Thomas Merton's Florida connection

Fr. Frederic Dunne at his
election as abbot. Note his
motto at the top of the photo.
Photo is from the book,
The Less Traveled Road

The “small world” adage seems appropriate as I write this. How else to explain the link I found between the Florida frontier and one of the greatest spiritual writers of the 20th century?

That writer is Thomas Merton. The Florida link is Dom Frederic Dunne. He was the abbot at the Abbey of Gethsemani who accepted Merton into the Trappist monastery in 1941. That happened in Kentucky, a long way from Florida. But Fr. Dunne not only had roots in Florida, he had roots in a Catholic colony established in the Florida wilderness in the early 1880s. 

At Gethsemani, Dunne noticed Merton’s talent and encouraged him to write. I believe he ordered him under the monastic rule of obedience to continue writing even when Merton resisted. (If you’re not familiar with Merton, do a Google search and you’ll see just how impactful that order to write would be.)

Merton later acknowledged Dunne’s influence and impact on his writing. Over the years, Dunne also become a spiritual mentor and father figure for Merton. The two remained close until Dunne's death in 1948.

So who was this influential figure who spent part of his youth in the Florida wilderness? He was one of the 14 students who sat at the kitchen table of Catholic home-school pioneer Cecelia Morse in the frontier settlement of San Antonio in south central Florida. I wrote a post about Mrs. Morse and her school a few months ago: https://frontier-florida.blogspot.com/2024/07/home-school-mom-catholic-ed-pioneer.html).

The settlement was a Catholic colony established by Dunne’s uncle. The younger Dunne spent some of his formative years there, between the ages of 11 and 16. This included years when his own father worked away from home because jobs were scarce on the frontier. 

A spiritual memoir about Dunne shares some important background about his years in the tiny Florida community. The Less Traveled Road by Rev. M. Raymond was published in 1953. Raymond was a monk at the Abbey of Gethsemani and he knew both Merton and Dunne

In his book, Raymond draws parallels between the silence and solitude Dunne experienced in the wilderness environment and the silence and solitude he found at the Trappist monastery. Raymond also notes how the hardships of frontier life laid a foundation for the austerity of monastery life. 

Raymond drew on firsthand reminiscences of one of Dunne’s sisters about the family’s life in Florida - and just how solitary it was. For example, it took a week to travel to and from Tampa, a distance of 32 miles. The Catholic colony was also 45 miles from the nearest railroad. 

Dunne attended Mrs. Morse’s frontier homeschool for about four years before starting carpentry work to help support his family. Raymond believes the teacher gave Dunne’s intellect a solid formation. Dunne himself credited Mrs. Morse, his brothers, his older sister Katherine - who helped raised him after their mother died — and his uncle, colony founder Capt. Hugh Dunne, with providing guidance in the years when his father lived and worked many miles from home.

Another frontier influence was the establishment of a Benedictine monastery in the colony. Dunne gained firsthand knowledge about religious life in a place far removed from centers of Catholicism and centers of society. 

All those experiences helped shaped the abbot that Dunne was to become. He entered Gethsemani in 1894 and became abbot in 1935.

Dunne became renowned not just for guiding Merton, but also for the expansion he oversaw at Gethsemani in his years as prior and abbot. Yet by all accounts he remained humble, hard-working, down-to-earth, astute and intuitive. He’s a man I would have liked to know. 

Frederic Dunne as a
young man. Photo is from
The Less Traveled Road.

Quilt revival had Florida flair

The Palm Beach Post published
this quilt pattern in 1933.

Funny how lifestyle trends come and go. That applies to quiltmaking as much as to anything else. 

On  Feb. 14, 1928, the Miami Herald ran an article that noted "old fashioned quilts are coming back into vogue." Specialty stores were said to carry patchwork and bed covers common in "grandmothers' day." If you figure roughly 20 years per generation, then grandmothers' day would have been 40 or more years previous - the 1880s. 

The trend rippled across the country, not just in Miami. The Florida version included a tropical twist. The May 3, 1929, issue of the Miami Herald featured a column offering home decorating advice specific to the region's climate. The column by Grace Norman Tuttle recommended homemakers use family heirloom quilts as substitutes for then-popular Oriental wall hangings. 

