Florida Frontiers: The Weekly Newspaper Articles of the Florida Historical Society is a weekly newspaper article covering history-based events, exhibitions, activities, places and people in Florida. The newspaper articles premiered in January 2014. We explore the relevance of Florida history to contemporary society and promote awareness of heritage and culture tourism options in the state.
Florida’s Highwaymen artists have been recognized with numerous exhibitions in major museums, several books, and a television documentary. Even with this widespread notoriety, amazing stories about pennies on the dollar sales of Highwaymen paintings still surface. Someone’s sister-in-law buys a Highwaymen painting of a bright red Poinciana tree at a garage sale for $25. The work is worth $2,500...
U.S. Senator Joseph McCarthy ruined the lives and careers of innocent people in the 1950s, fueled by Cold War-era paranoia about the possible communist infiltration of America. The Florida legislature had its own version of McCarthyism called the Legislative Investigation Committee, popularly known as the Johns Committee. Organized in 1956 by state senator and former Florida governor Charley Johns...
Some of the world’s most powerful leaders have made important decisions while staying in a relatively modest residence in Key West, Florida. Seven Presidents of the United States have stayed at the Harry S. Truman Little White House. The home bears Truman’s name because he was the one who most fully utilized the facility while in office, spending nearly six months of his presidency in his second...
Two venerable institutions that celebrate the past are facing a brighter future together. Today begins a new era for both the Florida Historical Society and the Brevard Museum of History and Natural Science as the oldest cultural organization in the state takes ownership of an outstanding local museum. The facility is now also the home of the Florida Historical Society Archaeological Institute. “I...
Florida is known around the world as the home of major theme parks such as Disney World, Universal Orlando, Sea World, and Busch Gardens. There are smaller theme parks here as well, including Marineland, Weeki Wachee, Gatorland and Dinosaur World. The state tourism agency Visit Florida estimates that 94.7 million tourists came to Florida in 2013, most of them visiting at least one theme park...
One of the first Florida novels ever written remained unpublished for more than 150 years. For nearly five decades, the hand written manuscript was preserved but forgotten in an archive at Rollins College. Wenxian Zhang is head of Archives and Special Collections at Rollins College in Winter Park. While doing an inventory of the Florida Collection in 2004, Zhang came across a hand written...
When most people think of Florida’s natural environment, an explosion of color comes to mind. We imagine multiple shades of green in a Florida swamp, bright red Poinciana trees, and the turquoise waters of the Gulf Coast. We picture the oranges, purples, pinks, and blues of the Florida sky. The black and white photographs of Clyde Butcher allow us to look at the natural Florida in a different way...
More than 200 white people wielding baseball bats and ax handles chased African Americans through the streets of downtown Jacksonville, trying to beat them into submission. It was August 27, 1960, a day that became known as “Ax Handle Saturday.” The violent attack was in response to peaceful lunch counter demonstrations organized by the Jacksonville Youth Council of the National Association for...