Founder Edward W. Bok had an idea to provide a sanctuary for people and animals. His vision came to fruition in a serene garden setting that would become the subject of countless postcards over the decades to follow.

Bok was a Dutch immigrant who came to this country at the age of six and would later become a Pulitzer Prize winning author and editor of The Ladies' Home Journal.

The centerpiece of the grounds is the 205-foot tower which was built to house a 60-bell carillon which rings from its top every half hour. Carillonneurs (men who use an organ type device to play songs on the bells) give daily recitals. There have been only three carillonneurs since first opening. The original player, Anton Brees, worked the keys from 1928 until 1967.

The tower exterior is rich in Art Deco details sculpted by Lee Laurie. The marble glistens pink when the sun catches it.

Edward Bok's body was placed opposite the door after his death in 1930. He died within sight of his tower.


Dinos rise from Florida swamp

Dinosaur World is a great place to kill an hour in awe of giant day glow creatures which may or may not have ever walked in Florida long ago.

The land where the prehistoric park now operates was once Gator Jungle of Plant City. Its curator, Christer Svensson, never received municipal approval for his conversion plan when work began in 1996.

Svensson soon found out his was knee deep in protected wetlands and the EPC was primortaly pissed to hear he had moved soil around the property with tractors, cleared paths and demolished structures.

He eventually came forward to answer allegations but all he would say was that he hoped to open in November.

His vision for a central Florida land of the lost rose like a raptor out of the swampland despite EPC concerns.

The prehistoric heard only populates with the passing of time. Each new reptile replica seems to have more of a taste for blood than the last. With every addition, Dinosaur World cements its claim as being the "World's Largest Dinosaur Attraction."


Painting the town in Lake Placid

Since the early 1990s, Lake Placid has billed itself with the distinction of being Florida's "City of Murals." Nearly every building is a work of art, depicting a message of its heritage. 32 portraits in all decorate its downtown area, working out to roughly one mural for every 44 residents.
It was inevitable that Lake Placid would run out of buildings to paint on. When artists began to look for a new way to channel their talents, the town embarked on more trashy forms of expression. Waste containers were revamped into masterpiece reciprocals.


Some took on architectural forms like the "Trash Barn," "Lake Placid Jail," and "Fishing Shack." Others like "The Panther" and "Caladium" were done up much like murals, retaining the bin's original shape.


Lake Placid is so proud of their bins that they hesitate to use the word garbage in their titles. Instead, they are affectionately referred to as "environmental streetscape containers." Proving once again that one man's trash can is another man's treasure.


St. Pete's sunken treasure

A journey through Sunken Gardens it St. Petersburg, Florida puts visitors on an exotic mile-long path through budding greenery and trickling waterfalls 15 feet below street level.

The tropical landscape was once a lake. When George Turner purchased it in 1903 he drained it in order to plant in the rich soil below.


In the 1920s he noticed people enjoyed walking through his plush surroundings and started charging a nickel for the pleasure. In 1935 Turner's Sunken Gardens became an official page in the Florida guidebooks.

Sunken Gardens is the oldest attraction in its area, but for a while its future did not seem so well rooted. When it went up for public bid, a nudist group thought they had at last found their Garden of Eden. In the end, it would fall into the hands of the State Parks Department.

Under new direction a transformed Sunken Gardens began to sprout up. Gone were the days of the tacky souvenir shop and alligator wrestling.

The pavilion in which Kachunga & the alligator once wrestled and raised activist voices with "gator pain for monetary gain" is now center stage for wildlife rehabilitators. They give a spiel on living in harmony with animals several times a day.

All in all, few animals were left to the attraction aside from a couple of Godzilla-sized iguanas along with the token flamingos and parrots.
Companies have gotten wise to the notion that Sunken Gardens is migrating ground for the golden-aged population. Salesmen pitch medical benefits as elders wait to pay their way inside and reminisce about the first shiny nickel they laid down on the place.