"A Land Remembered"

I just recently finished the book, "A Land Remembered," by Patrick D. Smith (Pineapple Press, 1984). It came highly recommended by my brother. He would have loaned me his copy, but it was on its third "loan out." It's a fascinating nostalgic saga telling the tales of three generations of Florida Crackers, starting with the migration of intrepid Tobias McIvey from Georgia to land near the Kissimmee River, north of Lake Okeechobee, to his son Zech, who shared time between the family "hammock" and Punta Rassa, the port destination of numerous cattle drives with his father, to Zech's son Sol, who developed the lands acquired by his grandfather and father down to Miami and points in between. This is a saga that stretches from riding a horse drawn "back board" through the flatwoods and swamps of central Florida to cruising Miami Beach in a Rolls Royce.?

I found this book particularly nostalgic as a 69-year-old Florida native who not only remembers twenty-foot-tall citrus trees blanketing areas north and south of Highway 60, but who accessed South Florida and Seminole villages via the Tamiami Trail, Cape Canaveral by way of the “Bee Line,” and Ocala and Gainesville on U.S. 41. But even more so because of my profession as an environmental site assessor. I guess you can say I'm one of a limited number of “pioneers” who have done this work exclusively for more than 30 years. On top of that, I was a real estate lender with a large bank prior to launching my second career. I often say that I’ve either mortgaged or assessed almost every property you can shake a stick at in these parts, issuing forth yet another “yeah, I know” from my wife. In the Tampa Bay area, I've been on the ground floor of sprawling developments, able to see nature there for one last time. It's the main reason I took up photography. For example, I’ve done pre-development assessments of the Starkey, Bexley, Fishhawk, Tampa Palms (west side), Waterset, Mirabay, Connerton, Two Rivers, and Wiregrass developments. Each one of these projects caused me to become (because of my love of history) intimately familiar with the families who travelled on much the same courses as the McIvey’s.?

For example, former St. Petersburg tax collector J.B. Starkey, who was on the board of First National Bank in St. Petersburg where I broke into banking, well into his eighties, warned the board of the threat of hurricanes on waterfront developments. Little did I know I'd be dealing with a third generation Starkey when it was time for his ranch to sell. I was also able to talk to a ranch foreman who worked for Mr. Bexley. His land was unfarmable until he pulled out all the massive pine tree stumps with a rickety bulldozer. These stumps were shipped via the north-south railway that bordered his ranch up to Brunswick, Georgia, for the manufacture of gunpowder. That same foreman told me how they controlled weeds on the east-west line that dissected his land running from downtown St. Petersburg to Stanford, Florida, by hand spraying arsenical solutions from the caboose. Most assessors worth their salt will know the “recognized environmental condition” I'm talking about! Then there was the Thomas clan who controlled thousands of acres in the Fishhawk area and on up to Hernando County. Wayne Thomas sold Seddon Island and was known as the "dean of the phosphate industry." His son Robert Thomas was a philanthropist who donated land for Hillsborough State Park. Then there were the Sumner's who owned most all the land that the Simmons didn't own between U.S. Highway 41 to the west to Balm Road to the east (Waterset and Belmont developments). It was fascinating to track the Mirabay development in Apollo Beach as it was built mostly on dredged land. This area was controlled by the Dickman’s, who along with the Council's and the Elsberry's made Ruskin tomatoes famous. Tampa Palms was owned by a Zephyrhills rancher, timberman, and former mayor I. A. Krusen, and Wiregrass was owned by the Porter family. Because of my wife's roots in Plant City, it’s interesting to note that her mother played bridge with the wives of Bexley and Conner and was close friends with James Porter and Wayne Thomas in the old days, so I was able to add some color to my reports.?

One of my most interesting projects was a large pristine development (with Reedy Creek running through it) owned by the Disney corporation. This project led me straight to the George Bronson family, whose family history is eerily similar to the McIvey's. Irlo Bronson, in fact, secretly sold Disney the property on which was constructed Disney World and Epcot using dummy corporations in the 1960s. An 80-year-old rancher who owned property contiguous to the Disney land we assessed reported prior owner Irlo Bronson swapped a parcel of land with him that, unbeknownst to him, was packaged up in the deal with the original “Imagineer.”?

In my hometown Tampa, I had the privilege of conducting a four-city block study including land on by the Hillsborough River occupied now by Water Works Park and Armature Works. This same area known colloquially as The Heights is presumed to have been the encampment of the Rough Riders and some 30,000 troops, and Patrick Smith weaves this into his story line when Zech McIvey has to reroute his Cuba-bound herd from Punta Rassa (formerly at the entrance to Sanibel Island) north to the port in Tampa because of the Spanish-American War, where the beef would also feed the soldiers staged there. Having grown up a stone's throw from the river, having a father who worked at TECO's Peter O' Knight power plant on its bank, and having puttered down the waterway many times as a boy, plus having been given the task of studying the Hillsborough River dredging history for developers needing to install boat docks along the new Riverwalk, it's hard not to bore my wife to death with yet another “Tampa tale.” I also remember a police sergeant I talked to regarding the area once occupied by Matasini's fishing business west of the Armature Works building at the old Garcia Bridge location. He warned me to not do any "digging" in the area, with tongue in cheek, alluding to Tampa's "Little Chicago" reputation.?

To wrap this up, because of all these "fun facts" rolling around in my brain, having inspected land from Jacksonville to Miami to Naples to Pensacola to Melbourne, and all parts in between, having cycled across Florida from coast to coast four times, having come face to face with many a herd of cows, got myself stuck in mucky wetlands, having pulled a few cattle dip vats out of the ground in my day, having been scared out of my wits by a buck leaping 10 feet vertically out of a clump of palmettos as I walked by, and as one who actually got out of his truck to read the historical sign at the Desert Inn in Yeehaw Junction (Highway 27), which tells the tale of the earliest "drovers" like real life Jacob Summerlin, who fought off bushwhackers, hurricanes, clouds of mosquitoes, bears, alligators, and wolves in the dark, for chests full of gold, I was transported by Smith’s saga unlike most. I thank the Lord he planted me in this great state, much of which will soon have underground irrigation and an HOA.

Please visit my photography site which includes a number of Florida scenes taken on-site and on the way to properties assessed. https://www.gloriography.com/Photography