Banes, Ruth A.

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\u3ci\u3eVictorian Florida: America’s Last Frontier\u3c/i\u3e by Floyd and Marion Rinhart

Scholar Commons | University of South Florida Research

Tampa Bay History 
Volume 10 Issue 2 Article 9 
12-1-1988 
Victorian Florida: America’s Last Frontier by Floyd and Marion 
Rinhart 
Ruth A. Banes 
University of South Florida 
Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarcommons.usf.edu/tampabayhistory 
Recommended Citation 
Banes, Ruth A. (1988) "Victorian Florida: America’s Last Frontier by Floyd and Marion Rinhart," Tampa Bay 
History: Vol. 10 : Iss. 2 , Article 9. 
Available at: https://scholarcommons.usf.edu/tampabayhistory/vol10/iss2/9 
This Book Review is brought to you for free and open access by the Open Access Journals at Scholar Commons. It 
has been accepted for inclusion in Tampa Bay History by an authorized editor of Scholar Commons. For more 
information, please contact scholarcommons@usf.edu. 
   Reaver presents the selections in five chapters: “International Folktales,” subdivided into 
animal tales, ordinary tales, and jokes and anecdotes, following the standard form of the 
Aarne-Thompson index reference; “Legends”; “Tall Tales and Trickster Stories”; “Ghost Tales 
and Horror Stories”; “Urban Belief Tales.” The folkloric items thus range from traditional tales 
with widespread analogues on other continents and considerable antiquity to contemporary urban 
tales familiar to most readers. The author’s notes are extensive and give information about the 
informants, circumstances of the recording and comparisons of tale type and motifs. Indices 
summarizing tale types and motifs will be welcomed by those interested in comparative 
scholarship, and the bibliography will be useful to all who wish to do further reading. 
 
   This volume is a major contribution to our literature on Florida folklore and should stand on 
the shelf beside the works of Zora Neale Hurston, Alton Morris and Stetson Kennedy. The 
University Presses of Florida are to be congratulated on making Reaver’s valuable materials 
available to both public and academic audiences. 
Patricia H. Waterman 
 
 
Victorian Florida: America’s Last Frontier. By Floyd and Marion Rinhart. Atlanta, 1986. 
Peachtree Publishers. Introduction. Photographs. Notes. Bibliography. Index. Cloth. $29.95. 
 
   Two texts, narrative and photographic, produce this cultural history of Victorian Florida, 
showing how the state was seen by wealthy and middle class white tourists during the second 
half of the nineteenth century. To these innocents, Florida was an idyllic winter playground, 
where one might find adventure, relaxation and good health. Travelling first by steamer and later 
in trains, aptly known as “travelling hotels,” the Florida-bound tourists entered the state in 
luxury. In resorts they enjoyed bicycling, gambling and golf. In the wilderness, men donned 
impractical but proper camping dress, such as “white flannel trousers, white rowing jersey, and a 
straw hat” (p. 75). Unless men were rowing, peajackets were appropriate wear. Female 
vacationers sported simpler versions of their uncomfortable (and hot) everyday clothes, wearing 
high collars and long sleeves, long skirts, corsets, bustles and elaborate hats – even when they 
were fishing, hunting or riding in rowboats and hoping for “no ill luck” (p. 143). According to 
Palm Beach gossip, one woman created controversy when she “disported herself in a man’s 
bathing attire to the amazement of onlookers” (p. 168). That is, she appeared in tight 
above-the-knee shorts and a tank top. 
 
   The incongruity between these tourists and the natural Florida landscape is startling. With 
stubborn specificity, photographs by artists, amateurs and commercial photographers reveal 
details of the natural beaches, lakes and rivers – settings which today are polluted and/or dwarfed 
by civilization. Prominent landscape photographers, most notably Charles Bierstadt, recorded the 
impressionist effects of the rivers and the swampland. But most of the illustrations of rivers, 
peaceful beaches and isolated private resorts which dazzle the reader are the work of lesser 
known commercial photographers, many of them from Florida and published here for the first 
time. At the end of the book are biographies of the photographers, picture credits, a selected 
bibliography and an extensive index. 
 