The quilts were considered "mural decorations." In one Miami home, a quilt was attached to the wall behind a bed and served as a type of wall-decor headboard. The effect must have been dramatic, because the top of the quilt was placed where the wall met the ceiling. The quilts used in the featured home were family heirloom pieces. 

The Herald and other Florida newspapers also featured quilt patterns for sale on a regular basis, for people who wanted to create new quilts. This, too, was a national trend. Newspapers all over the country pounced on the popularity of the quilt revival and offered patterns. Readers would mail a few cents or a dollar and in return would receive a pattern or several patterns for making the featured items. 

One of my favorites was printed in the Dec. 27, 1933, edition of the Palm Beach Post. It's perfectly Floridian: it's based on palm leaves. The newspaper writer called Palm Pattern No. 469 as "a striking quilt pattern." I agree. You can see it in the photo at the top of this post.

The writer stated that the palm is a symbol of victory and a longtime decorative emblem. Perhaps that antiquity explains why the pattern that looks so Floridian is attributed to an unknown quiltmaker "of generations ago." 

An aside: I checked Barbara Brackman's BlockBase Plus database to see what I could find about the palm leaf pattern. She lists four published names for this pattern, with the earliest dating to 1922. It could have been an older pattern, just one that had been unpublished until then.

To get the pattern and instructions, a reader had to send 10 cents to the Palm Beach Post's Needlecraft Department. Which was, inexplicably, in New York City. Or maybe not inexplicably. Requests for patterns offered by newspapers nationwide probably funneled into a few clearinghouses. 

But I'm sold on the Florida look of this one. The pattern was said to be especially lovely when made with a green print on a white background. The quilt was supposed to be simple to make. I'm skeptical. Bias edges and multiple matching seam points don't make for a simple quilt. But quiltmakers generally don't back down from a sewing challenge. I'm game.

Truth in advertising

Market gardening was grueling work in frontier
Florida. These19th century homesteaders
are harvesting cucumbers.

The destruction wrought by Hurricane Helene reminds me life in Florida can be challenging. My neighborhood was spared this time, but who knows what the future holds.

Florida frontier life was always challenging. Hurricanes were one obstacle among many. Newcomers learned the hard way. Many had been lured to Florida by promotional material that emphasized and exaggerated the state's potential.

That resulted in some seriously annoyed transplants. "Most of the market gardening in Florida, so far as we know it, cannot but prove disastrous," was the verdict of three Vermont brothers after a few years here in the early 1870s. 

They blamed the false promises fed to them before arrival. "Land agents and visionaries hold forth that great crops may be expected from insignificant outlays; and so they decoy the credulous to their ruin."

Those are sharp words. More surprising is that they appear in an 1873 book written specifically for new settlers in post-Civil War Florida. 

As usual for that era, the book has a weighty title: The Florida Settler, or Immigrants' Guide, A Complete Manual of Information Concerning the Climate, Soil, Products and Resources of The State. The contents were compiled by D. Eagen, commissioner of Lands and Immigration.

Eagen reached out to Florida locals and asked them to submit reports on their counties. They replied with specifics about climate, crops, terrain, industries, wages, transportation, economic outlooks and occasional descriptions of a town's business district. (Zero mention of domestic details that so interest me.)

As expected, positive aspects are highlighted. Some go beyond that, though. The correspondent from Madison County wrote that "Florida is in need of an energetic, thorough-going, stirring, enterprising, industrious class of men. The late unhappy and unfortunate civic strife seems to have dwarfed our energies, and as of yet we have been unable to shake off our lethargy or gain anything like our former vigor."

The "civic strife" was, of course, the Civil War. It had ended a mere eight years before the book was published. 

The Vermont brothers were among early post-war newcomers, as they were already planting in 1870. They bought 275 acres near Mandarin for $275. That's about $5,300 today. They - and/or their hired workers - cleared 35 acres for planting.

Mrs. H.B. Stowe recounted their agricultural experimentation in a Christian Union article reprinted in the 1873 book. I'm guessing Mrs. Stowe was Harriet Beecher Stowe, who owned a home in Mandarin.

Despite the brothers' harsh words, in the end they said their best market crops were "handsomely remunerative." That was after a lot of trial and error. They discovered the need for ample fertilization the hard way. They also learned what crops to plant and when to plant them.

