Fantastic Florida Upcoming Events

The first two months of 2013 are crammed full of great historical and environmental Florida events. I wish I had time to do them all, but I will have to pick and choose which ones ones I can attend. Here are just a few of my faves.

There are two historic events tomorrow (Saturday, January 12th) in West Volusia County. First in the Historic Volusia County Courthouse in downtown DeLand, the second performance of "Ponce de Land Landed Here" will be performed, complete with re-enactors and lawyers. This live court drama will attempt once-and-for-all to set the record straight as to the whereabouts of Ponce's initial landing place in La Florida. Click here for more information or to watch it live.

Just up the road in DeLeon Springs is having their annual "Day in Florida History" event featuring re-enactors from different eras of Florida history and a vintage tractor show. I went a couple years ago and found it to be entertaining and fun.

Further up the road in St. Augustine, Flagler College will be celebrating the 125th anniversary of the opening of the Hotel Ponce de Leon, the grand Spanish Revival complex which houses the College.

Next Thursday, January 17 the Florida Sierra Club is having a rally in Tampa to demand environmental protection of Florida's waters. There will be a press conference and march to the EPA information session. More information here.

The next day in Sarasota, my friend Robin Draper of Authentic Florida is putting on a fundraiser for the Scrub Jay program at Oscar Scherer State Park. Speakers include Florida's own Ansel Adams, Clyde Butcher, the brilliant Florida writer Jeff Klinkenberg, and Jack Perkins, who's voice you would recognize anywhere. It starts at 10 am at the Girl Scout Conference Center on Friday, January 18. More information here.

On Saturday, January 20, the Orange County Regional History Center will host the authors of "Ditch Of Dreams," the story behind the ill-fated Cross Florida Barge Canal. The results of this project to bi-sect the state can still be seen in the form of Rodman Dam and Rodman Pool which interrupt the flow of one of Florida's most scenic rivers, the Oklawaha.

Photo by John Moran

On February 1st the Center for Earth Jurisprudence is hosting a conference for those interested in advocating for the earth's legal rights.  The event, titled "Rights of Springs: Strategies for Change Makers" will be held at the Barry University School of Law in Orlando. More information here.

The next big event will be another Rally for Florida's Water like the one I attended at Silver Springs over the summer. Featuring former Senator Bob Graham and Seminole County Commissioner Lee Constatine, this event will raise the awareness of the importance of protecting Florida's most important resource, its water. The event will be February 16 from 10 am to 4 pm at Wekiva State Park.

On Sunday, February 24, the following weekend, the always fun Floridiana Festival gets underway at the Palladium Theater in downtown St. Pete. For more information, click here.

Further out, there are two big events related to my upcoming book. First my book's companion exhibit, "Finding the Fountain of Youth: Exploring the Myth of Florida's Waters" opens in the Central Gallery of the Florida Museum of Natural History in Gainesville after a Members only event on March 21st. My graphic panels will be part of John Moran's Springs Eternal exhibit on display at the Gainesville museum through the end of the year. More to follow...

My first scheduled talk about my book will be at the main branch of the Orange County Public Library on June 8 at 2 pm.  As I haven't put my talk together yet, there is no information available yet, but I promise to post it as soon as possible.

So mark your calendars and I hope to see you and some of these important Florida events!

For the love of old Florida

Last weekend I traveled to St. Pete with author Joy Dickinson to attend the Floridiana Festival. This year's show was held in the St. Pete Garden Club, a smaller venue from the previous Floridiana Festival I attended at the historic Gulfport Casino. It was a tight squeeze to fit everybody in the small building, but that added a sense of excitement and I was thrilled to see this many people into all things vintage Florida.

In addition to looking for ephemera for my Fountain of Youth project, I was there to meet author Lu Vickers, whose latest book Cypress Gardens, America's Tropical Wonderland was the basis for an article I laid out for the History Center's Reflections journal. I had friended Lu on Facebook and it is apparent we both share a love for Florida's vintage attractions.

Lu Vickers sees herself as primarily a fiction writer with a love of old Florida attractions

Lu gave two talks, one on Cypress Gardens, one on Weeki Wachee, subject of another of her great books published by the University Press of Florida. Lacking a lecture hall, we squeezed into the Garden Club's kitchen for the presentations. The Cypress Gardens talk focused on how Dick Pope grew from a swampy patch of land on a remote Winter Haven lake into one of the country's most popular tourist destinations. Taking advantage of WPA funds to drain the marsh-like land, Pope had to return funds to the government when it became apparent that Cypress Gardens would be a made-for-profit operation, and not a public park. The famous water ski shows started as aquaplane demonstrations for G.I.s and grew into a a world-wide phenomena. And Dick Pope was instrumental in making water skiing into a popular sport across the globe.

Elvis at Cypress Gardens?

