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Florida Collection September 2024 Focus: Grand Hotels of Florida Don CeSar Hotel: Pass-a-Grille Beach, Fla., 1927 PA 13728
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FEATURED BOOKS FROM THE FLORIDA COLLECTION:
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As the rail barons who transformed Florida pushed their lines southward, they also created a string of resort hotels to attract wealthy northerners with an appetite for balmy climates and luxurious accommodations. Susan Braden tells the story of the magnificent pleasure palaces created by Plant and Flagler and the impact of their conspicuous scale and opulence on the Florida wilderness. Braden traces the enterprises that brought Plant and Flagler to Florida and then examines each of their hotels, describing the architecture, how they physically functioned, and what they offered their guests in the way of recreation and leisure. From the Spanish Renaissance of St. Augustine's Ponce de Leon, to Georgian Revival in Palm Beach's Royal Poinciana, to the Islamic Revival of the Tampa Bay Hotel and the Alpine ambience of the nearby Belleview, her individual profiles of each hotel show how the builders mixed recognizable style with physical and functional independence, and then capped both with an aura of blatant luxury on a scale previously unknown in Florida.
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The Belleview Mido Resort Hotel: A Century of Hospitalityby Prudy Taylor BoardThe Belleview opened its doors and 145 rooms to a gathering of founder and transportation magnate Henry B. Plant's friends, family and business associates on January 15, 1897. Area residents who had watched the hotel take shape over 18 months were also present. From this moment, the west coast of Florida was assured a prominent place on the map, as well as in the hearts and minds of many of the world's most seasoned travelers, and our area's position as a leading destination was secured. The historical significance of the hotel was officially recognized when it was listed on the National Register of Historic Places.
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by Helen Muir The Biltmore: Beacon for Miami, tells the story of this famous Coral Gables Hotel. The Biltmore is more than a magnificent hotel for visitors from around the world. It is a gathering place for special events within the community. The hotel and its accompanying country club were products of the 1920's Florida land boom. The author, Helen Muir, is the author of Miami USA, a history of the area published in 1953. She also has written for newspapers and magazines and also has played an active role in the field of libraries. Much of the book is written through personal accounts.
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by Donald Walter Curl The Boca Raton Resort & Club, originally known as the Cloister Inn, was designed by famed Palm Beach architect Addison Mizner to house prospective investors in his planned Boca Raton development. His dream, however, dissolved with the end of the Florida land boom and the 1926 Miami hurricane, as his Cloister Inn was acquired by utilities magnate Clarence Geist. Geist hired hotel architects Schultze and Weaver to design a major addition to the hostelry. Reopened as the Boca Raton Club in 1930, it became a principal employer and the primary tourist attraction in Boca Raton in ensuing years, its revival linked in many ways with that of the small community. Join architectural historian Donald Curl as he chronicles the lovely landmark that opened in 1926 as a small inn on Lake Boca Raton and has since become the city's most exclusive destination.
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by Charles Lockwood Since the late 1890s visitors to Palm Beach have wanted to stay "down by the breakers" - where the waves wash against the palm-lined shore and the Atlantic provides refreshing breezes. A century after it first opened in 1896 as the Palm Beach Inn. The Breakers still beckons guests with its incomparable oceanfront setting and exceptional architecture. But The Breakers is more than just a hotel. The story of its first hundred years is the history of Florida's development as one of the world's premier tourist destinations. Palm Beach was an isolated community before Henry Flagler arrived in 1893, fresh from successes in St. Augustine. There he built two exotic hotels to entice visitors and brought a railroad to them. Beautiful photographs throughout the book illustrate the story of The Breakers.
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The story of the Don Ce-Sr Hotel in St. Petersburg Beach, Florida, is a series of mountains and valleys. For a while things go well. Then something happens. The economy nosedives, the owner dies, a project is abandoned and everyone moves out. Then, much like the legendary Don Caesar De Bazan for whom the building was named, there's a sudden reprieve, a new life, and the Don blossoms for another era of usefulness. This book is more than just the story of a well-known landmark. It's a testimony to the reader that persistence pays. The amazing rebirth of the discarded Don was the work of many. Together they proved the efficacy of that famous Biblical passage, "All things work together for good."
