Seminole County History and Housekeeping

For week 3, I continued to delve into a great deal of the history of Seminole County. This involved continuing research into various sites being considered for a historic marker nomination. In the process, I have definitely learned many interesting things about Sanford’s history. Of course, one of Sanford’s claims to fame has to do with Jackie Robinson. While doing research for one particular site, I learned about Robinson’s visit, the special accommodations that had to be made for him and another African American player, Johny Wright, while visiting Jim Crow Florida, and how their trip was abruptly cut short due to threats from white supremacists.

Previously, while I had been familiar with the fact that Robinson visited Sanford, I had not known how the story ended. Stories such as this one (and there are many) certainly set a distinct tone for Florida in the 1940s and also emphasize the drastically different reality that existed in Central Florida then versus now.

This week, one of the more specific pieces of information I have been making sure of is determining the various buildings’ construction dates on official databases. The oldest structure on the list that is also still standing is from 1900, which was interesting to learn. I have also been checking to see if the properties are privately owned.

Another aspect of Seminole County’s history that I have been learning about is Casselberry. This semester, since I will be working with documents that came from Brightwater, the Casselberry Family Estate, I have been learning more about Hibbard and Martha Casselberry as well as the origins of the city so that I will have some context when looking through the documents. The first archival pieces that I will be looking through are the scrapbooks with the newspaper clippings inside them. So, I imagine having a bit of background will make it easier to make sense of such fragments.

This week, my supervisor also showed me how to use and navigate various older databases that I should hopefully be getting some credentials for in the next week. This should greatly help with the research on some of these lesser-known sites of historic significance.

As a whole, this week was definitely a slow and steady one as I got prepared for next week. Soon I should get the opportunity to share more, as I will have additional things to do, making for a more interesting read.