Among the challenges they faced during their first three years:

• Cabbage seeds sowed in sandy soil without manure resulted in weak plants beaten down by rain. Entire crop was lost.
• Three acres of cabbage were half ruined by a Christmas frost.
• Four acres of cucumbers planted in "new, hard, sour land" produced a "wretched crop." 
• A hailstorm prematurely spoiled what had been the following year's otherwise good crop of cucumbers.
• Tomato plants were lost to rain, wet land and insufficient fertilizer. A heavy rain also  helped ruin the next year's crop.
• A Christmas freeze killed half an acre of blooming pea plants.

The Vermont natives improved cultivation methods each year. By the fourth year they saw a decent return on their investment. But they warned potential newcomers that growing good market crops required intense cultivation. They said market gardeners would spend as much on manure for one acre as they would to buy 100 acres of new land. 

That's real advice, the kind any potential settler in the 19th century would appreciate. Today's newcomers, not so much. For them, I recommend taking a good look at topographical maps before buying any house or land in Florida. Get acquainted with the flood plain and stay away from lowlands. Don't build on the waterfront. And evacuate when told to do so.

Society columns: social media of 1920s

A January 1925 edition of The Palm
Beach Post was filled with society
news and advertisements like this.
(Source: newspapers.com)

We seem to live in a weird version of the Roaring Twenties of a century ago. Everything is frenzied and fast-paced. Development races along. The famous and super-rich party on. Social media influencers drool over it all.

I wanted to learn how upscale folks partied during the wild times of the 1920s. And learn how newspaper society columnists - the social media influencers of their day - wrote about the celebrities of that era.

Where else to look in pioneer Florida but Palm Beach. It was as famous then as now for money and status. But only during the season, generally January to March.

The January 18, 1925 issue of The Palm Beach Post gushes about the winter season. And I mean gushes. Social-media influencers today have nothing on those old-time newspaper society writers.

Breathy articles about people and places are interspersed with numerous large ads for housing and hotel developments. It was the high times of the1920s Florida Boom. There was so much to write about and advertise that the newspaper edition had 66 pages that day.

Let's turn to the glee sprinkled through that edition's society pages. It'll give you an idea what the rich and famous of 1920s Florida did in world that was spinning quickly and crazily. Much like ours is today.

The hyperbole is all there in print. All I did is quote it and add my occasional note. Enjoy!

• "The Royal Poinciana welcomed many additional guests yesterday and everyone was on the qui vive to see the register and note who had come and who was with them and so on."
•  I had to look it up: qui vive means "on the alert or lookout."
• "All records for the opening of the Coconut Grove, the dear old Coconut Grove, beloved of Palm Beach and world famed as its greatest attraction, were absolutely smashed yesterday. ...before the first bar of music was heard the Coconut Grove was like a great garden full of fluttering, vari-colored flowers, and all Palm Beach in gala array had filed through ..."
• "Mrs. Mc_ was looking very charming in a petunia printed silk frock with a small cloche to match; Mrs. M_ was a symphony in sky blue; Miss W_ was a poem in rose ..."
•  I omitted their full names.
• "Whitehall welcomed for the season today Mr. and Mrs. R_ of Chicago, who will spend the entire season here and are known to all the smart colony here."
• People didn't just visit Palm Beach. Members of the elite social circle considered themselves a colony.
• "One hardly knows where to begin in the chronicle of the day's events at The Breakers yesterday, for so many celebrities appeared upon the scene that it is difficult to know to whom to give this place of honor."
• The honor went to author Ring W. Lardner, responsible for penning "the most delightful description of Palm Beach and its hectic life that has ever found its way into print." I'll have to go seek out his book. BTW, I never heard of him or any of the other celebrities mentioned in that article.
• "Dr. Bertha Scher, whose wonderful work in restoring youthful contours to face and neck ... has brought her a large clientele of society women in New York, Virginia, Hot Springs and Hollywood, Cal., where she has lately achieved a great success among motion picture stars... Many in Palm Beach are now availing themselves of Dr. Scher's treatments which remove ravages of sun, wind and sea..." 
• Hard to think of a time when Hollywood needed a state identifier, even in that silent-movie era.
• "The beautiful rooms (at Whitehall) made a perfect background for the rare jewels and lovely gowns of the women and everyone was quite lost in admiration upon entering the rooms of the superb collections of canvases, an exhibition of rare distinction and beauty."
• This was about an art exhibit at Whitehall, where the "great foyer made a wonderful promenade and the patio with its roof of star-pierced sky and" (many other superlatives) "combined to make the whole scene one of such rare loveliness that everyone was entranced..."