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by Hatty Lenfestey Henry B. Plant loved hotels. Before the Civil War, Plant and his first wife and two sons lived in the hotels of the South while he was working for the Adams Express Company and later while running the Southern Express Company. After Ellen Plant died, Mr. Plant and the second Mrs. Plant built a fine home in New York City but he mostly lived and worked in his private railroad car and the Florida resort hotels of the Plant Investment Company. Florida of the late 1800s was a primitive frontier wilderness with fabulous weather. Plant saw Florida as a future playground for Northern tourists and knew that the Plant System of railroads would have to have not just good connections but luxury hotels.
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by Thomas Sentill Graham The origins of the Hotel Ponce de Leon date back to the winter of 1885 when Standard Oil millionaire, Henry Flagler, brought his second wife, Alice Shourds Flagler, to St. Augustine for the winter. The Flaglers took rooms in the new San Marco Hotel, a six-story wooden structure dominating the view just outside the old city gate at the north end of town. The San Marco had been erected in 1884 by the firm of McGuire and McDonald, under the guidance of Osburn D. Seavey, a career hotel man who became manager of the luxury hotel when it opened. After a long consultation with Seavey and James McGuire, Flagler decided to build a hotel of his own. Flagler would later say that originating the design for the Hotel Ponce de Leon was the most perplexing task he ever faced in his Florida enterprises.
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by Louise Frisbie Florida's Fabled Inns, lavishly illustrated, highlights the state's appeal as a tourist mecca from the 1820s, soon after the United States purchased Florida from Spain, up to the early 1950s. Louise Frisbie invites the reader to share a close-up view of the elaborate hotels of the Plant and Flagler chains, built in the 1880s and 1890s, such as the Breakers at Palm Beach and the Belleview Biltmore at Clearwater and others. The book provides a brief history and illustrations of hotels throughout the state.
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Florida in the late 1800s was a paradise waiting to be discovered. During this period, two visionary tycoons of the Gilded Age set out on separate ventures that would transform the Sunshine State from America's last frontier into a destination for the rich and famous. The grand hotels that Henry M. Flagler and Henry B. Plant opened at their planned resort sites offered a fantasy stay surrounded by all the accoutrements expected by sophisticated, Gilded Age patrons. Florida's Grand Hotels from the Gilded Age provides a look at these magnificent structures during their glory years, along with the fashionable entertainment and social and recreational pastimes that engaged their gilded guests.
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by Bruce HuntThis new book offers 120 of the most romantic, historic, quaint, and often eclectic places to stay in Florida. Written in an engaging, personal style, the book relates the histories of the inns as well as the personal stories of the innkeepers. Divided into seven geographical sections, this guide and travelogue highlights the grand to the humble and everything in between. In addition, Bruce presents a brief history of the development of Florida's east and west coasts. It's the story of Henry Flagler and Henry Plant, two tireless railroad barons who made Florida's farthest reaches accessible to visitors and built hotels to house them.
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by Herbert Hiller This book provides first hand accounts of 92 special places to stay in Florida. It is the result of almost 30 years of work with tourism in Florida. The author observes that as tourists, we are bombarded by advertising to reward humdrum lives with quick weekends of escape to help make the year of weeks bearable and to consume in exotic surroundings a portion of what we labor the year to produce. The author prefers self discovery. He states that small hotels and other intimate lodgings, by how they put us in touch with authentic hospitality elsewhere, can help us find authenticity in ourwselves.
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On July 26, 1888, New York architect John A Wood set the cornerstone for the Tampa Bay Hotel. The hotel opened in 1891. Wood's choice of style was probably influenced by Florida's 200 years as a Spanish possession. The book is the story of the construction, style and decor of the hotel from information found in the Henry B. Plant Museum. It includes pictures of famous visitors and even a copy of the music for the Tampa Bay Hotel Galop.
