1891 – Author, folklorist and anthropologist Zora Neale Hurston was born in Notasulga Alabama on this date. Famous for her novels and articles, Hurston grew up in the oldest incorporated African American municipality in the U.S., Eatonville located in central Florida north of Orlando. Many of her literary works use Eatonville as a backdrop. Hurston was considered part of the Harlem Renaissance, a cultural movement centered in Harlem New York City and centered on African American expression through the arts and humanities against traditional definitions of race and gender. She graduated from both Howard University and Barnard College in the 1920s. Hurston also traveled extensively throughout the American south and the Caribbean collecting folklore and songs which she helped record for the Federal Writers Project, a New Deal initiative during the 1930s. Among her most famous literary works was “Their Eyes Were Watching God,” published in 1937. Set in rural central and south Florida during the early 20^th century, the story follows a young African American woman’s journey through marriage, hardship and triumph in the Jim Crow-era south. Although Hurston traveled all over the world, she lived in Florida on and off until her death in 1960. She is buried in the Garden of Heavenly Rest Cemetery in Fort Pierce.