medicinal springs in 1911.  An ad from the Weekly Tallahasseean in 1901 boasts of new mineral and salt water pools, hot and cold water in all rooms, baths in the hotel, and "all modern conveniences" (including shuffleboard!) According to much more recent 2008 article, different springs were purported to cured different ailments and were labeled as such, including Arthritis Spring and Liver Spring.

The spring closest to U.S. 98 had a brick wall around it leading to a circular opening, so I assumed it was the famed "Cypress Stump Spring" from which water flowed directly out of a stump. Nearby were several other rectangular basins of differing sizes, some sheltered, others completely open to the elements. One spring filled a pool large enough for several people, others were about the size of hot tubs. All of them had cloudy water that seemed to indicate a high concentration of minerals in the spring water.

Cypress Stump Springs from the State Archives of Florida

Cypress Stump Spring?

The most interesting spring was near the rear of the park, where three, (at one time four), brick columns supported a roof above a small, round basin, that reminded me of a spring one might find in a temple in the ancient world – a temple that was home to an oracle.  Located right next to the creek, one of the columns had been pushed down into the water and another was decorated with graffiti. This place where the water was at one timed believed to have miraculous properties is very much at risk.

Across the street at the Welcome Center I found some archival images of the spring, but no historical interpretation. I emailed Wakulla County through their tourist website, and the county official who responded said that the park was located on private property and the county is not responsible for the park's upkeep. Yet the park is promoted as a destination for tourists and is mentioned on printed materials and included on websites. Additionally in 2015 the Welcome Center once posted renderings of restoration plans for the park. I have inquiries pending, and my hope is that these remnants of another era are somehow preserved.

2015 photo from the Wakulla Welcome Center, courtesy Karen Chadwick.

In summary, the spring pool at Worthington Springs is now covered by a parking lot. The spring pool at Hampton Springs was recently filled, and then emptied when residents reacted strongly to the loss of their swimming hole. The basin at Newport Springs is fenced off, and the spring pools at Panacea are crumbling and at risk of falling by the wayside.  I like the words of the mission statement of the Florida Division of Historical Resources: "To inspire a love of history through preservation and education" by cultivating "connections between people and place." These spring pools are invaluable assets of our state's history where enormous opportunities exist to create connections between people and place. To let these assets crumble and disappear or in some cases, even be paved over, is unacceptable. One does not need an oracle to see the cloudy future facing these irreplaceable historic resources.

Archival images of Panacea Springs from the State Archives of Florida