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by James W. Covington The book provides a look at both Henry B. Plant and his magnificent hotel. It is illustrated with numerous color and black and white photographs. Author James Covington, professor of history at the University of Tampa, wrote the book in celebration of 100th anniversary of the Tampa Bay Hotel, which creates the skyline signature of Tampa and the man who was responsible for changing the face and future of Tampa.
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The Renaissance Vinoy: St. Petersburg's Crown Jewel by Prudy Taylor BoardAuthor Prudy Taylor Board leads readers through the fascinating history of this elegant Florida resort. A landmark on St. Petersburg's waterfront for 75 years, the Renaissance Vinoy's past is replete with as many twists and turns as can be found in a best-selling suspense novel. The story of the Vinoy's ultimate restoration and reopening in July of 1992 is as interesting and spellbinding as her early years peopled with a cast of rescuers and rogues, dreamers, and astute businessmen.
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LIBRARY AND TAMPA BAY AREA EVENTS:
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Saturday, August 2 through Friday, October 25, 2024 John F. Germany Library, 900 N. Ashley Dr., 2nd floor. "Latin Treasures/Tesoros Latinos" is a collective juried art contest featuring Tampa Bay's Hispanic artists celebrating their cultural roots. The artist's represent the Hispanic culture through colors. The Coalition of Hispanic Artists seeks to provide Hispanic Artists secure cultural cultural environments for their development.
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Saturday, September 7, 10:00 am to 1:00 pm John F. Germany Library, Cecil P. Beach Conference Room Meeting is a hybrid meeting. Elizabeth Gomoll will be presenting via webinar in the Beach Conference Room in the Florida History and Genealogy Library at the John F. Germany Public Library. Alternately, you can attend via Zoom webinar. Finding an adopted child’s biological family is especially challenging for genealogists. This presentation uses a success story to show how good methodology combined with document research and DNA matches (plus a dose of good luck) finally put to rest a decades-old question.
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Southshore Regional Library John Crawford Art Education Studio Learn tools and strategies for getting started with family research. Recommended for adults. Registration recommended.
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by Christopher Knowlton Wednesday, September 25, 7:00 - 8:00 pm John F. Germany Library - Beach Conference Room, 4th floor The 1920s in Florida was a time of incredible excess, immense wealth, and precipitous collapse. The decade there produced the largest human migration in American history, far exceeding the settlement of the West, as millions flocked to the grand hotels and the new cities that rose rapidly from the teeming wetlands. Tycoons, crooks, and celebrities arrived en masse to promote or exploit this new and dazzling American frontier in the sunshine. Yet, the import and deep impact of these historical events have never been explored thoroughly until now. Copies of the book are available at FHGL, in several libraries in the county and as an ebook or eaudio book. For adults. Registration is not required.
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Join us for a conversation about Tampa history with USF Special Collections librarian, Andy Huse. Huse will be discussing his book From Saloons to Steakhouses: A History of Tampa. This takes readers on a journey into historic bars, theaters, gambling halls, soup kitchens, clubs, and restaurants, telling the story of Tampa's past through these fascinating social spaces many of which can't be found in official histories. Beginning with the founding of modern Tampa in 1887 and spanning a century, Huse delves into the culture of the city and traces the struggles that have played out in public spaces. He describes temperance advocates who crusaded against saloons and breweries, cigar workers on strike who depended on soup houses for survival, and civil rights activists who staged sit-ins at lunch counters. These stories are set amid themes such as the emergence of Tampa's criminal underworld, the rise of anti-German fear during World War I, and the heady power of prosperity and tourism in the 1950s. After the book discussion, there will be a light lunch served. After, attendees will get a tour of the Florida History and Genealogy Library and have the opportunity to get research help from librarians.
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by Kerry Kriseman Kerry Kriseman has shared intimate, authentic details of her life in politics and the public spotlight across two decades in Florida politics. She makes clear how a modern 'political spouse' is anything but the stereotype of the adoring 'stand by your man' mannequin wife but is instead a full partner in the decisions, the public fights, and private challenges of service in the modern era.
