Also, the Vacation Club Resort was renamed Old Key West Resort.

Interesting video, thank you.

does the villas being torn down except the treehouses) to build saratoga springs count? obviously dixie landings became port orleans

i don't recall ever being asked for my license, unless i tell them i am staying at the resort. if i have dining reservations, it's typically either a wave through, if it's dinnertime, or showing the MDE screen with the reservation, if it's morning.

Disney's Dixie Landings Resort is the other resort that changed it's name. It's now Port Orleans Riverside

BTW , thank you Tom for your incredibly well done videos of Florida. Ocala resident here.😊

As a retired Disney world tech, I could tell even more about the security of WDW and especially post 9/11. Best advice from me.....don't do ANYTHING on WDW property that you wouldn't do in front of an audience in Times Square 😂😂

Is Old Key West the other resort which had a name change?

7:05 Disney has buses running between parks when park hopping hours open up.

I am so grateful that you document these Florida gems.

Great video I can imagine hours of research went into this one. Just a correction: the image you show @6:40 was not the location for the old Venice municipal airport. The old landing field was located where you can now find Venice Elementary and Venice High School along the Intracoastal waterway dredged in the 60s Shut out to the cities that kept the airports or even better examples like Lakeland that converted them into areas of use for every citizen

I grew up going to the Kapok Tree 60 years ago. It was so beautiful and lots of fun. We played hide & seek through the gardens and the food was wonderful. It is such a happy memory.

Oh my goodness.I forgot all about this orange bird. He was so cute. I guess this is when the united states was trying to promote good food😂

Wow beauitiful cant believe people are not lined up to see this place😱

Hello and thank you so much for this video and all of the time and energy to do the research. I recently acquired a complete deck of these cards and am thrilled to learn so much more. I know it's a deck about American Space programs but the 4❤ sure looks like Yuri... 🤔

There is “Wards City” in Pompano Beach. Check it out

The Peter Pan has since been fully demolished and is now a dairy queen 😢 you’re also pronouncing Urbana wrong but it’s beside the point. I appreciate this video because I actually just recently learned the Peter Pan had a sister restaurant and I was hoping to plan a visit over the summer to go check it out but read the building was closed off and now I’m hoping it’s still there at all after this hurricane

I didn't know Tiki Gardens even existed. I am so sorry I missed it. I have been to the Ft.Lauderdale Mai-Kai numerous times; Celebrated my mother's birthdays and my own wedding anniversaries there. It has always been the most mesmerizing themed restaurant to me with lit narrow winding rivers,wooden bridges & tropical live greenery in between tables and Hawaiian dance shows. I just love the place.

Also, the snook at the underwater observation are massive because there's no fishing in area. And Lu was fed marshmallows by school kids early 80s given to us by park workers.

Lu makes me feel old. Saw him 44 years ago and 14 years ago. Hope he breaks all records and makes 80 or 90 or more

You should do a video on the history of the University of Central Florida starting from Florida Technical University to the current date plus they have the citronaut so it goes well with the orange bird

I learn a little bit more every time I hear about Lena.

LENA! LENA! LENA!

Hey!!! I’m so sorry to bother you, but would you have any way I could contact you, I have a few questions about this attraction you may be able to answer

I was there at Olustee on GPR Day in 1994. With both a deep interest in the battle and a background in soils engineering, I was very excited to get to see an experienced operator conduct a subsurface investigation with this then-emerging technology. It was as though I had fallen into my TV with it tuned to the Discovery Channel. I was a volunteer in the archaeological survey and active in the CSO. As I recall it, Dr. Mary Collins, a soils scientist at UF, had been contacted by Dan Penton, the lead archaeologist conducting the survey. Apparently Penton knew Collins and mid-way through the survey, he called in a favor and asked Collins to bring her GPR gizmo to Olustee. I am certain it was a freebie as the CSO budget for the archaeological survey was tiny and nearly all committed. I suppose before making a claim based on an anonymous source, I would try to hunt up the financial records of the survey. Pretty sure if Dr. Collins received any payment, it was minimal (certainly not the $250/hour she charged commercial clients). Dr. Collins was on site for perhaps two hours, about half of it devoted to packing and unpacking, laying out a grid, and calibrating the device. My recollection is that she ran four (maybe six) north-south lines through the open part of the cemetery, each around 100 feet long, then collected data by dragging the device along these guides. Then she left for Gainesville, the report of her findings was sent after data interpretation in her lab. The archaeological report seems to support my recollections from long ago. Rather than being shut down on the eve of success by unnamed locals as Gannon suggests, the GPR investigation was only ever intended, “... to test the effectiveness of the unit under the extant soil conditions and evaluate its applicability to the task of locating the mass Union grave.” That goal was fully met, so her work was done. Success was defined not by locating the mass grave, but testing the feasibility of a more extensive search. As noted in the archaeologist’s report, representatives of the cemetery were present and, to my eye, seemed as excited to be there as I was. Grant chasing is about writing your first report to establish the foundation for the next grant. For good or ill, that’s the game, and Dr. Collins did all of us a huge favor in her abbreviated site visit. The hope of generating interest to follow up with a well funded archaeological investigation to build on this initial one has not materialized. Living in the academic world, maybe Dr. Gannon could organize such a grant hunt, to light a candle as it were. With no remaining budget, nobody needed to swoop in and put a halt to further investigation, it was a foregone conclusion. Posting unsupported claims that conflict with the recollections of those who were there would seem to fall short of not just academic standards, but belies any genuine interest in progressing from the unknown to the known. Tom, thanks for this opportunity to reply. Have you asked Dr. Gannon to support any of her historical claims with something other than bold assertions? The main question would seem to be, does she have any evidence of the mass grave beyond what she found in Dicky Ferry’s 1986 article (and whose entire research file was provided to the archaeologists in 1994)? If yes, maybe another video presenting such evidence would find an interested audience.

