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Tuesday, February 23, 2010

A Monster in Two Egg??? Parramore area sightings raise questions!

It appears that Florida's famed "skunk ape" may be ranging north.

Several eyewitnesses have come forward to report sightings of a strange, upright, hairy creature roaming the ponds and swamps about seven miles northeast of the downtown Two Egg crossroads. Locals are calling it the "Two Egg Stump Jumper."

Available descriptions describe the mysterious creature as being smaller in size than a human, but covered in hair. It walks or runs on two legs and seems to frequent swampy and wooded areas. At least two of the sightings have taken place at night, indicating the monster may be nocturnal.

According to eyewitnesses, one of which described the creature as "pale" in color, it seemed as startled to see them as they were to see it. Both described it as upright, but only saw it as it was running away on two legs. It is said to look something like a "hobbit" or "mini" Bigfoot.

Such stories are fairly common in Central and South Florida, where residents have been reporting encounters with what they call the Skunk Ape for years. They are much more rare in Jackson County, but are not entirely unknown.

If you would like to read the full story of the Two Egg Stump Jumper sightings, please visit www.twoeggfla.com/monster.

Friday, February 12, 2010

Two Egg receives first snowfall in a decade!


As snow flurries spread across Jackson County this afternoon, the Two Egg area received its first snowfall in a decade.

Heavy snow began falling in the Two Egg area at around 3:30 p.m. and continued for more than an hour. In places the snow came heavy enough to create a light dusting on grass, trees and plants. The community had been under a Winter Weather Advisory all day. Please click here to see more.

The snow that reached Jackson County marked the southern edge of a large winter storm that is expected to continue moving across the South for the next couple of days. Areas of Alabama, including Mobile, reported snowfall of more than 5 inches and major traffic delays were reported across that state. Heavy snow was also reported south of the Alabama line west of Jackson County in the Florida Panhandle.

Students at Baptist Bible College in Graceville reported heavy snow falling there shortly before 3 p.m. and students at Chipola College in Marianna reported the same about 15 minutes later.

To see more photos of the Two Egg snow, please visit www.twoeggfla.com/snow2010.

Tuesday, February 9, 2010

Life on a Jackson County Plantation - An Excerpt from the New Book

The following is excerpted from Chapter One of my new book, The History of Jackson County, Florida: The War Between the States. The book is available through Amazon.com by clicking this ad. It is also available at Chipola River Book and Tea in Downtown Marianna.

This excerpt discusses Sylvania, the Jackson County plantation of Confederate Governor John Milton:

"...Milton’s plantation, Sylvania, was centered around a surprisingly modest home all but hidden from view in a grove of lush trees. English tutor Sarah L. Jones (a pseudonym) vividly described her first view of plantation manor:


"It was just light enough to distinguish a long, low dwelling, surrounded by a deep piazza reached by steps extending along the whole front. A very pretty style of building, quite Southern, and in the midst of a wood. Excepting the drive to the house, and a cleared space in front, it was literally in a wood, and was therefore appropriately called ‘Sylvania.’

"Jones quickly discovered that Sylvania was a unique mixture of gentility and boisterousness and her arrival at the home in the trees was quite memorable. She described how she was invited into the parlor for tea by Mrs. Milton, all under the watchful eyes of the family’s ten youngest children:

"A fire was soon blazing in the sitting-room, called the parlour, the evenings being chilly; but the doors remained open, and I heard steps and voices on the piazza, and saw by the light of the blazing fire, splendid black eyes peeping in at the windows, and popping away on meeting mine, and I knew that some of the ten were ascertaining what sort of a looking body ‘the new teacher, Miss Jones’ might be.

"At the tea-table some half-dozen of the ten appeared, and I never saw such a collection of eyes in my life. They were all dark, and all beautiful, and all like their mother’s, but no two pairs alike. ‘Pretty girls, and amiable, evidently; manners perhaps a little uncouth, listless and inexpressive; temper easy, mind undeveloped, and character also expressionless. Such were my pupils in Florida….