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The unvarnished history of America's most notorious palace and its American queen Moments before the Roaring Twenties sunk into the Great Depression, socialite heiress Marjorie Merriweather Post and financier E.F. Hutton constructed an estate to outdo all estates. To the tune of $4 million (about $68 million today) and four years of labor they called forth a 118-room mansion in a conflated Spanish, Portuguese, and Venetian design over a coral reef in hurricane-prone Palm Beach County. They named it Mar-a-Lago-a winter haven where corporate titans, the glitterati, and nobility gathered. But the honeymoon didn't last long. In American Castle, Pulitzer Prize finalist Mary C. Shanklin reveals a century of controversy, politics, and lifestyles of the super-rich and powerful after Mar-a-Lago became a part-time residence and party place upon Post's divorce from Hutton over mutual adultery. It's a story of an American royal who, at the age of 27, inherited a cereal company that would later become the General Foods Corporation and spent a lifetime in business, art collection, philanthropy, and the management of multiple estates-including her white elephant, Mar-a-Lago.
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Millions have sat under the "big top," watching as trapeze artists glide and clowns entertain, but few know the captivating stories behind the men who shaped the circus. Battle for the Big Top is the untold story of the battles of the three circus kings--James Bailey, P.T. Barnum, and John Ringling-all vying for control of the vastly profitable and widely influential American Circus. New York Times bestselling author Les Standiford recreates a remarkable era when a community-without regard for gender, creed, or nationality--would be captivated by the spectacle created by three diversely talented individuals who transcended the ordinary. Ultimately, the rivalry of these three men resulted in the creation of an institution that would surpass all intentions and, for 147 years, hold a nation spellbound. Filled with details of their ever-evolving showmanship, business strategies, and personal magnetism, this Ragtime-like narrative will delight and enchant circus-lovers everywhere.
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by Erik Larson
On November 6, 1860, Abraham Lincoln became the fluky victor in a tight race for president. The country was bitterly at odds; Southern extremists were moving ever closer to destroying the Union, with one state after another seceding and Lincoln powerless to stop them. Slavery fueled the conflict, but somehow the passions of North and South came to focus on a lonely federal fortress in Charleston Harbor: Fort Sumter. Master storyteller Erik Larson offers a gripping account of the chaotic months between Lincoln's election and the Confederacy's shelling of Sumter-a period marked by tragic errors and miscommunications, enflamed egos and craven ambitions, personal tragedies and betrayals. Lincoln himself wrote that the trials of these five months were "so great that, could I have anticipated them, I would not have believed it possible to survive them."
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Florida Man: Poemsby Tyler Gillespie Florida Man stories often go viral for their weirdness such as “Florida Man Arrested for Drunk Dialing 911 When He Wanted Vodka,” but there’s more to him than a punchline, which Tyler Gillespie breaks down through an exploration of his home state’s history, landscape, and his own recovery from substance abuse. In the tradition of C.D. Wright, Gillespie -- a reporter for national publications -- utilizes journalistic techniques in an innovative nonfiction hybrid that merges poetic sound and form in pieces that range from alligator anatomy to Southern heritage to growing up gay in a Christian school. As Gillespie writes, Florida is not only a vacation spot or a retirement destination but an ideal state for “A country full of people who would spend their last chance on a dream & a plot their happy ending." Tyler Gillespie’s Florida Man poems strip away the accepted myths of Florida and its inhabitants, using a lyric mix of journalism, science, history, family lore, and lived experience to reveal the complex realities of self and state.