As a retired educator, I am stunned by the blatant tenor of bias reflected in Gannon's remarks. Her tone ratchets up into the registers of vicious disdain and anger. Why would a professor allow herself to cast aside impartiality and fairness? The issues she raises do not reach the threshold commonly associated with the vicious attacks she launches. I know well one of the contributors to this thread, and I defer to his vast and deep knowledge of the area, the battle, and its aftermath. I confine my criticism to the wholly unprofessional approach taken by Barbara Gannon--a very angry woman. I wonder what her department chair would have to say upon hearing one of the university's professors rant about a subject that, according to knowledgeable local sources, needs some serious fact-checking, along with an effort to impart impartiality in delivery. At the educational institution where I taught for almost thirty years, faculty were expected to conduct themselves with dignity and honor in all things--especially when speaking publicly.

White people built so many amazing and sustainable societies over the years, building America to the great country it is now. Thanks for the great history info!

There are some records of who was buried at Orange Hill! UCF has Carey Hand's Undertaker's Memoranda available online, and if you look for the years it was used, you can find a few of them.

We just discovered your videos today. Excellent and informative work. Thank you!

😢 allí pasamos bonitos momentos de la infancia

Great story! Great research! Ginger Peterson is great.

I grewup in Sarasota. This sounds interesting

Interesting but I wish you’d have interviewed in a quieter place

Very interesting Never heard of this story

I originally published the reports of Lt. Grossman concerning the mass graves in 1986 that Barbara Gannon quotes. My great great grandfather fought at the battle of Olustee with the 6th Florida battalion. Interestingly enough his grandson, my grandfather deeded the land that the cemetery is located on to the federal government in 1938. I have resided in Baker County for 74 years and actively studied the battle for 50 years therefore I feel qualified to comment on the subject. I am one of the locals that Barbara Gannon refers to in this video and it troubles me that she appears to loathe the locals every chance she gets. Fact checking is a hot topic today in the news so let's fact check a few things Gannon says on the video. One troubling statement is that she heard that the locals stopped the GPR search for the graves. Fact The locals are the ones that actively sought the grant to do the Archeological survey. The locals were the ones who provided the in-kind services for the grant. The locals provided support when the survey was done. The GPR survey was only a small 1/2-day segment of the entire survey which covered several months. The University of Florida student who performed the GPR only spent a short time on the search. No, the locals did not stop it, they actually supported it. There are several more inaccuracies which would take up a lot of space which will be addressed in the future.

I love your videos, Tom. Always informative and entertaining. Thank you for all your hard work. Keep it up, the world needs more of this and less Facebook, Instagram, and Tik Tok.

Tom, Sir -- I commend you for all your effort you continue to put forth, enlightening the current generation about the earliest days of Florida to the present. As you travel the State, I hope you will visit the recently opened Miami-Dade Military Museum & Memorial, which is dedicated to preserving the rich military heritage of South Florida. A very dedicated group led by Dr. Anthony Atwood are working hard, as they honor all branches of the U.S. Armed Forces. They have a kin focus on the youth of South Florida and educating them about the role of the military in maintaining the freedoms we all cherish. I feel certain you'll enjoy the display of artifacts from South Florida veterans who participated in many theaters of operation from WWII to the present day.

2 years late but thanks for the video. 😊

Floridas biggest destroyer: development.

Please excuse my correction but A1A ends in Miami and from there you would be traveling on U.S 1 through the Florida Keys

Loved going there when I was young !

What a wonderful video 💪❤ Thank you Sir ! ❗ This is awesome ❗

Just a quick note: It was pointed out to me that the text states that Plant City is 23 miles WEST of Tampa. That's a typo. It's EAST of Tampa. 23 miles west would place it in the Gulf of Mexico. And yes, I read it as west in the narration. Just shows that narrators don't really read text for content.

Good job with the narration - enjoyable to watch. How Florida has changed since 1936, when Orlando was a small town and Plant City was 23 miles West of Tampa!

I ate in the Fort Lauderdale Restaurant in the mid 1980’s. Many happy memories. Ted P.

My dead younger brother was here in the late 1970’s. He washed out due to medical problems. RIP Bobby. Ted your brother 9/1/24

much love 👍🏼☺️from Port Charlotte ❤

Just discovered yourchannel. Very enjoyable video!

Very informative video. I have learned a lot about the tower. 👍

Watched this one after a link sent on another. Good video of Ringling and the Sarasota Bay property. I grew up in Manatee County, but know much of the history of this area as well. Very interesting stories and legacy. "Ringling Tower" in DT Sarasota was torn down when I was a kid, and there was a very long debate about the history of it and if it should be preserved. The rail line where I grew up was used for the "circus train" and also had quarters for performers in Ellenton, FL area near the end of the Circus era.