Hurricane Ian battered my home and neighbors, but it didn’t lay a finger on my love for Pine Island. The day I started collecting my thoughts for this piece, I was waiting for an insurance adjuster to arrive and triage the wounds Hurricane Ian had inflicted a few weeks before. The Category 4 storm lingered lethally over coastal Lee County on Sept. 28, wiping out parts of Fort Myers Beach,

When you think of Florida agriculture, what comes to mind? Oranges? Strawberries? Sugar? Tomatoes? How about Christmas trees?

A museum's festival brings an often overlooked part of Florida history to life. When we think of the history of the Seminole tribe in Florida, we tend to think of one group of people. However, in reality, the Seminoles are a diverse group of men and women from different tribes and backgrounds. Their story is emblematic of the state they took shelter in. People from all walks of life trying

Tampa’s diverse immigrant communities cross paths in a single story. By Janet Scherberger In the late 1880s, Tampa’s Ybor City neighborhood emerged as a center of Florida’s immigrant community, bringing groups together from all around the world. Many of them came from Cuba and worked in Tampa’s renowned cigar industry or provided goods and services to those who did. They established traditions and laid the foundation for the diverse cultural

An enslaved Floridian’s astounding journey to freedom inspires awe, conversation—and poetry. By Janet Scherberger Editor's Note: The exhibit “Journey to Freedom: The Odyssey of Abolitionist Moses Roper” won a Secretary of State award through the Florida Main Street Awards Program.  In 1834, 19-year-old Moses Roper had already tried to escape from slavery 19 times. A forced laborer on an Apalachicola steamboat, Roper was ferociously beaten after every attempt, but undaunted,

With the 2022 National Book Festival fast approaching, Florida Humanities is highlighting the authors and books selected to represent the Sunshine State at this year’s festival. As part of the book festival’s Route1 Reads initiative, Florida Humanities was tasked with promoting stories that illuminate the important aspects of the state and commonwealth connected by the 2,369 miles of U.S. Route 1 from Kent, Maine to Key West, Florida.  Our Route1

FORUM, the magazine of Florida Humanities, won 16 awards at the 2022 Florida Magazine Association Charlie Awards Gala on August 5 in Ponte Vedra Beach. The magazine received six first-place “Charlies,” six silver and four bronze — including a Charlie for Best Overall: Writing and sweeping the Best Writing: In-Depth Reporting category. The awards recognized outstanding writing, design and photography achievements by Florida magazines in 2021. Congratulations to the entire

Tampa’s “Colonel” Tom Parker made Elvis Presley the greatest pop star of all time. 
But did he ruin him as an artist? By Bob Kealing All eyes were on Elvis Presley as he strode into a press conference at the International Hotel in Las Vegas on Aug. 1, 1969. Few noticed “Colonel” Tom Parker, the star’s ubiquitous 60-year-old manager, who stood to the side as Presley took a seat at

Tribal elder Betty Mae Jumper recounts how in 1837, two young Seminoles 
escaped from the Trail of Tears. In 1830, the United States began rounding up all Southeastern Indians east of the Mississippi River and marching them to what had been declared Indian Territory in present-day Oklahoma. Many perished on the grueling journey, which became known as the Trail of Tears. Only the Florida Seminoles offered armed resistance, setting off

The mayor of Newberry on his town’s work to acknowledge—
and heal from—its tragic racial past. By Jordan Marlowe Alachua County, home to Gainesville and the University of Florida, sits in the middle of North Central Florida. As a college town, Gainesville is a blue dot on the region’s deep-red political map. I live in that deep-red area, in Newberry, a small rural community roughly 15 miles west of Gainesville. The inherent