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Florida Trail Hikes: Top Scenic Destinations on Florida National Scenic Trailby Sandra FriendA guide to the best scenic day hikes and overnight trips along the state-spanning Florida Trail, this book helps readers of all backgrounds and experience levels plan an adventure exploring natural Florida. Explore natural Florida with an adventure on the state's most notable hiking trail Stretching 1,500 miles between Pensacola and the Everglades, the Florida National Scenic Trail has over 100 trailheads, most located within an easy drive from nearby urban areas. A guide to the best scenic day hikes and overnight trips along this state-spanning footpath, Florida Trail Hikes leads readers to showy overlooks, wildflower-dotted prairies, river rapids, steep bluffs, tall sand dunes, and many other compelling destinations. Updated in this third edition with the most current route details, this book provides full-color maps, options for lengthening and shortening hikes, and information on nearby towns for use as base camps. Selected from the personal experiences of the authors, the hikes in this book include many loop trails convenient for solo hikers as well as several accessible trail sections. Sandra Friend and John Keatley also offer the backstory of the Florida Trail, first blazed in 1966, and the hidden history of Florida that hikers will encounter on their journeys. Florida Trail Hikes helps readers of all backgrounds and experience levels plan an outdoor getaway amid Florida's natural beauty.
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by Phillip Hubbart
This book is an insider's account of the case of Freddie Lee Pitts and Wilbert Lee, two Black men who were wrongfully charged and convicted of the murder of two white gas station attendants in Port St. Joe, Florida, in 1963, and sentenced to death. Phillip Hubbart, a defense lawyer for Pitts and Lee for more than 10 years, examines the crime, the trial, and the appeals with both a keen legal perspective and an awareness of the endemic racism that pervaded the case and obstructed justice. Hubbart discusses how the case against Pitts and Lee was based entirely on confessions obtained from the defendants and an alleged "eye witness" through prolonged, violent interrogations and how local authorities repeatedly rejected later evidence pointing to the real killer, a white man well-known to the Port St. Joe police. The book follows the case's tortuous route through the Florida courts to the defendants' eventual exoneration in 1975 by the Florida governor and cabinet. From Death Row to Freedom is a thorough chronicle of deep prejudice in the courts and brutality at the hands of police during the civil rights era of the 1960s. Hubbart argues that the Pitts-Lee case is a piece of American history that must be remembered, along with other similar incidents, in order for the country to make any progress toward racial reconciliation today.
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Haunted Florida Ghost Townsby Heather Leigh Carrol-LandonThe term "ghost towns" brings to mind communities from the Old West where there were once bustling Boom Towns but today are abandoned and lonely pieces to the puzzles of the past. With this image ingrained into a person's mind, it is challenging to visualize ghost towns with sandy beaches and palm trees swaying in the wind. A little-known fact about Florida is it is home to more than 250 ghost towns, many of which remain the home for the spirits of former inhabitants, civil war deserters, pirates, and more. Haunted Florida Ghost Towns covers the many abandoned locations in the Sunshine State where paranormal entities are known to roam. Take a journey into the world of the supernatural and learn the history behind why Florida has so many ghost towns and the energy that remains to fuel paranormal activity.
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Historic Florida Churchesby Joy Sheffield HarrisOver 200 years have passed since the first Florida church was established and today the Cathedral Basilica of St. Augustine has been restored to capture its original beauty. Pioneer Village Church at Shingle Creek is home to a replica of one the first churches built in the Kissimmee, the St. John's Episcopal Church. The former St. Paul's By-The-Sea is now the deconsecrated Beaches Chapel at The Beaches Museum and History Park in Jacksonville Beach. Travel throughout the state or enjoy the beauty of these and many more churches without leaving home.
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JFK's Last Hundred Days: the Transformation of a Man and the Emergence of a Great Presidentby Thurston ClarkeFifty years after his assassination, President John F. Kennedy’s legend endures. Noted author and historian Thurston Clarke reexamines the last months of the president’s life to show a man in the midst of great change, both in his family and in the key issues of his day: the cold war, civil rights, and Vietnam, finally on the cusp of making good on his extraordinary promise. JFK’s Last Hundred Days presents a gripping account that weaves together Kennedy’s public and private lives, explains why the grief following his assassination has endured so long, and solves the most tantalizing Kennedy mystery of them all—not who killed him but who he was when he was killed and where he would have led us.
