FORUM Spring 2021

COVER STORY: WRITTEN IN WATER
How earliest inhabitants coped with a rising sea. Noted archaeologist Kenneth Sassaman takes us on a journey back to the earliest days of the land that became Florida, when the rising seas shaped the lives of the ancients.
By Kenneth Sassaman

Return of Smithsonian’s “Water/Ways”
The Museum on Main Street traveling exhibition begins its Florida tour in June, focusing on a topic crucial to Floridians.

OUR STORY OF WATER
From the earliest days, the lives of those who have lived on this peninsula have been interwoven with Florida’s waterways — from where we live to how we see the world. In these pages, we look at the endless ways water has shaped our state.

WATER AS OUR WAY OF LIFE
Treasures beneath — and beside — the sea: In Tarpon Springs, this Greek sponge diver found a livelihood, and a community, that reminded him of home.
By Janet Scherberger

Coming together for a beloved Bay
Florida Bay Forever unites everyone from fisherfolk to business owners in concern for the life-giving Everglades-Florida Keys waterway.
By Jacki Levine

Voices of the Bay
Who better to tell the story of a threatened waterway than those who know it best. As part of Florida Bay Forever’s “Voices of Florida Bay” project, fishing guide Captain Eddie Wightman recounts a life on the water.
As told to Emma Haydocy

Makeshift Freedom
The often-primitive boats known as “chugs” offered a perilous escape for generations of Cubans fleeing their island home. The Key West Tropical Forest and Botanical Garden displays a group of these vessels, in an exhibit partially funded by a Florida Humanities grant.
By Janet Scherberger

Virtually navigating the new normal
When pandemic lockdowns put an end to in-person humanities programming around the state, cultural organizations found another way.
By Madeline Rhodes

WATER AS A NATURAL BRIDGE
Bonding across the Straits of Florida Our shared waterways — and the marine life within — bonds scientists from Cuba and Florida together across the political divides. A Cuban marine biologist who now works in Clearwater offers a personal perspective.
By Anmari Alvarez Aleman

WATER AS A DIVIDER
When beaches were not for all Our beaches and swimming pools once illustrated and furthered a great divide, separating us one from another in the days of segregation.
By Audrey Peterman

WATER AS FREEDOM
Fluid freedom: There’s something about water — the seas, springs, rivers, lakes — that evokes freedom for those who seek it. But in our crowded state, watery liberty has its limits.
By Thomas T. Ankersen

WATER AS A HEALING SOURCE
In search of miracle cures Author Rick Kilby takes us back a century, when our seas and springs lured Victorian-era tourists here with promises of healing.
By Rick Kilby

WATER AS INSPIRATION
Remembering Bill Belleville: A literary appreciation of the late writer and naturalist, who celebrated the state and its waterways, encouraging his readers to get out and explore.
By Cynthia Barnett

A magical place, revisited
This historian and writer returns with his daughter to his boyhood waterside home and reunites with a source of his lifelong passion.
By Jack Davis

Reflections on water
Essays on memorable days on the water.

On the water, of the water
By Angelique Herring

The Sewing Box and the Great Blue
By Hannah Gorski

WATER AS WE LOOK TO THE FUTURE
Building for tomorrow’s rising seas: Just as ancient Floridians did, today’s planners, architects and engineers envision ways to live with the rising seas.
By Ron Cunningham

STATE OF WONDER
Peace of the manatee
This photographer finds a welcome respite paddling our waters on her annual trips to Florida, particularly when she encounters one of the state’s most gentle and popular creatures.
By Courtney Welch