Where were the editors?!

I skipped the abhorrent (to me) enthusiasm for an upscale retail furrier business that opened a shop for the season at one of the hotels. And I couldn't help but note that entitled people act the same no matter what the year. One day, a woman and her daughter staying at The Everglades Club informed management at 11 o'clock in the morning to prepare for the daughter's exclusive wedding - that was to take place that morning!

"... in a limited time," the newspaper columnist wrote, "the drawing room was transformed into a bower of beauty, with white roses, calla lilies and lilies of the valley with a wreath of ferns and greenery."  After a wedding breakfast, the lovely couple motored off in a Pierce-Arrow limousine for their honeymoon in Miami and Cuba.

The fun and festivities faded in Florida by the end of 1926. Bank crashes and hurricanes shut down the state's boom long before 1929's Black Friday struck the entire nation. 

By 1933, height of the Great Depression nationwide, the Palm Beach Post's Jan. 22, 1933, Sunday paper had only 16 pages. Advertisers had vanished along with the yacht owners and jet-setters (actually, railroad-setters, ha ha) who formerly spent the winter season seeing and being seen. Society writers devoted column inches to dressmaking patterns.

And I can't help but remember that history repeats itself.

Home school mom a Catholic ed pioneer

Early view of St. Anthony of Padua Catholic
Church in San Antonio, Florida .
(Photo credit: Jeff Miller, Flickr)

Home schools were often a necessity on the Florida frontier, much as the domestic church was a necessity. Home schooling was especially important for parents who wanted their children to have a Catholic education.

In such cases, the home school became an extension of the domestic church. One pioneering example of this in Florida is a school launched by a widow named Cecelia Morse.

Mrs. Morse, the mother of six, arrived in Florida from Texas a few years after Bishop John Moore's 1877 appointment to the St. Augustine Diocese. Catholics comprised about 4 percent of the state's population at the time. They were spread out across thousands of miles. 

At the start, Bishop Moore had about 10 priests to serve a diocese that covered most of the Florida peninsula. The diocese had seven parishes, 17 missions and 70 stations. Stations were usually in the house of a Catholic homeowner. Local Catholics would gather there for Mass whenever a priest could visit the area.

In such conditions, the home became the center of catechesis and devotions. Catholics took the responsibility seriously. Some, like Mrs. Morse, went several steps beyond.

Cecelia Morse lived in the south central Florida town of San Antonio, some 150 miles from the  diocese's St. Augustine base. It was a rural as frontier Florida could get.

San Antonio was established in about 1881 as a Catholic colony. It's believed that, before being able to buy land, the earliest residents had to present a document from their hometown priest stating they were Catholics in good standing.

In 1883, construction began on a parish church. Bishop Moore dedicated the new St. Anthony of Padua Church on St. Anthony's feast day in June of that year. He then said the first Mass in the church in early 1884. 

Mrs. Morse saw a need for more, mainly a school. In 1883, she asked the colony's founder to start a Catholic school. He refused and told her to wait until more people moved to San Antonio. She is reported to have told him, "The minds of the children who are here now won't wait."

Wait she didn't. Mrs. Morse set about combining religious education with a wider curriculum of study. She began to teach her children and other local youngsters in 1883. Fourteen children gathered in her home for lessons.

A year later, she moved her classes into the newly built church and continued to teach. By the end of 1884, the school was in a new 12x24 schoolhouse constructed with funds supplied by Bishop Moore. Mrs. Morse continued to teach.

In his 2020 biography of Bishop Moore, Fr. Michael J. McNally writes that, by 1885, Mrs. Morse had 35 students. They were primarily of French, German or Irish descent. Fr. McNally writes that Mrs. Morse taught them reading, writing, arithmetic, Bible history, the Catechism and Catholic moral values. He cites her school as an extension of the domestic church. 

