The Murals of Palatka FL

Palatka is about 12 miles from our campsite at Rodman Campground along the Majorie Harris Carr Cross Florida Greenway.

The greenway is a designated Florida Recreation and Conservation area after a storied past of litigation and partial progress.  FDR authorized funds for work in 1934-1935 to construct a canal across the state.  Work also was re-initiated in 1964 before President Nixon stopped the project by Executive Order in the 1970's.  Finally Congress de-authorized funding and all lands were transferred over to the state of Florida.

Today the canal is far less than what was intended, and only covers 110 miles of canal connecting the St. John's River (near Palatka on the east coast) with Yankeetown on the west coast.

Our interest in the area was two fold:
1) We needed to find a place to stay for a week in February after waiting until December to find a campground in Florida.  This presented a few issues, mainly -- all the State Parks were filled (except for a couple of days here and there; and
2) Commercial campgrounds this time of year command a pretty high dollar.  After all it is in the middle of snowbird 'high season'.  Rodman Campground fees:  $24.42/night.

After a couple of hours of calling around and finally securing a spot at the Rodman Campground, we looked forward to 'checking out' the local area.

Palatka is about 12 miles away from Rodman Campground in the middle of the Ocala National Forest.  On one trip to Palatka, we stopped at the local Chamber of Commerce.  We learned Palatka had a number of murals depicting snapshots in its history.

This caught our interest as we have been to a number of other towns with murals.  Some of those we have seen in our travels included murals in:

- Pontiac, Illinois (aka Walldogs), July 2009

- 29 Palms, California, January 2010

- Lake Placid, Florida, February 2013

- Vicksburg, Mississippi, June 2013

Each have their own unique style and approach but we find them all pretty interesting.

I think we captured most of them after tracking them down on the city map.  Sometimes we had to go down another street and change directions.  Lots of pictures here which are probably not the best way to represent them, but for documentation reasons when we want to go back and relook at some Roadrunner adventures years from now -- we'll be able to find them in one place.

Here they are in no particular order:

Train Station

 Mary Lawson Hospital

 Harlem Nights in Palatka

 Mural on side of local business

 Night Passage

 Putnam Treasures

Annie Oakley

 Senator B.C. Pearce

 Cattle Drives to Paines Prairie

 High Time in Palatka

 Work in Progress:  Honoring Vets including those that served in Iraq and Afghanistan

 Bygone Days

 To God Be the Glory

 Night Passage

Putnam County Wildflowers

 Battle at Horse Landing

 William Bartram 

 The Putnam House

Putnam County Jail

 Putnam County Courthouse

 Bronson-Mulholland House

 Palatka City Hall

 Old JT&K Railway Station

 Old Palatka Waterworks

One of the reasons we chose this area was because we wanted to get to know the Central Area of Florida a little better.  We've been able to get a glimpse of the Canal, Palatka, the Ocala National Forest.  Plus we've put a few hundred miles on the car as we have taken a number of day trips.  Its been fun to get a semblance of 'the lay of the land'. 

And we enjoyed chasing down the Murals of Palatka.

Thanks for joining us today on the Roadrunner Chronicles!

Roadrunner Backfill: Murals of Vicksburg, MS

I've become a fan of murals and get excited when we happen to find them across walls and buildings or where ever.  We discovered another well- done series of murals in downtown Vicksburg.  They are all on a couple of flood walls along the Mississippi River waterfront - aka the 'Riverfront'.

The project began in 2002 with its first mural painted by artist Robert Dafford.  The idea began after a visit by some townspeople to the flood wall murals in Paducah, KY. (Another town to put on our 'Visit List'.)  I liked the way it is laid out with the mural, then a plaque in front of the painting explaining its significance.  We learned a lot just by strolling along the walk way and reading about the city's history and heritage.

Here's a couple of things I didn't know:
The origin of the 'Teddy Bear' -

And the first one to put Coca Cola in a bottle -

Some history:

After our time down on the Riverfront, we went by the old store owned by Joseph Biedenharn that first bottled Coca Cola.

That's if for this edition of the Roadrunner Chronicles - thanks for joining us!

Murals of Lake Placid Florida

We spent a few days near Lake Placid, FL at the 4H Camp Cloverleaf.  It has 50 amp service and water with a dump station on the grounds.  Very convenient.

During one of our exploring day trips, we drove 5 miles down the road to Lake Placid to walk the town and check out the murals.

It was fantastic!  The town has 44 authorized murals on the side of building through the small town.  It really was unique and beautiful!  And a great way to spend a couple of hours walking around.

We started at the "Mural Art Gallery" at the Lake Placid Chamber of Commerce / Welcome Center.

After watching the 10 minute video we looked around the gallery.

Before leaving, we purchased our $3 mural guide and started our walkabout to find the murals.  There are 44 'authorized' murals and a few rogue ones on buildings and offices and such.

Here are a few:

#4 - Decades of Green Dragon Basketball, #5 Honoring Early Physicians, #19 Eddie Mae Henderson and #34 Train Depot. 

The train depot also serves as town museum that is worth seeing.

Remember the Dewey Decimal System back when you had to learn how to use the library? Dr. Melvil Dewey was from Lake Placid NY and he convinced the Florida State legislature to change the name of the town from Lake Stearns FL to Lake Placid FL.

 Lake Placid is the Caladium Capital of the World where 95% of the worlds caladiums grow.  Around turn of the century, Walter Coachman and W.T. Sessions were instrumental in creating jobs in the area with the turpentine industry.  The last mural shows the Lake Placid Drugstore that was popular in the 1950's.

#32 displays one of the larger murals in town:  Our Citrus Heritage.  Central Florida has had the citrus industry up and running since 1845.  Today Highland County has over 10 million trees and roughly 14% of the fruit throughout Florida.

One of my favorite was the two clown murals on the American Clown Museum walls.  In 1991 the clown school opened up in a local hospital and it has grown ever since.  Today, over 2,000 clowns have graduated from the school.

Other murals in town include ones depicting boxing, paying tribute to Annie Hill a nurse mid-wife, the Boy Scouts and one noting the Tropical State Bank Robbery in September 1931.

As if murals weren't enough, the town has many unique "Artistic Trash Containers.  Also a few "Birds Around Town" and some clowns in unsuspecting places.

A number of murals depict wildlife including black bears, Florida panthers, supposed elephants from long ago, turkeys, Sandhill cranes and red wolves.

The biggest mural in town in on the wall of the Winn Dixie on Highway 27.  It is really quite something.

It commemorates the Cracker Trail Cattle Drive.  Often cattle were driven across state to a deep water port (Tampa) where they were shipped to Cuba.  The name "cracker" comes from the cracking of whips of the cowboys while keeping the herds in line.

If you get a chance to see the murals of Lake Placid - it is well worth it.

Thanks for joining us today on the Roadrunner Chronicles!  Until next time...