Tiny Tim tip-toeing through Cypress Gardens

Aquaplane demonstration pre-dated water ski shows at Cypress Gardens

Slides © Lu Vickers

Dick Pope from the State Archives of Florida

Lu had two guests for the Weeki Wachee talk – former mermaids Dianne and Bonnie. Dianne was a high school age synchronized swimmer when she performed at the very first underwater show ever held for the public at the legendary spring. Bonnie was among the later generation of mermaids who swam with mermaid tails and used rubber hoses to replenish their air supply. The Weeki Wachee version of Dick Pope was underwater innovator Newt Perry who developed underwater performance first at Silver Springs, and then at Wakulla Springs before establishing Weeki Wachee as a legendary attraction. Lu showed amazing images of the underwater performers and the two mermaids provided first hand accounts about what it is like to dance forty feet under the water. It was a huge thrill for a Florida freak like me, and meeting Lu and hearing her presentations alone were worth the drive from Orlando.

Bonnie Georgiadis and Diane Wyatt McDonald, former Weeki Wachee performers

Newt Perry carrying a mermaid in Tampa

from the State Archives of Florida

In addition to Lu, authors Florida ephemera authors Larry Roberts and Ken Breslauer were on hand selling items from their collections. I connected with Larry who owns a great antique store in Micanopy and whose wife is a fantastic bird photographer. And I returned twice to Breslauer's table to buy vintage Florida travel brochures.

Around the perimeter of the space original Highwaymen artists like James Gibson and Maryanne Carroll displayed their artwork. While feel I have been over exposed to the proliferation of Highwaymen art, I greatly respect the fact that the show had real Highwaymen in attendance. It was fun to see people buying paintings and getting photographs made of their paintings and the artists together.

For me it was a successful show because I found some fine examples of vintage Florida ephemera while communing with those who share the same passion for old Florida that I do. And if you are interested in the roots of Florida tourism I highly recommend Lu's books on Cypress Gardens and Weeki Wachee.

All things flamingo and alligator were on hand throughout the show

Vintage scores from Ken Breslauer's collection

Fresh Florida Fun

Here are some of my purchases from the Floridiana Festival last weekend that were related to previous blogs. 

The oversized Citrus Tower postcard dates from 1972 and shows nothing but groves and lakes as far as the eye could see. Just to the right of the big red arrow is the amphibious vehicle that used to offer rides in a nearby lake.

The Orange Blossom Trail linen postcard folder features sights from along 441 from one end of the peninsula to the other. 

What is now Bok Tower Gardens started out as Mountain Lake Sanctuary, created by Edward Bok as a haven for our fine feathered friends, like the flamingos pictured here. At a recent visit to Bok, I was told that it became too expensive to feed the beautiful pink birds so they got rid of them. Homosassa Springs and Sunken Gardens, two parks I've visited recently, still have flamingoes.

And the Florida State Parks map shows the wonderful sculpture at Tomoka State Park that I'm pining to visit.

Floridiana Festival

Gulfport, Florida is a suburb of St. Pete originally called Disston City after Florida's first land baron, Hamilton Disston. At one point, Disston owned enough land in Florida to make him the largest single landowner in the world. A typical Florida boom-to-bust story, Disston was found dead in a bathtub in 1896 and his family allowed his Florida lands to be foreclosed on.

Interestingly enough, the organizers of the Floridiana Festival chose Gulfport as the site of their big event. The Festival was held this past weekend in the Gulfport Casino right on the Boca Siega Bay. This historic structure is half ballroom, half gymnasium with a bar in front. Booths of great Florida kitsch and ephemera crowded the wooden floors and several Florida Highwaymen sold their paintings to energized patrons. I was pleasantly surprised at how many people seem to be collecting memorabilia from the Sunshine State and they appeared to be very serious about it, going through every box of postcards and looking at every Hawaiian shirt. There were books on Florida, old travel brochures, china, lamps and contemporary products made in the spirit of vintage Florida. Ambiance was added by the Florida Citrus Queen, aka Bre-elle from Winter Park, and the mood was set by an exotica soundtrack by Martin Denny playing in the background.

I resisted purchasing my favorite item, a $250 alligator lamp, and stuck to small paper ephemera and got some good deals spending less than $20 total. The biggest thing I came away with was a sense of validation that there were others like me who were mesmerized by our state's history and colorful past.

Events worth noting...

There are two facsinating events happening in the middle of the state this weekend related to pop culture. Last night the Orange County Regional History Center's new exhibition Jim Henson's Fantastic World opened to a huge crowd. Henson, who purchased a home in Central Florida in the '80s, was a skilled artist and creative visionary and his work at the History Center reveals new insight into his imaginative world. The unveiling of this Smithsonian curated exhibition was kicked off by Henson's daughter Heather, who owns a local puppetry troupe. There is so much to see, I can't wait to go back and spend more time studying the plentiful artwork and artifacts. What I liked the most, however, was the link between storyboards for some of Hensons early commercial work in the '50s and '60s, to adjacent puppets used in the commercials and then to the final broadcast spots. Another artifact that stood out was a jazz record album Henson designed that I will be looking for now whenever I browse the record bins.

The second event is the 2009 Floridiana Festival & Highwaymen Artist Show tomorrow, (Sat. Feb. 7), in Gulfport, FL. Gulfport, an early suburb of St. Pete,  was originally called Disston City, after one of Florida's legendary developers. While I've seen plenty of Highwaymen work and even designed a book on the subject, I am intrigued to see what kind of Floridiana collectables will be on sale. More to follow....