In 1889, Benedictine nuns took over administration of the school. A while later, Mrs. Morse and her family relocated to the Tampa area. She died on the feast day of St. Anthony in 1926. Her newspaper obituary noted she was a devout Catholic.

Unsung heroes. So many local histories have them. I wish all their stories could be told.

Frontier book deals? Novel ideas

19th century Florida newspapers gave away
books to readers who subscribed. The
papers also sold books alone at low prices.

I'm giving away ebook novellas and selling
ebook novels for 75% off, but only for July 2024
 and only on the Smashwords online store.

First, the disclaimer: This post evolved from my plans for a promotion of my books. During July 2024, my novellas in ebook form are free and my novels in ebook form are 75% off. The deal is good only on Smashwords from July 1-31. Use this link -  https://www.smashwords.com/profile/view/gerribauer - or do a web search for the Smashwords website and, once there, put "Gerri Bauer" in the search box.

Being fashion-forward in 1894

Big sleeves and an unusual hairstyle characterized
fashion in 1894 (Credit: Vogue magazine archives)

What a parade of red-carpet fashions we've seen recently. I streamed some, watched some on TV and browsed photos of others - Oscars, Met Gala, Cannes, CMA and on and on. Fun to see. And it made me wonder what passed for prime fashion in Florida's past years. Specifically, during the Gilded Age.

St. Augustine was a trendy winter destination for the elite in that era. The top spot in the city was the Ponce deLeon Hotel, built by mega-rich oil magnate Henry Flagler. So, when Mrs. Henry Flagler hosted an event, local newspapers took notice. Hence the write up in the April 5,1891 issue of "The Tatler," aka the St. Augustine News, "devoted to the interests of Southern winter resorts."

The article was about "a very pretty small dance" given by Mrs. Flagler for a few of her friends in the west wing of the hotel's dining room. (That room is vast - I've been in it.). Alas, the reporter wasn't up on fashion. The women's dresses are variously described as dainty, lovely, handsome and beautiful. Low necklines abounded, as many of the gowns were described as decollete.

A few details can be gleaned from color and fabric mentions: mauve crepe de chine, green crepe de chine, white tulle, pink tulle, yellow tulle. But there's nothing about sleeve styles, embellishments or accessories. 

A number of guests staying at the Ponce headed over to a dance at the Cordova Hotel in  1894, according to The Tatler's issue of April 7, 1894. This article is a bit more descriptive. One young matron wore a "pink-and-white moire gown with a decollete bodice of black velvet and pointe de neige lace bertha (collar) and sleeves." A visitor from New York wore a gown of "black lace with many rows of garnet velvet (and) velvet sleeves." 

Sleeves were an item in 1894. Illustrations in Vogue magazine's April 5, 1894 issue make that clear. Sleeves were large, very large, and loud. An odd (to me) hairstyle also was popular that year. Look at the blobs of hair atop the center of the women's heads in the left side of the image at the top of this post. Then, as now, some fashions were way over the top.

Puffy sleeves and skirts
starred in 1894 fashion. (Credit:
 Vogue magazine archive)

Unity amid differences

St. Peter Church in DeLand's first church
building was dedicated in 1884. (Photo
credit: West Volusia Historical Society)

All plans for this month's blog evaporated when I saw a Facebook post from the West Volusia Historical Society. Looking out at me from the webpage was the 1884 photo you see at the top of this page. The man pictured second from left is Bishop John Moore.

Only a week earlier, I'd started reading a book about the bishop: John Moore: Catholic Pastoral Leadership During Florida's First Boom, 1877-1901, by Fr. Michael J. McNally, a Catholic historian. Seeing the bishop's face staring back at me from my computer was a surprise. I jumped to learn more about this pioneer Catholic's appearance in a local history photo.

As the Facebook entry explains, Bishop Moore was in DeLand in April 1884 to dedicate the small Catholic community's first church, St. Peter Catholic Church. Catholics were a minority in DeLand in the 1880s. Four leading Catholic families formed the nucleus of a parish in 1883: the Kilkoffs, Drekas, Zieglers and Fishers. Masses were said in the Kilkoff home beginning in June 1883, while Catholics pooled resources to build and furnish a church. 

