Welcome to Florida

A Levy County resident wants to put a sand mine on his property endangering the University of Florida's planetarium.

We're discussing carnivorous plants this week with Kenny Coogan, owner of Critter Companions by Kenny Coogan nursery in Tampa specializing in carnivorous plants, and author of "Florida's Carnivorous Plants." Follow Kenny on Instagram at @crittercompanionsbykennycoogan.

Anyone interested in plants should look into membership with the Florida Native Plant Society.

Details on Brooker Creek Preserve which Craig mentioned.

Learn more about Eatonville 1887 History Tours.

Legendary Florida author Randy Wayne White joins us for this episode to discuss how he came to Florida, making the transition from newspaper man to charter boat captain, and eventually on to becoming the New York Times bestselling writer of the Doc Ford series of novels.

We'll also talk about his decision to ride out Hurricane Ian on Sanibel Island and the traumas he faced for that choice in the moment and after.

For more information on how Sanibel Island became a favored enclave for ex-CIA operatives, Craig has written about that story with insight from Randy.

Craig has a list of New Year's Resolutions to pass out around the state, starting with our idiot Department of Transportation secretary.

Author Lu Vickers is our guest this episode. She joined us back on Episode 100 along with an original Weeki Wachee mermaid. This time, we're talking about Dick Pope, founder of Cypress Gardens.

If you'd like to support the show as we enter our 5th season, you can do so by becoming a patron at www.patreon.com/welcometoflorida for just $5 per month.

When did "environmentalist" become a dirty word to Republicans?

Our guest for this episode is author Jack Davis. Davis has joined us twice before to discuss the recovery of the bald eagle and the Gulf of Mexico. Check the archive for those two outstanding shows.

This time, we're discussing a Florida icon, a feminist icon, a conservation icon, and an Everglades icon: Marjory Stoneman Douglas. Douglas coined the term "river of grass" to describe the Everglades, founded the Friends of the Everglades non-profit, and lived to be 108 years old. Davis wrote the definitive Marjory Stoneman Douglas biography, "An Everglades Providence: Marjory Stoneman Douglas and the American Environmental Century."

Davis will be one of the Florida literary legends joining Craig at the 2024 Key West Literary Seminar January 11-14. 

A pair of proposed mega-developments in southwest Florida would prevent the Florida panther from ever expanding its numbers if approved.

Critical to an understanding of Florida history is its roots as a Spanish colony, not a British colony like Georgia and South Carolina. Kevin Kokomoor is an historian and the author of "La Florida: Catholics, Conquistadores, and other American Origin Stories" published in 2023. We discuss the Spanish origins of what is now Florida.

Global Warming is causing the oceans to acidify creating an existential threat to the ocean food chain and the seafood industry and Florida politician's largely don't care.

Hank Asher is the most important man you've never heard of. He's a Florida man who moved to the Sunshine State in the 70s. His life would intersect with the drug trade, the 2000 presidential election and 9/11, largely because of his work in the field of data mining. McKenzie Funk's 2023 book, "The Hank Show: How a House-Painting, Drug-Running, DEA Informant Built the Machine that Rules Our Lives."

If you'd like to receive exclusive BONUS episodes of "Welcome to Florida" you can do so by becoming a podcast patron at Patreon.com/WelcometoFlorida where for only $5 per month you can support production of the show. A new episode was released in December 2023 highlighting "Our Favorite Florida," our favorite Florida state parks, books, movies, museums, big cities, small towns, musicians and more.

We begin this episode with sad news and the passing of Florida author Tim Dorsey. Dorsey joined us on Episode 73.

Did you know the longest private airstrip in America is in Florida?

The Brian DePalma-directed 'Scarface' from 1983 starring Al Pacino as Cuban immigrant turned Miami cocaine kingpin Tony Montana alongside Michelle Pfeiffer celebrates its 40th anniversary in 2023. Marking the occasion, movie critic and film historian Nat Segaloff has written "Say Hello to My Little Friend: A Century of Scarface." He's our guest this week.

We have a number of wonderful episodes in our archives related to the drug trade in Miami in the 1980s, as well as Cuban immigration and the Marielitos. If you're interested in this topic, check them out.

If you'd like to celebrate the anniversary alongside Pacino at the Fontainebleau hotel in Miami Beach, you can do so here. 

Thanks to all of our "Welcome to Florida" patrons at patreon.com/welcometoflorida where for just $5 a month you can help support production of the show. We'll have another bonus episode exclusively for our patrons dropping in December.

"Welcome (back)to Florida" Jeff Bezos.

We're getting wet on this episode and learning about the Atlantic Goliath Grouper. Our guest is marine scientist, researcher and conservationist Sarah Frias-Torres who spent 20 years in Florida studying this magnificent fish. Find her on Twitter and Instagram @GrouperDoc.

In the episode, she mentioned a scientific paper, here is a link to that study.

There is no love affair as strong as the one between the Florida legislature and developers. Politicos in Tallahassee just gave the industry another major gift.

In 2018, Florida voters in overwhelming fashion put a stop to greyhound racing by voting for a constitutional amendment outlawing it. Carey M. Theil helped lead the grassroots effort to ban the "sport" which had murdered and abused hundreds of thousands of dogs in Florida over its 100 year history here.

Theil has co-authored a book published in 2023 offering a behind-the-scenes look at how a small group of animal rights advocates took on, and took down, a billion dollar industry. The book is titled "Brooklyn Goes Home: The Rise and Fall of American Greyhound Racing and the Dog that Inspired a Movement."

Craig has written previously about greyhound racing coming to an end for Flamingo magazine and the Florida Phoenix.

We enjoy every episode of "Welcome to Florida," but enjoyed this one more than most. This story takes us to Fort George Island about midway between Jacksonville and Amelia Island by the St. John's River and Atlantic Ocean. This is the location of Kingsley Plantation, named for its owner Zephaniah Kingsley.

His, however, is not the most interesting story to be told there, that story belongs to Anna Madgigine Jai.

To learn more about Jai, Craig recommends the book "Anna Madgigine Jai Kingsley: African Princess, Florida Slave, Plantation Slaveowner," which he quoted from during our interview with Emily Parker, a visual information specialist for the National Park Service specializing in the Timucuan Ecological and Historical Preserve which includes Fort George Island and Kingsley Plantation.

To listen to Johnetta Betsch Cole, direct descendant of Jai and Abraham Lincoln Lewis' great granddaughter - he was Florida's first Black millionaire and the founder of American Beach - visit our Patreon page where our patrons have exclusive access to a presentation she gave about A.L. Lewis in September of 2023.