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!

Touring Flagler's Masterpiece

In an earlier post I highlighted a few of my favorite architectural appetizers from St. Augustine. The main course? It has to be Henry Flagler's Ponce de Leon Hotel, today the home of Flagler College. Henry Flagler made his wealth by creating the Standard Oil Trust with John d. Rockefeller and he spent his fortune transforming a backwoods sandbar known as Florida into a fabulous resort destination for the rich and famous. The railroads he built to to get to his resorts kick-started the development of the entire east coast of Florida. Towns such as Palm Beach and Miami were transformed from sleepy villages into fantastic playgrounds with his Midas touch. St. Augustine has an amazing examples of his work and the finest is the former Ponce de Leon Hotel.

Archival images from the State Archives of Florida

• Flalger decided to name the hotel for the legendary Spanish explorer after observing "an elaborate celebration reenacting the landing of Ponce de Leon" according to Tropical Splendor, an Architectural History of Florida
• The 450 room hotel's construction was begun in 1885 and and the hotel opened January 10, 1888

• The interior was designed by none other than Louis Comfort Tiffany

• The electrical system, one of the first of it's kind in the world, was engineered by the Edison Electric Company
• The hotel was Florida's first monumental building and used many local building materials including Coquina rock

• The hotel was designated as a National Historic Landmark in 2006

I always make a point of visiting the Flagler courtyard and sometimes stepping into the glorious rotunda on my visits to the nation's oldest city. But for some reason, I had never participated in one of the twice-daily tours of the college, offered for a mere $7. My Fountain of Youth project gave me the incentive to take the tour, and afterward I wondered why it had taken me so long to participate.

After watching a video and about Henry Flagler in the lobby, the tour begins in the courtyard with narration by an excellent student docent. Our tour leader pointed out evidence of the innovative poured-concrete technique, that made it one of the earliest examples of that type of construction in the country. My favorite bit of trivia from this part of the tour, was that when guests complained about the Sulphurous smell of the water piped into the courtyard's central fountain, Flagler told them that the water had healing qualities and the guests never complained again!

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From the courtyard the tour returns to the lobby where the three-and-a-half story rotunda is truly awe-inspiring. Beautiful and functional, this central point of the hotel linked the public spaces to the guest rooms with over-the-top Victorian splendor. Some trivia about the rotunda:
• Eight hand-carved wooden caryatids are said to be modeled after the famed caryatids of the Acropolis in Athens
• Murals by George Maynard represent the four elements and the four stages of Spanish exploration: adventure, discovery, conquest and civilization
• Maynard re-created these same murals in the Library of Congress

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The place I was most interested in seeing, however, was the Dining Hall. Said to host the largest private collection of Tiffany stained glass windows in the world, the three-and-a-half story room is as ornate as anything one might see in Europe. The angels gracing the ceiling represent the four seasons and Spanish galleons represent the sailing ships of Ponce de Leon and other explorers. In addition, muralist Maynard created Spanish coats of arms, Spanish proverbs, signs of the zodiac and sea horses. I'm going to go out on a limb and say that this is my favorite space in all of Florida. And the students at Flagler College get to dine here every day!

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The last room on the tour is the Ladies Parlour, where flash photography is not permitted due to the sensitive nature of the artwork inside. Still containing many pieces of period furnishings, this space is opulent and ornate, but on a smaller scale than the larger public areas.

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The Ponce de Leon Hotel is on par with Henry Plant's Tampa Bay Hotel (also used as a college), Vizcaya in Coconut Grove, The Biltmore Hotel in Coral Gables and Ringling's Ca' d' Zan in Satasota as epic architectural monuments that one shouldn't miss (if you are at all interested in such things.) Located in the heart of St. Augustine's old city, directly across from Flagler's Alcazar Hotel, Zorayda's Castle and the Casa Monica, there is no other block in Florida quite like it.

Evidence that the Dining Hall is still a functioning space today

Menu from the hotel's opening in 1888

The hotel suites are now dorm rooms
Images from the State Archives of Florida

Architectural appetizers in St. Augustine

St. Augustine has the best collection of historical architecture in Florida, hands down. From towering masterpieces of the Victorian age like Henry Flagler's Ponce de Leon Hotel, to modest wooden churches, there is a charm in the old town that captivates me every time I visit. And I keep finding reasons to visit.

I've been by this little schoolhouse a zillion times, but never actually seen it when it wasn't surrounded by tourists before.

Got a spare 1.3 million to spend? You can own this replica of St. Augustine's oldest house directly across from one of my favorite places to eat, the Mayan Cafe.

Grace Methodist Church was built by Henry Flagler so he could build the Alcazar Hotel on the site occupied by the former Methodist Church.

Another rare opportunity to shoot this site of Ripley's Believe It or Not without hundreds of tourists... this was once a hotel owned by Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings' husband.

The Ponce de Leon Shopping Center designed by famed architect Morris Lapidus.


Details of the Alcazar Hotel, now home to the Lightner Museum and City Hall.

The fabulous Casa Monica, formerly owned by Henry Flagler.

I keep photographing this vacant mid-century Firestone dealership because I'm afraid it won't be there the next time I visit...

"Bernard Street is one of three historically black residential streets in the North City area, dating back to the Flagler Era... In the early twentieth century, Dawson Chapel C.M.E., Hurst Chapel A.M.E., and North City Baptist Church were built on Bernard Street."

"Perhaps the most unique location in the city, Palm Row is reminiscent of residential mews found tucked away in historic sections of urban locales (think Greenwich Village and you'll get the idea). What appears to be a bricked walkway is the actual street as it was laid out in the very early 1900s at the end of the Victorian era. Houses line up on the south side with parking on the north."

Another mid-century beauty, the Prince of Peace Church is part of the Nombre de Dios shrine where Menendez performed the first mass in North America.