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Janet Reno: a Lifeby Judith Hicks StiehmIn this first full biography of former United States attorney general Janet Reno (1938-2016), Judith Hicks Stiehm describes the independent and unconventional life of a woman who grew up in a rural South Florida homestead and rose to occupy one of the top positions in the United States government, whose ethics and example served as inspiration for women in law and politics across the nation. In telling Janet Reno's story, Stiehm incorporates personal details from her full and exclusive access to family papers and photos, as well as inside information from Reno's own materials and interviews with over 40 of Reno's personal and professional acquaintances. Stiehm begins by tracing Reno's free-range childhood, her college years at Cornell and experience at Harvard Law School as one of 16 women in a class of over 500, the challenges she faced as a woman lawyer launching her career in 1960s Miami, and her 15 years as Miami-Dade state attorney. In 1993. Reno was appointed to serve in Washington as United States attorney general in the Clinton administration, the first woman to occupy the position in the history of the nation.
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This “witty, humorous, and heartfelt“ memoir navigates the tangled branches of Annabelle Tometich’s life, from growing up in Florida as the child of a Filipino mother and a deceased white father to her adult life as a med-school-reject-turned-food-critic. When journalist Annabelle Tometich picks up the phone one June morning, she isn’t expecting a collect call from an inmate at the Lee County Jail. And when she accepts, she certainly isn’t prepared to hear her mother’s voice on the other end of the line. However, explaining the situation to her younger siblings afterwards was easy; all she had to say was, “Mom shot at some guy. He was messing with her mangoes.” They immediately understood. Answering the questions of the breaking-news reporter—at the same newspaper where Annabelle worked as a restaurant critic––proved more difficult. Annabelle decided to go with a variation of the truth: it was complicated.
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Motion Picture Paradise: a History of Florida's Film and Television Industry by David D. MortonHighlighting Florida's essential, often overlooked role in shaping American film and television Motion Picture Paradise is a sweeping story of filmmaking in Florida, featuring the activities of studios and filmmakers across the peninsula by looking at the many iconic films and television shows shot in the state. In the early years of the American film industry, Florida was a favorite location for pioneer movie makers, and David Morton chronicles the state's importance to producers throughout the next 125 years. Often overshadowed by the well-known entertainment industries of Hollywood and New York, Florida has over time had several major film production centers. Using a wealth of source materials, Morton offers a comprehensive history that demonstrates how films and television shows made in Florida have influenced the state's sense of identity, drawing attention to Florida's underacknowledged role as the "third coast" in American film history. Motion Picture Paradise adds new insights into the state's dramatic social and economic transformations during the twentieth century.
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Offbeat Florida the Nature, History, Culture, and Quirk of the Sunshine Stateby Neals McCartenOffbeat Florida: The nature, history, culture, and quirk of the Sunshine State is a guide for the independent traveler who knows there is far more to Florida than beaches and theme parks (even though our beaches and theme parks are stellar). Over 800 separate attractions in more than 230 towns across Florida from the Flora-Bama Bar (site of their famous mullet toss) at the north west corner, to Fort Jefferson where the infamous Dr. Mudd was once incarcerated (and why he was released). Along the way you’ll discover that we still have drive-in movies and where to find them. And where to see snakes being milked, and the colorful tale of how Tates Hell State Forest got its name, as well as how the Conch Republic got its name and where and when to see the swimming Santas.