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Banes: <i>Victorian Florida: America’s Last Frontier</i> by Floyd and Ma
Published by Scholar Commons, 1988
   The book takes the reader on a guided tour of Fernandina and Fort George Island, Cedar Keys 
and North Florida, Jacksonville, the St. Johns River, the Ocklawaha River, the Orange Belt, 
Tampa and the West Coast, St. Augustine, the Halifax River, Indian River Country, Palm Beach, 
Miami and Key West. Without exception, the authors match the illustrations to the text. They 
explain the photographs with patience and precision. The reader is forced to read in a non-linear 
way, looking from text to photograph to text again. Other illustrations help to create this unique 
reading experience. They are photographs of material artifacts including advertisements, 
brochures, maps, newspapers, train schedules, travel booklets and souvenirs. (A tiny live 
alligator in a cigar box was popular. So were palmetto hats and orangewood canes.) Midway 
through the book A Tourist and Hunter’s Guide To Indian River Country, 1889-90 Season 
appears, adding to the reader’s ability to imagine the traveller’s perspective. Letters from 
travellers and commentary by writers including the  
 
1889-90 Season appears, adding to the reader’s ability to imagine the traveller’s perspective. 
Letters from travellers and commentary by writers including the poet, Sidney Lanier, enhance 
the reading of this book still further. 
 
An engraving from Scribner’s Magazine, 1889, showing the San Carlos Hotel at St. James City 
on Pine Island near Fort Myers. 
 
Photograph from Victorian Florida.
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Tampa Bay History, Vol. 10 [1988], Iss. 2, Art. 9
https://scholarcommons.usf.edu/tampabayhistory/vol10/iss2/9
   What is missing? There are only a handful of photographs of blacks, Conchs, Indians and poor 
whites. Tourists viewed these people as quaint and occasionally photographed them. But the 
commercial photographers included here do not record their histories. Another sad side of 
Florida tourism is the destruction of the natural environment. During the 1880s one riverboat 
traveler remarked, “From the lofty decks of the steamers a great deal is seen, but every moment 
one is hurried ruthlessly away from some spot where there is every temptation to linger, and then 
left to while away hours at some landing where preceding crowds have gathered every flower, 
and alarmed every bird with pistols and parasols” (p. 57). Worse than these Victorian travelers 
were hunters. In Florida, they hunted alligator, deer, panthers and sea turtles. Adding to the 
destruction, financiers, including Henry M. Flagler and Henry Bradley Plant, built luxury motels 
on scenic beaches, the beginning of the condominium-lined, private, no-trespassing shores we 
see today. Victorian Florida preserves an elite vision of the state, a Florida still pristine, still 
wild. 
 Ruth A. Banes 
 
 
Seminole History: A Pictorial History of Florida State University. By Martee Wills and Joan 
Perry Morris. Foreword by Burt Reynolds. Jacksonville, Florida, 1987. South Star Publishing 
Co. Pp. 240. Photographs. Index. Cloth. $37.95. 
 
   While attending Florida State University in the 1970s, I often heard the story of how FSU and 
its rival, the University of Florida, were statutorily commanded by the Florida legislature to meet 
annually on the gridiron. Usually, some Gator would be trying to rub in the usual dominance of 
his town over mine. This story is one of several that is laid to rest by this fact-filled, lovingly 
produced history of Florida State University. It was the Florida Board of Control (precursor to 
the Board of Regents) that directed the state universities to compete in all intercollegiate sports 
in 1955. A bill introduced before the senate that year was rejected because it was felt a special 
law was not the way to implement this now infamous meeting. 
 
   FSU has had many colorful people associated with it throughout its years of change and 
adaptation as a major state university. From Faye Dunaway, who was runner-up in the 1959 Miss 
FSU contest, to Dr. Paul A.M. Dirac, Nobel Laureate for Physics in 1933, the range and scope of 
students and faculty have always been varied. 
 
   The opening chapters recount the history of this institution, which began in 1857 as the West 
Florida Seminary. Through the efforts of Albert Alexander Murphree, president from 1897 to 
1909, the seminary was given college status and renamed Florida State College in 1901. 
Enrollment stood at 252 in 1902. 
 
   The Buckman Act (1905) caused the name to be changed to Florida Female College, which 
offended nearly everyone associated with the college. In 1909, the name was officially changed 
to Florida State College for Women, which it remained until 1947. The Tallahassee branch of the 
University of Florida (TBUF) opened in 1946 to accommodate the returning World War II vets. 
TBUF was located at Florida State College for Women’s West Campus. Initial enrollment 
reached 600. On May 15, 1947, de facto coeducation became authentic with the birth of Florida 
State University. 
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Banes: <i>Victorian Florida: America’s Last Frontier</i> by Floyd and Ma
Published by Scholar Commons, 1988


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\u3ci\u3eVictorian Florida: America’s Last Frontier\u3c/i\u3e by Floyd and Marion Rinhart

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