Erecting a church of their own was a big deal for the Catholics. They provided materials including stained glass windows, physically helped construct the building and made the altar linens. They added a sanctuary lamp, statues of Joseph and Mary, candlesticks and flowers to the interior. 

The day of dedication was a formal occasion celebrated with a High Mass, meaning at full ceremonial level and including music and incense.

The historical society's Facebook post notes something I've often uncovered in my local history research. Despite the church being in the Protestant-dominated South at a time of anti-Catholicism, the townsfolk in this case supported one another. The dedication was a communitywide event.

The choir for the special Mass included non-Catholics who filled out the small congregation's voices. A leading Methodist townswoman, Mrs. Hettie Austin, loaned a portable melodeon for the occasion. The picture depicts the choir standing outside the new church. I wish I knew the names of everyone in the picture. Is Fr. William Kenny one of the other men shown? He'd said the first Mass in the building the day before the dedication ceremony.

St. Peter Church's history archives tell how parishioners spoke of dedication day as a joyous occasion. They also spoke of the generous help given by non-Catholic friends. 

One year later, in April 1885, the parish consisted of 13 families. Today, (2024) the parish has more than 1,500 families. The 1884 church building is long gone, but the spirit remains.

Many thanks to the historical society's Dreggors Collection for saving the image. 

Don Cesar: against the odds

St. Petersburg Beach had a lot of empty space 
when the Don Cesar opened in the 1920s.
Photo credit: Florida Memory

The Great Depression swept across the nation in 1929. In Florida, it started earlier -  in 1926 with the collapse of the Florida Land Boom. So I was surprised to learn that the famous Don Cesar resort in St. Petersburg Beach first opened its doors in 1928.

Developer Thomas J. Rowe was already building the massive hotel when the Florida boom crashed. He'd also sold lots in a subdivision he was creating around the hotel and had started building the Spanish-style houses so popular then. But he wouldn't admit defeat.

In June Hurley Young's The Don Ce-Sar Story, she describes Rowe as a man of poor health but an astute businessman with a high tolerance for risk. He had to be, to continue pursuing such a dream in a time of shaky finances. A combination of savvy business dealings, partnerships, loans and mortgages saw him through.

The 300-room hotel was completed in December 1927. It featured towers and wings and other Mediterranean and Moorish design elements.

The official opening took place January 16, 1928 with a gala attended by 1,500 people. Hurley provides details about the event, the kind that add color to dates and other numbers. Picture a Gatsby-style evening:

• Women in gowns and men in tuxedos arrived in LaSalles, Chryslers, Marmons and other upscale cars. 
• The entrance was canopied in red fabric.
• Dancing in the large ballroom cost $2.50 per person. I guess people were able to skip the dinner and attend just the dancing portion of the evening.
• No word on the type of food or cost of the dinner, which was served in the fifth-floor dining room and eaten on Black Knight china from Germany. 
• Flowers filled the rooms.
• The Don Ce-Sar Orchestra provided music.
• Nella Erickson and Helen Ford sang a Brahms duet.
• Guests toured the rooftop gardens. 

Guest rooms contained mahogany furniture and the best horse-hair mattresses of the era. Some rooms even featured private baths - which wasn't a given at the time, the way it is today.

St. Petersburg Beach back then was still a semi-wilderness, as the photo with this post shows. The Don Ce-Sar (later renamed the Don Cesar without the hyphen) started as a seasonal resort that opened for only January and February each year. People flocked to the resort for those two months in 1928, 1929 and even 1930.

In fact, in 1930, hotel guests included F. Scott Fitzgerald and Zelda Fitzgerald. Hurley writes that they stayed for the season. Nightly rates that year ranged from $12 for a single room to $30 for a suite (roughly $214 to $535 today). The price included meals.

The grand resort had its ups and downs through the years and was almost demolished in the 1970s. Hurley was a leader in the successful effort to save the historic landmark. It was restored by hotel magnate William Bowman Jr.

Since the early days, the massive structure has had several owners and multiple uses including as a government office building. Today, it remains a gem worth visiting. 

Read the Don Cesar's full history on the hotel website and in Hurley's book, which has gone through seven printings since being published in 1974. It's available via several outlets online. I found my copy at a local independent bookstore. The hotel also has a tribute to Hurley on its blog. She died in February 2024.

