Back to Basics in Barberville

On my first visit to the Barberville Pioneer Settlement I virtually had the entire place to myself. As a fan of Old Florida architecture, I was in heaven. The collection of buildings that make up the settlement is spectacular. But when I pulled up on Saturday, a sheriff's deputy pointed me to a parking lot in a field a quarter mile away from the action. The line waiting on a shuttle bus was long and I was pleased that hundreds of other folks had chosen to spend the first chilly day of Autumn at the Fall Country Jamboree.

The Barberville Pioneer Settlement, located just north of DeLeon Springs near the eastern edge of the St. Johns River, began in 1976 as the Barberville Settlement for the Creative Arts. The primary structure is a wonderfully restored schoolhouse, but the grounds are full of historic structures including a railroad depot, church, Cracker cabin, and shotgun shack. On my first visit to the Fall Jamboree, it was immediately apparent that I needed to shift my focus from the architecture of the place to the people packing it, as the grounds of the museum were full of interesting faces.

I was soon engulfed in music: Bluegrass, Folk, Roots music, and old fashioned Country Music. There were stages on the back of the Pierson railroad depot, in the little country church, in the rustic barn, and in spots scattered throughout the grounds. But many times the musicians would simply find an unoccupied piece of real estate, take out their instruments and break into impromptu song. In some cases, that's where the best music came from.

My Father came from the Appalachians and I grew up listening to Country Music, Southern Gospel, and Bluegrass. As a kid I loved rock and roll, and hated it when my Dad would play his Willie Nelson eight track over and over and over... But as I've grown older, I find that somehow his musical tastes have wormed their way into my subconscious, and when I hear the music my Dad loved, I have strong emotional connection to it. In short, as I wondered the grounds of this Old Florida celebration, my heart was full and I had a tear in my eye every time I heard one my Pop's favorite tunes. He passed away less than a year ago, and I think of him often, especially at gatherings like this one.

But I was not the only one who seemed to be have a grand time on this day. Just take look at the photos. There is another celebration in Barberville in the Spring. I'll be back.

A cow town, re-created

I'm fasincinated by Osceola County because it has such extreme contrasts. It's where old Florida cattle country collides with the kingdom of the mouse. In Patrick Smith's epic tale of pioneer Florida, "A Land Remembered", the cattle raising protagonist visits Osceola's largest town Kissimmee often, as it was one of the few towns accessible to cowmen in Florida's interior. The cattle industry is still part a big part of life in Kissimmee but its more and more obscured by the glare of the mouse. It's hard to imagine any town in Florida has had as many demographic changes in the last 40 years.

A Cracker homestead in Kissimmee.

Note the whip held by the gentleman in front. Some assert that the crack of the whips
used by Florida Cowmen is where the term "Cracker" comes from.

A Parade in downtown Kissimmee- the Silver Spurs Rodeo
is an on-going Osceola County tradition.
Images from the Florida State Archives.

One of the best ways to get a glimpse into the Florida Cracker lifestyle of the 1800s is at Osceola County's Pioneer Village and Museum. Located surprisingly close to the tourist corridor on 192, this collection of archival buildings is a breath fresh air from the tacky architecture just blocks away. Two old Cracker houses are closest to the road, the Tyson and Lanier homesteads. The Tyson house has been turned into a general store, complete with artifacts from Narcosee's post office. Next door, the Lanier homestead is set up with actual furnishings of the period and one can get a sense of what it must have been like to live in Florida in the late 1800s. On the Fall day I was there, the weather was perfect and it seemed like a pretty good way to live. But I can't imagine what it would be like in the summer.


Another highlight for me was the one-room schoolroom. Complete with books and desks it's very quaint. Other buildings include a wash house, a smoke house, a blacksmith shop, a citrus parking house and a small museum.



Across the street is the Mary Kendall Nature Preserve, part of the Shingle Creek Regional Park. This 78 acre area has boardwalks and trails that leads to 2 more Cracker structures, the restored Stefee homestead and the Caretaker's house. Both were closed on my visit, but the walk was beautiful and serene and I was happy that this little piece of old Florida had been preserved. Visiting the Preserve and the Pioneer Village made for a memorable afternoon and I left with more insight and appreciation for life in nineteenth century Central Florida.

About a hundred yards from the preserve, lies ground zero for Central Florida tourism.

The Cracker home of Laura Riding Jackson

I must admit I heard about the poet Laura Riding Jackson's House before I heard of her. I saw a photo of her Wabasso Florida home in a book, and sought it out on a trip to Vero in April. I found myself there again this month and was struck by the similarities between her house and her lifestyle and that of Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings.

Like Rawlings, Riding Jackson was a northerner who chose to live in rural Florida and try her hand in the citrus business. Soon after college at Cornell, Riding Jackson became associated with a group of poets known as "the Fugitives" who were "defenders of formal techniques in poetry and were preoccupied with defending the traditional values of the agrarian South against the effects of urban industrialization." She lived in New York, England and Spain before moving to tiny Wabasso in 1943. With her husband Schuyler Brinckerhoff Jackson she worked on a project called "A Dictionary of Related Meanings" that was published posthumously in 1991. Despite renouncing poetry at one point in her long writing career, she published "more than a dozen volumes of poetry". She also published fiction under the pseudonym Madeleine Vara.

Her home was moved to the current site at the Environmental Learning Center after Riding Jackson sold the property it was situated on towards the end of her life. According to the non-profit Laura Riding Jackson Foundation, the home was "was moved to save it as a focal point for the study of literature, philosophy and history, as an example of a disappearing architectural style, and as a symbol of an older, more environmentally-sensitive way of life."

The house's setting is one of the main differences from Rawling's home - it lacks context sitting in an empty field by itself, while Rawlings house in Cross Creek still sits in its original location. The two-story, 1,400 square foot house seems more compact that Rawlings home, but it shares the same Cracker vibe of simplicity. For me it seemed difficult to get a sense of the home's owner by peering through the windows of the locked house. I wonder if there is a connection between these two well known literary figures beyond their choice to live in Cracker houses in small towns in Florida? It is interesting that after seeing much of the world, they both choose a rural lifestyle.

For me, when I look out the window from my old Florida home and see moss-draped live oaks or a majestic hawk searching for dinner, I feel a connection to my environment. While I don't have the simplicity of small town living, I revel in that feeling of connectedness with the natural world. I know that living on a small lake in Central Florida has changed the way I view the world forever. Perhaps these two writers felt the same way.

Yes And No
by Laura Riding Jackson

Across a continent imaginary
Because it cannot be discovered now
Upon this fully apprehended planet—
No more applicants considered,
Alas, alas—

Ran an animal unzoological,
Without a fate, without a fact,
Its private history intact
Against the travesty
Of an anatomy.

Not visible not invisible,
Removed by dayless night,
Did it ever fly its ground
Out of fancy into light,
Into space to replace
Its unwritable decease?

Ah, the minutes twinkle in and out
And in and out come and go
One by one, none by none,
What we know, what we don't know.