Tag Archives: Jean Ribault

The Myth of Ancient Floridian Giants

Posted on June 25, 2022 | Leave a comment

Click below for this week’s story, or navigate the city through the search bar or the direction buttons at the top of the page:

The fiction that the Timucua and other indigenous Florida peoples were seven to nine feet tall spread rapidly in the 1950s. My mother believed it, told me we were descended. Another fiction. Willie Browne and Father Dearing believed it. D.B. McKay — Tampa mayor, newspaper editor, and chief organizer of the White Municipal Party — believed nine foot tall ancient Floridians populated the Garden of Eden. So where did these ideas come from?

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Tagged A Land Remembered, Athore, Cross and Sword, Cross and Sword: A Symphonic Drama of the Spanish Settlement of Florida, D.B. McKay, Father Frank Dearing, Fiction Fix, First Presbyterian Church Jacksonville, Fort Caroline, Fort Caroline National Memorial, Garden of Eden Florida, Great Fire of 1901, In Abraham's Bosom, Jacque Le Moyne, jaxpsychogeo, Jean Ribault, Juan Alonso Cavale, Mocama, Mocama Indians, Oriba, Patrick D. Smith, Patrick D. Smith A Land Remembered, Paul Green, Purple Petunia, René Goulaine de Laudonnière, Saturiwa, Theodor de Bry, Tim Gilmore, Timucua, Timucuan Indians, Timucuan Village U.S. Capitol, Wesley B. Plott, White Municipal Party, William Sears, William Sears archaeologist, Willie Browne

Willie Browne on the Lost Communities of Fulton and Lone Star

Posted on September 26, 2021 | 1 comment

January 1967, Old Willie Browne, who will soon donate his hundreds of acres of forest and bluff to conservation, discusses lost communities with Father Frank Dearing. You’ll find the two stories below:

1) Here’s the lost town of Fulton, Willie’s friend Captain Hole, stories of moonshiners and buried treasure, the digging up of Fulton Cemetery.

2) And here’s the lost black community of Lone Star, one of many in the Arlington area. Here, at least the cemetery remains. Its oldest occupant was born before Jacksonville.

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Tagged Andrew Atkinson Grant, B.G. Jarvis, Calypso Island, Captain Hole, Chaseville, Chaseville Arlington Jacksonville, Cleve Powell, Cosmo, Cosmo Arlington Jacksonville, Frank Dearing, Fulton, Fulton Arlington Jacksonville, Fulton Boat Ramp, Fulton Cemetery, Fulton Town, H. Frederick Hole, Henry Ferrar, Homoloa, Isaiah Hart, jax psycho geo, Jean Ribault, John C. Christian, Lone Star, Lone Star Arlington Jacksonville, Lone Star Cemetery, Lone Star Road, Lord “Harry” Peter Chamberlain, Lucy Ames Edwards, Mary Hole, Mill Creek at Kendall Town, Mt. Zion Methodist Church, R. Fulton Cutting, Reverend Frank Dearing, Sanchez Grant, Saxon Browne, Shipyard Creek, Shipyard Road, St. Johns Bluff, Tim Gilmore, Timucuan Ecological and Historic Preserve, Willie Browne, Woodsong Loop West

New Story: The Ancient Timucuan Community of Sarabay

Posted on June 19, 2021 | Leave a comment

Click below for this week’s story, or navigate the city through the search bar or the direction buttons at the top of the page:

This is the ancient Timucuan Indian community of Sarabay. For more than two decades, UNF archaeologist Keith Ashley suspected it. Now he’s sure. European pottery found here matches notes in French and Spanish writings from the 1560s to the early 1600s. For the Mocama, the Timucuan people who lived here for thousands of years, European contact meant the beginning of the end.

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Tagged Auburn archaeology, Big Talbot Island, Daniella Kapuschansky, Denise Bossy, Fort George Island, Francisco Pareja, Grand Shell Ring, Jacque Le Moyne, jax psycho geo, Jean Ribault, Jody Gilmore, John Cottier, Keith Ashley, Laudonniere, Little Talbot Island, Majolica, Matt Soergel, McKenna Lenoir, Mocama, Mocama Indians, René Goulaine de Laudonnière, San Juan del Puerto, Sarabay, Theodor de Bry, Tim Gilmore, Timucua, Timucuan Indians, UNF archaeology, University of North Florida archaeology, William Jones, Zephaniah Kingsley

New Story: St. Elmo “Chic” Acosta House

Posted on December 28, 2020 | Leave a comment

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When the old man fired his gun over the boy’s head for stealing oranges, the future city commissioner said one day Armstrong’s house would be his. He bought it in 1911. St. Elmo “Chic” Acosta was arrested in 1924 on “false charges” of keeping a “disorderly house” and indicted in 1933 for giving away the city’s “sack of potatoes” and a mule. He made enemies easily, but always fought for urban “beautification.” After the Acostas donated the house in 1966, it became the artistic heart of Episcopal School of Jacksonville.

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Tagged Acosta Bridge, Acosta House, Anna Van Valkenburgh, Barbara Stevenson, Charles Cummings, Chic Acosta, Cohen Brothers, El Modelo, El Modelo Cigar Factory, Elmo Acosta, Elmo Chic Acosta, Elmo W. Acosta, Episcopal Boys Home, Episcopal High School, Episcopal School of Jacksonville, Ernest Anders, Ernest E. Anders, Federal Writers Project, Florida history, J.E.T. Bowden, Jacksonville history, jax psycho geo, Jean Ribault, John Alsop, John T. Alsop, John W. Martin, Keystone Bluff, L.H. Armstrong, Mark Zimmerman, Munnerlyn Campus, Pedro Menéndez de Avilés, Pedro Menendez, Robert Bruce Van Valkenburgh, Rose Shepherd, Satsumas, Sean Bean, Second Seminole Indian War, St. Elmo Acosta, Tim Gilmore, Unshu Mikan, Van Valkenburgh, Van Valkenburgh House

New Story: Old St. Johns River Lighthouse

Posted on February 28, 2019 | Leave a comment

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When I climbed the lighthouse in the year 2000, we found, in place of the light, the nest of a great night bird of prey. The Old St. Johns Lighthouse should stand for hundreds of years, perhaps a thousand, says Herschel Shepard, the architect who restored it. The door’s long buried in the risen ground. Wanton S. Webb called it a “pretty romance,” the story of a retired maritime sergeant who locked his daughter in the lighthouse a century and a half ago.

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Tagged "The Story of Mayport", Audubon Society, bar pilots, barred owl, BEAKS, Bird Emergency Aid and Kare Sanctuary, Bluebeard, convolvulus, Elizabeth Stark, Fanny Brandt, Fresnel, George A. Smathers, Glenn Bartley, Hazard Light, Hazard Lighthouse, Herschel Shepard, Jack Spottwood, Jacksonville Beaches, jax psycho geo, jaxpsychogeo, Jean Ribault, John Kunkel Small, Ken Smith, Mayport, Mayport lighthouse, Mayport Navy Base, Morning Glory, Old St. Johns Lighthouse, Rapunzel, Ribault Monument, Tim Gilmore, Wanton S. Webb