"Paradise Park was the "colored only'" counterpart to Silver Springs, a central Florida tourist attraction famous for its crystal-clear water and glass bottom boats. Together the two parks formed one of the biggest recreational facilities in the country before Disney World. From 1949 to 1969, boats passed each other on the Silver River--blacks on one side, whites on the other. Though the patrons of both parks shared the same river, they seldom crossed the invisible line in the water"--Jacket.

A Land Remembered has become Florida's favorite novel. Now this Student Edition in two volumes makes this rich, rugged story of the American pioneer spirit more accessible to young readers. Patrick Smith tells of three generations of the MacIveys, a Florida family battling the hardships of the frontier. The story opens in 1858, when Tobias and Emma MacIvey arrive in the Florida wilderness with their son, Zech, to start a new life, and ends in 1968 with Solomon MacIvey, who realizes that his wealth has not been worth the cost to the land. Between is a sweeping story rich in Florida history with a cast of memorable characters who battle wild animals, rustlers, Confederate deserters, mosquitoes, starvation, hurricanes, and freezes to carve a kingdom out of the Florida swamp. In this volume, meet young Zech MacIvey, who learns to ride like the wind through the Florida scrub on Ishmael, his marshtackie horse, his dogs, Nip and Tuck, at this side. His parents, Tobias and Emma, scratch a living from the land, gathering wild cows from the swamp and herding them across the state to market. Zech learns the ways of the land from the Seminoles, with whom his life becomes entwined as he grows into manhood. Next in series > > See all of the books in this series

Cypress Gardens was Florida's original theme park where movie stars, water-ski champions, and Southern belles created magic. To someone weathering a New England winter, Dick Pope's Cypress Gardens looked exotic. The images coming out of his promotional powerhouse appeared in magazines, newspapers, newsreels, and movies depicting everything from bathing beauties aquaplaning through walls of fire to Southern belles relaxing beneath huge tropical plants, from Don Ameche proposing to Betty Grable under moss-hung cypress trees to Esther Williams performing a water ballet in a Florida-shaped pool. It was all happening in sleepy Winter Haven, where one real estate maverick turned tourism tycoon was out to sell "100,000 [visitors] 25 cents worth of Florida." This book reveals the empire Pope built from a remote swampland to its heyday as a famous water-sports destination and playground for such stars as Joan Crawford, Johnny Carson, and Carol Burnett, as well as royalty from the Duke and Duchess of Windsor to King Hussein of Jordan. It also discusses the park's decline following the construction of Walt Disney World, changes in management, the evolving interests and vacationing habits of the nation, as well as its outlook for the future as a part of LEGOLAND Florida.

Provides an entertaining history of one of Florida's oldest roadside attractions, Weeki Wachee Spring and its performing mermaids, that ranges from its development in 1947 to the present day, bringing together extensive archival research and interviews with dozens of mermaids and other park employees with 250 black-and-white and color photographs.

A focus on the photography and photographers that made Weeki Wachee Springs an iconic tourist destination of Florida.

“A hilarious and daring portrait of growing up gay in the American South. One roots for Lily as one does for Huck Finn. This beautifully written debut novel explores the fragile links between a girl’s growing awareness of her sexuality and the far-reaching effects this has upon her family.”—Pamela Ball, author ofLavaandThe Floating City "Lu Vickers is an exquisite writer. Her work can be, at once, poetic, sharp, hilarious, and relentlessly moving. In Breathing Underwater, she investigates, with keen insight, the legacies of guilt, the intricacies of the mother-daughter relationship, and the complexities of budding sexuality. A stunning, rich, and haunting debut." --Julianna Baggott, best-selling author ofGirl Talk, The Madam,andLizzie Borden in Love In 1970s Chattahoochee, Florida, where the main employer is a mental institution, it’s sink or swim for Lily. When her mama, a former beauty queen who once dreamt of being Miss Florida, takes Lily and her siblings fishing one morning, Lily nearly drowns while her mother looks on, “weighing her gains against her losses.” Lily proves to be a survivor, which she will need to prove again and again, as she struggles to stay afloat amidst her mother’s slow mental deterioration, her first love, and her quest to come to terms with who she is and what she wants from this crazy world. With lyrical prose, Lu Vickers gives voice to Lily’s inner soul, and in turn reveals how universal our needs and desires are.

Winner of the 2005 New Jersey Author Award for Scholarly Non-Fiction from the New Jersey Studies Academic Alliance Long before Bruce Springsteen picked up a guitar; before Danny DeVito drove a taxi; before Jack Nicholson flew over the cuckoo's nest, Asbury Park was a seashore Shangri-La filled with shimmering odes to civic greatness, world-renowned baby parades, temples of retail, and atmospheric movie palaces. It was a magnet for tourists, a summer vacation mecca-to some degree New Jersey's own Coney Island. In Asbury Park's Glory Days, award-winning author Helen-Chantal Pike chronicles the city's heyday-the ninety-year period between 1890 and 1980. Pike illuminates the historical conditions contributing to the town's cycle of booms and recessions. She investigates the factors that influenced these peaks, such as location, lodging, dining, nightlife, merchandising, and immigration, and how and why millions of people spent their leisure time within this one-square-mile boundary on the northern coast of the state. Pike also includes an epilogue describing recent attempts to resurrect this once-vibrant city.