Congratulations and Best Wishes

Florida's governor Charlie Crist is getting married today at St. Petersburg's First United Methodist Church. He is the third governor of this state to marry while in office in the past 100 years.

In June 1949, Fuller Warren and Barbara Manning were married at a private home in Los Angeles.



















In February 1967 Claude Kirk and Erika Mattfield were married at the Breakers Hotel in Palm Beach.
















Best wishes and congratulations to the bride and groom!

(Photos from the Florida State Archives)

Napoleon Bonaparte Broward

Napoleon Bonaparte Broward, Florida's larger-than-life 19th governor, died on this date in 1910. He is still remembered for his efforts to drain the Everglades, a task which had daunted many a prior titan. However, as he saw it, man could conquer nature, for after all, "Water will run downhill!"

"Napoleon of the Everglades," by Gary Mormino, Tampa Tribune September 14, 2008

For further reading:

Napoleon Bonaparte Broward, Florida's Fighting Democrat, by Samuel Proctor (1950, reprinted 1993 by the University Press of Florida)

The Swamp: The Everglades, Florida and the Politics of Paradise, by Michael Grunwald (2007, Simon and Schuster)

Mayor Anton Cermak's Ill-fated Trip to Miami

Just a few feet away from the war memorial in Miami's Bayfront Park is this marker in a patch of grass.

On February 15, 1933, President-Elect Franklin Delano Roosevelt spoke at Bayfront Park in Miami. In the crowd was Guiseppe Zangara, an Italian-born naturalized out-of-work bricklayer with anarchist tendencies. Zangara attended the rally with the intention of killing FDR, but he lost his balance at the crucial moment and ended up shooting Chicago Mayor Anton Cermak and four other people instead. Zangara was quickly arrested, and soon found guilty of assault and attempted murder. When Cermak died March 6, Zangara was found guilty of murder, and sentenced to death. Evidently the legal process was quite different then, as the execution took place March 20 at Raiford.

The University of Miami's Digital Library includes scanned FBI documents relating to the investigation of the assassination attempt. In a February 16, 1933, letter it is revealed that FDR was on Vincent Astor's yacht shortly before giving his speech in Bayfront Park.

Tampa's Mayors

In recognition of tomorrow's inauguration of Pam Iorio for her second term as Mayor of the City of Tampa, here's a link to the Office of the City Clerk's biographies of Previous Mayors of Tampa.

Who's your favorite?