Past meets future

Am posting a bit earlier than usual this month for time reasons. This post has updates about two places I've written in the past:

• One has a time element: The Mary S. Harrell Black Heritage Museum in New Smyrna Beach is having a heritage festival this Saturday - February 24, 2024. I hope you can make it.

• The other is about the former St. Benedict the Moor Catholic School in the Lincolnville neighborhood in St. Augustine. Many thanks to historian and author David Nolan for alerting me to the good news about a community project in development in that building. I hope you can support it. 

Mary S. Harrell Black Heritage Museum
(Photo credit: Peter Bauer)

MARY S. HARRELL BLACK HERITAGE MUSEUM

The Black Heritage Museum is housed in the historic former Catholic church, St. Rita's, that served the Black community in the midcentury years of the 20th century. Those earlier days are the focus of my 2016 post. 

Both past and present are featured in the excellent exhibits on view at the museum today. You can learn a great deal about the life and times of the community from its early days through today. Guided tours are part of the 31st annual Black Heritage Festival, which takes place from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. February 24 in Pettis Park, adjacent to the museum building. Many other activities are also part of the festival.

Guided tours offer insights and context to exhibits that a visitor otherwise wouldn't know. I remember, during my visit, being shocked to learn that the community had protested the impending closing of their Black school during integration days. Shocked, because I had been taught otherwise, had been taught that Blacks applauded the school moves.

I was young during school integration days, and attending an already integrated Catholic elementary school in New York City. My (erroneous) knowledge was gained later, via the prevailing narratives taught in public high schools in my time. The older I get, the more I understand how much history contains nuanced and sub-surface levels, and shifting perspectives that depend on time and place of the telling. 

Of course I digressed.... Try to attend the festival and tour and support the museum. You'll be glad you did.

A blessing ceremony for a restoration and
transformation into a neighborhood center took
place at the former St. Benedict the Moor School 
building. (Credit: First Coast News/Jessica Clark)

ST. BENEDICT THE MOOR SCHOOL

I was again shocked - this time in a good way - to learn that the 1800s building that housed St. Benedict the Moor School in St. Augustine is being restored! When I wrote about the former school in a 2017 post, I wasn't even sure the actual building even stood any longer. I couldn't find any then-current photos of it.

So imagine my delight to learn that the Sisters of St. Joseph - who taught Black children at the school many decades ago - have launched a restoration project. Their goal is to restore the building and use it as a neighborhood center. Among other services, the St. Joseph Neighborhood Center will provide single mothers with education and job skills training. 

First Coast News featured a January 2023 article about a blessing ceremony at the project site as restoration got under way. What the Sisters of St. Joseph need right now is your support to keep the ministry project moving forward. Learn more and donate via the St. Joseph Neighborhood Center's website. (And, fellow Catholics among readers, consider it a good way to boost your Lenten almsgiving.)

CLOSING THOUGHTS

I didn't plan this, but both my updates involve historic former schools in which Catholic sisters defied social norms by serving Black communities in a Jim Crow South. I know there are challenges that need fixing within Catholicism. But there is also so much good within the faith. Catholic sisters are past and present proof of that.

Punta Rassa: small size, big history

Punta Rassa may be small, but it's history is large.
This image shows a structure there from the late
1800s. (Credit: WGCU Public Media)

Punta Rassa is a small, flat piece of Florida with a big history. The waterfront land near Fort Myers in Southwest Florida has seen everything from cattle drives to cowboys, military troops and blockade runs to and from Cuba.

For a while, Punta Rassa was diverse before diversity. During the Civil War, troops stationed there came from all across the United States. They sometimes had trouble communicating because of their regional accents. The white New York City soldiers couldn't understand the Black soldiers from Virginia who couldn't understand the Black soldiers from Louisiana. As one historian says in the video linked in this post, at least they all knew they were on the same side.

According to Wikipedia, the name Punta Rassa evolved from the Spanish phrase Punta Rasca, which means smooth or flat point. It's an apt description for this sliver of Florida lowland. 

Only about 1,500 people live in Punta Rassa today, on land that's less than five square miles in size. The area's big back story makes up for it. Enjoy this history video from Florida Gulf Coast University's WGCU Public Media: Punta Rassa, Untold Stories.