By VERNA BROCK
Recently a friend, Jane Temple, shared a hand-drawn map of Wakulla (Station) from 1937. Based on historical resources, it shows our small village as it may have looked nearly 100 years ago. There are some discrepancies I can see for myself, and many homes and businesses I’ve never heard of. For instance, it denotes a peanut farm, saying the farm was worked by German POWs during World War II. Which only raises more questions!
I traveled to the Woodville Branch Library to make a copy of the map, and am eager to learn more about it. There are a handful of people with whom I wish to consult. As you know, I have a small reservoir of stories about our “berg,” some of which I am an eyewitness.
If you were born and raised here, if you have information about the neighborhood, please let me know. As time passes, and it is wont to do so, memories fade and are lost. I believe it is very, very important to save as much of our history as possible.
One of my personal memories revolves around Mr. and Mrs. McClees, who lived in a small cottage on what is now Methodist Lane. Shortly after Ed and I bought our house at the end of 1977, I visited all of our near neighbors. Among them was an elderly couple, married for over 70 years. Mr. and Mrs. McClees had migrated from the wild and wooley frontier of the Dakotas (as I recall) to warm and sunny Florida, during the 1920s. They had married in their teens, and were completely dependent upon each other. When I did the math, I figured the McClees’ had to have been born in the early 1880s!
Mr. McClees was rightly proud of his role in seeing legislation passed that would require farmers and ranchers fence their livestock in, rather than allow the hogs and cattle to roam freely across the landscape. With the burgeoning traffic from automobiles, more and more people were discovering how bulls can wreck a vehicle. Not to mention the risk to life and limb!
This type of accident still occurs on our roads, but only rarely. Back at the turn of our most recent century, someone hit a horse on Bloxham Cutoff, as it meandered on an early foggy morning. It was bad news for the vehicle, and really bad news for the horse!
Mr McClees partnered with Wakulla Station native and State Representative George Nesmith to convince Florida State Legislators of the wisdom of changing the law. All this, despite howls of protests from ranchers and farmers across the state. It’s difficult to imagine what North Florida was like back then, since it was a frontier in its own right. No air conditioning, no mosquito control, and dangerous roads that were little more than two-rut roads.
Rep. Nesmith, who was elected from 1943 until 1951, also worked tirelessly to have Highway 98 expanded to provide safe travels across North Florida. Beginning in Pensacola, and running West to Perry, it eventually turned South to Lake Okeechobee. This artery was destined to become the longest road East of the Mississippi; his efforts were so crucial to extending Hwy. 98, the Newport Bridge over the St. Marks River is named in his honor.
Weather always seems to be a topic of discussion for folks, and this week we have borne witness to the power of water when channeled and unleashed. Please keep the families of the dead and missing in Texas in your prayers.
Also in need of our prayers are Terry McClure, Cindy Blackstock, the Johnson family, Gloria Dock, Jimmy Gainey, Clem Bunker, and Buddy Lewis.