"Life at Sylvania, however, soon proved to be a bit more difficult than the young teacher had expected. She quickly discovered to her chagrin that Jim, one of the Milton slaves, was a prankster who enjoyed taking items from the home and hiding them in the woods. Prior to bed one night she had arranged a row of books on a piano in the little one-room plantation schoolhouse, only to return to the building the next morning to find them gone:

"‘I bet a dollar that Jim…has carried them off into the woods,’ said Johnny.
‘Why should he do that.’
‘Oh, just for mischief. I left my violin here one evening, and the next day it was gone. A long time afterwards, which I was hunting in the woods, I found it smashed up under the trees; and I know Jim broke it up for mischief.’ Thus the row of books vanished, their loss borne amiably and unconcernedly, without an effort to recover them.

"Miss Jones soon discovered that the girls of the family were just as playful as Jim. In fact, she soon realized that the Miltons, like other wealthy elites of the Southern planting class, did not discipline their children at all:

"…Southern parents who have been reared on the same principals do not understand the discipline necessary to enforce any system. They are too indulgent, too much accustomed to control an inferior class, and to allow their children to control that class, to reconcile to themselves the idea of compelling obedience in their own children when once past infancy, which would perhaps be placing them too much on a par with the negroes.

"In short, the tutor believed that wealthy Southerners did not discipline their children because doing so would place them on the level of slaves. She described how little Johnny would even call a slave to carry his spade for him while helping her in the garden. As a result, her efforts to teach the Milton children were frustrating in the extreme. The children would come and go from the little school on the grounds as they pleased. Sometimes other children from the neighborhood would come, other times not.

"While Jones’ account provides a fascinating look at life in the Milton home itself, the plantation was first and foremost a place of work and farming. The future governor of Florida held 52 slaves, some were children and others house servants, but most were field hands, who worked all day in the fields and woods of the plantation. Jones paid little attention to them during her sojourn at Sylvania, noting only that they were “too busy planting, or ploughing, or chopping wood” to assist her with her small garden...."

To read more, please consider The History of Jackson County, Florida: The War Between the States.

Friday, February 5, 2010

Volume 2 now in stock at Chipola River Book and Tea in Marianna

The History of Jackson County, Florida: The War Between the States (Volume 2)
Volume 2 of The History of Jackson County, Florida is now in stock at Chipola River Book and Tea in Downtown Marianna.
The store had 20 autographed copies in stock as of this afternoon and will have more next week. They expected to temporarily sell out over the weekend, so if you are in town and want to pick one up you might want to visit early tomorrow. The shop opens at 10 a.m. and is located in downtown Marianna right across the street from the Battle of Marianna Monument.

You can also order online through Amazon.com. They have a full supply in stock and can ship immediately. Just click here: The History of Jackson County, Florida: The War Between the States (Volume 2)

Thursday, February 4, 2010

Volume 2 of The History of Jackson County is now available at Amazon.com

I'm pleased to announce that The History of Jackson County, Florida: The War Between the States, Volume 2 of my series on the county's history, is now available at Amazon.com for immediate delivery.

The book will be available locally at Chipola River Book and Tea in Marianna next week and I'll let you know as soon as they have a supply on hand.

The sequel to The History of Jackson County, Florida: The Early Years, this volume focuses on the Civil War years in the county. Key elements covered include the plantation era, slavery, secession, the Confederate warship Chattahoochee, the soldiers form the county that served both South and North, the Battle of Marianna, the skirmish at Campbellton, guerrilla activities including the Battles of Forks of the Creek and Port Jackson, Governor John Milton and much more.

The book is 330 pages long and includes wide ranging historical and genealogical information such as listings of all known Union and Confederate soldiers from the county, many previously unpublished accounts of life in Jackson County during the Civil War and exciting new detail on the life of John Milton, the first resident of the county to rise to the governor's chair.

The book will be followed shortly by the release of Daniel Weinfeld's outstanding new history of the Reconstruction era in Jackson County, which makes an outstanding companion volume to the new book (more on that coming soon).

All shipping and delivery of the new book is being handled by Amazon.com. To order, just click ad at the top of this page.