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Path of the Panther: New Hope for Wild Florida by Carlton WardPath of the Panther is a story of new hope for the recovery of an iconic endangered species and its Everglades home – and a global example of how protecting wildlife corridors can sustain balance for nature and people. The panther is the state animal of Florida, the last big cat surviving east of the Mississippi River, and an emblem of the Endangered Species Act. It was driven to extinction in the eastern United States, except for a small remnant population that persisted in Florida’s Everglades. Panther numbers had dwindled to fewer than 20 individuals by the 1980s, but heroic conservation efforts have helped panthers come back to nearly 200 today. The biggest obstacle for the panther’s continued recovery is access to enough of its historic territory throughout Florida and beyond. The tale of the Florida panther has grown from the unlikely survival of a rare cat to a story of hope for all of wild Florida. Path of the Panther in now a call to action to recognize and protect the Florida Wildlife Corridor – a network of public and private land that connects the panther’s current range in south Florida to suitable habitat throughout the state of Florida and adjoining states. The Florida Wildlife Corridor is the panther’s path to recovery and a western-scale conservation opportunity that remains largely hidden in the east.
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A Tropical Frontier: Tales of Old Floridaby Tim RobinsonThe Southern Frontier: A road-less, watery wilderness, uninviting to all but the most stouthearted and adventurous. As great cities were springing up in places like St. Louis, Denver, and San Francisco, the lower peninsula of Florida endured. Here, the panther, the alligator, and the bald eagle remained safe from the restless, meddlesome hands of civilization, continuing as they had for eons past. Renegade Indians, pirates, hurricanes, and man-eating animals - not to mention venomous snakes and bloodthirsty hordes of mosquitoes - reigned supreme. It took a certain kind of person to boldly venture into such an inhospitable environment where a man had only himself and his family upon which to depend. It took men and women with not only vision, but backbone and grit, people like the MacLeods, Dawsons, and Hackensaws, true pioneers who confronted whatever came their way, together, as a family. From shipwrecks to Indian uprisings to buried treasure, blockade runners to murderous beach tramps, and the sad, lonely life of the solitary beachcomber, Tales of Old Florida takes the reader back to a singular time and place that will never be seen again. Above all, Tales of Old Florida is an epic saga of survival and prosperity, love and love lost, and most important, the power of the human spirit to prevail.
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An Unflinching Look : Elegy for Wetlands by Benjamin DimmittAn Unflinching Look is an examination of a unique North American ecosystem in decline, investigated through eighty-five duotone photographs, scientific analysis, and critical interpretation. The project's focus is the area of the Chassahowitzka National Wildlife Refuge on Florida's Gulf Coast and the history and fate of its wetlands. Dimmitt began photographing in the salt-damaged sawgrass savannas and spring creeks there as a way of examining and reckoning with the ecosystem loss and of understanding what was becoming of his native Florida. He narrowed his focus to a small, remote area that he loves and knows well. Dimmitt's intention in bearing witness to this loss has been to portray the ruined landscape with respect and beauty. To document the progress of the saltwater intrusion, Dimmitt has rephotographed landscapes that he first photographed more than forty years ago. His photographs reveal the impact of several factors that are causing the loss of an entire ecosystem: rising sea levels caused by global warming, excessive pumping from the underground aquifer, and the contamination of limited natural resources. In addition to Dimmitts photographs, An Unflinching Look includes contributions from four other experts
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ON DISPLAY IN THE FLORIDA HISTORY & GENEALOGY LIBRARY, 4TH FLOOR OF THE JOHN F. GERMANY PUBLIC LIBRARY
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Hillsborough State Bank
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Florida Banking Records Collection The Florida Banking Records give insight and context to the history of Florida's economy. They date from the late 19th century to the mid-20th century. The records come from several banks of historical significance and include Hillsboro State Bank, Bank of Dunedin, First Savings and Trust Co., and SunBank. The records were stored for several years in a warehouse and were scheduled to be destroyed. In 2014, a SunTrust bank employee asked the Florida History & Genealogy Library if they would accept the donation. In 2021 the library started an in-house preservation project. This includes cleaning, repairing, and cataloging the records.
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A Food and Drink History of Tampa as told through the Burgert Brothers Photographic Collection, 1900-1964 The video display features photographs of farms, restaurants and bars. It was created to accompany the 2024 Family Heritage Festival, From Saloons to Steakhouses: A Conversation with Andy Huse.
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A Food and Drink History of Tampa Items in the Display Case include books and photographs, and other memorabilia about food and restaurants in Tampa.
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