Jacksonville, Florida
Sierra Vista, Arizona, sits about 20 miles from the U.S.-Mexico border, and is home to the Fort Huachuca Army base. While military bases are often good for boosting local businesses, management of the town’s McDonald’s realized that service members often passed by the restaurant without Read More …
The Nazca Lines are massive geoglyphs — sometimes more than a thousand feet long — carved into the ground some 250 miles south of Lima, Peru. At first glance, these lines might look similar to crop circles, and can only be viewed from the cockpit of Read More …
On this day, eight years ago, Bob Dylan received a phone call that left him “speechless” after learning he had become the first musician to be awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature. Prize motivation: “for having created new poetic expressions within the great American song Read More …
Art Bikes are electric bikes you can rent to tour Jacksonville’s amazing collection of public art. You can book a self-guided 3 hour tour or a 90 minute Art Bikes lunch. Art Bikes are basically “podcast on wheels.” Art Bikes works with local artists to Read More …
Mrs. Sophia Nickerson Starks was the owner and President of Nickerson’s School of Beauty Culture located at 1503 North Myrtle Avenue, Jacksonville, Florida. The school was founded in 1924 and was the first licensed beauty culture school in the State of Florida.The school offered both Read More …
We’ve all heard the story of the “40 acres and a mule” promise to former slaves. It’s a staple of black history lessons, and it’s the name of Spike Lee’s film company. The promise was the first systematic attempt to provide a form of reparations Read More …
Father’s Day doesn’t always get the attention it deserves. A modern, secular holiday that arrives on the third Sunday of June, sometime between the end of school and the summer solstice, the day can be overlooked by kids who are immersed in vacation activities or Read More …
Before founding the animation studio that bears his name, Walt Disney was a commercial artist in Kansas City, Missouri. It was there, around 1919, that he began making hand-drawn cel animations of his own, which were screened in a local theater and dubbed “Laugh-O-Grams.” The Read More …
Yellow fever, also known as the “yellow plague” or the “yellow jack,” was one of the most dangerous and dreaded diseases prevalent in Florida during the 1800s. The disease is viral, spread primarily by the Aedes aegypti mosquito, but this knowledge was not widely known until the Read More …
Mother’s Day is here, which means it’s time for children of all ages to think of ways to give thanks to these special women in our lives, or to honor the memory of those no longer with us. But before you get going on making Read More …
The Alcazar Hotel, the name being Arabic(Al-kasr) for “royal castle”, was the second of the luxurious hostelries erected in St. Augustine by Henry M. Flagler, known first in the nation’s financial marts as an associate of John D. Rockefeller in the creation of the parent Read More …
Cassius Clay (Muhammad Ali) defeated World Heavyweight Boxing Champion Sonny Liston in Miami Beach on this date in 1964. The fight was one of the most anticipated, watched, and controversial matches of all time. This first of two meetings between the two heavyweights was held Read More …
Orange County Sheriff David W. Mizell was shot and killed in an ambush while on his way to arrest cattleman Moses E. Barber near Holopaw, in what is now Osceola County, on this date in 1870. The ambush stemmed from earlier disagreements over the payment Read More …
The Timucuan Ecological and Historic Preserve turns 36 tomorrow! Happy Birthday! It was formed by the United States Congress and signed by President Ronald Reagan on Feb. 16, 1988 to “preserve certain wetlands and historic and prehistoric sites in the St. Johns River Valley, Florida.” Read More …
On This Day – February 14, 1778, American 18 gun Sloop of War Ranger (Captain John Paul Jones Commanding) of the Continental Navy, received the first official salute to the new American flag, the “Stars and Stripes.” The nine-gun salute was rendered by the French Read More …
Sallye B. Mathis was one of the first Black women to be elected and serve on our City Council in 1967. Locally, Ms. Mathis is honored by the local NAACP Jacksonville Branch by naming their annual community service award in her honor, as well as Read More …
This song is by Nellie Florence, features Barbecue Bob on guitar and appears on the compilation The Country Girls! 1927-1935 (1964) and on the compilation album Barbecue Bob, Vol. 2 (1928-1929) (1991) by Barbecue Bob. Nellie Florence is an obscure blues vocalist who recorded two songs for Columbia Read More …
Jacksonville’s Abraham Lincoln Lewis was Florida’s first black millionaire after his founding of the Afro-American Life Insurance Company here. The company was founded to provide affordable life and burial insurance to the black community. As well as being a leading contributor to black colleges like Read More …