Jacksonville, Florida
James Beard Award-winning author Adrian Miller shares his family recipe for the New Year’s Day staple. On New Year’s Day, millions of people will dutifully eat some amount of black-eyed peas with the hope that it will lead to prosperity throughout next year. This superstition Read More …
Three … two … one … Happy New Year! Every December 31, the planet prepares to put up a fresh calendar and roll into a new year. And for more than 100 years, a key component of New Year’s Eve traditions has been watching the “ball drop” Read More …
Thanksgiving’s turkeys have been gobbled, elves are on shelves, and it’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas. Although December 25 is a Christian holiday celebrating the birth of Jesus Christ (whose birthday might actually be in the spring), to many children, Christmas means one thing: a Read More …
Ruth Wakefield was no cookie-cutter baker. In fact, she is widely credited with developing the world’s first recipe for chocolate chip cookies. In 1937, Wakefield and her husband, Kenneth, owned the popular Toll House Inn in Whitman, Massachusetts. While mulling new desserts to serve at the inn’s restaurant, she Read More …
Move over twinkling fir trees and wreaths, eggnog, stockings and the office secret Santa — there’s a new kid in town. Over the last decade the ugly Christmas sweater has firmly embedded itself in yuletide culture. You know the one. It’s a wooly pullover, usually Read More …
If you’ve been, you know: One of the most spectacular holiday installations in the southeastern United States shines in Asheville, North Carolina. Biltmore, George Vanderbilt’s 8,000-acre estate, puts on a show for Christmas like no other. Lizzie Whitcher, Biltmore House’s Floral Manager and the architect Read More …
Bowl season has arrived, with the first six games kicking off tomorrow. To get you prepared and excited for the weeks ahead, Yahoo Sports’ Nick Bromberg has ranked all 41 games. Rose Bowl: No. 1 Michigan vs. No. 4 Alabama (Jan. 1) … CFP semifinal Sugar Bowl: No. 2 Read More …
Gravestone symbols from A to Z reveal interesting insights into our ancestors’ lives and beliefs. When you were learning to read as a child, you probably learned the alphabet from A to Z. Likewise, learning gravestone symbols from A to Z will help you learn Read More …
The legend of the Roanoke colony is so enduring because it lies at the heart of the founding of America. Starting in 1584, 23 years before the establishment of the Jamestown colony in nearby Virginia, three English expeditions landed at Roanoke Island, nestled between the Read More …
I. Hear the sledges with the bells— Silver bells! What a world of merriment their melody foretells! How they tinkle, tinkle, tinkle, In the icy air of night! While the stars that oversprinkle All the heavens, seem to twinkle With a crystalline delight; Keeping Read More …
Rock n’ roll will live on in an old casket factory. The Jacksonville Historical Society is working to renovate a vacant warehouse, which was once the Florida Casket Co., near Veterans VyStar Memorial Arena. The museum will showcase artifacts, posters and other memorabilia that share the long history Read More …
The owners of Regency Square Mall yesterday announced they are finalizing its sale to an unidentified buyer. The proposed deal comes after Arlington City Council member Ken Amaro called on the owners to shape up or ship out and Sen. Clay Yarborough, R-Jacksonville, demanded immediate action to fix Read More …
Not unlike Madonna, Lady Gaga, and other world-famous divas, Miss Piggy has never deigned to use her full name among us mere mortals. If she had, more of us might know that her first name is actually short for “Pigathius,” which comes from a Greek Read More …
If you have a smartwatch or other fitness tracker, you might get a little celebratory notification when you hit 10,000 steps — or maybe you’ve just heard someone refer to “getting their 10,000 steps in.” That benchmark persists because it’s a nice, round number that’s Read More …
St. Augustine, Florida, was founded on September 8, 1565 — more than 200 years before the United States was an official country. Pedro Menéndez de Avilés was an explorer from Spain who came ashore in Florida on August 28, 1565, on the Catholic feast day Read More …
Most people know the “five-second rule”: the idea that if food that’s fallen on the floor has been there less than five seconds, it’s still acceptable to eat. No one knows the origins of this questionable rule — and plenty of people think it’s kind of Read More …
Originally, it was actually the other way around. For much of the 19th century, most infants and toddlers wore white dresses. Dresses facilitated diaper-changing, and white cotton could easily be cleaned with bleach. But around 1900, childcare experts began to push for a greater distinction between little girls Read More …
If you live in Florida for any length of time, you will probably either ride through a few major hurricanes or get the heck out of the way of one before it arrives. Hurricanes – and their weaker cousin, the tropical cyclone – pose a Read More …