Fort Christmas Historical Park

[@angeliabeach3741]

Super sweet video, and thank you for sharing! 🥰😇

[@JungleJayAdventures]

Thanks! I enjoyed making it for yall!

[@burningsandsexploration3711]

Awesome place. I wish my family and I could have stopped there when we visited Florida. Thank you!

[@JungleJayAdventures]

Well, time to plan another trip! You can book a Bioluminescence tour with me while you're at it lol!

[@SoleymoonPercussion]

No way to sneak in to school when you're late with those doors lol. Super fun video JJ, loved it 🙌

[@JungleJayAdventures]

LOL! I would have been screwed LOL!

[@theresasequera5453]

Great place, used to stop in when I lived over that way. Thanks. 😊

[@JungleJayAdventures]

It is just so cool just to stop in whenever. Thats how I've been doing it. Then got the wild hair to make a video.

[@cheribrodeur9928]

Sugar cane! They are actually doing a sugar cane demonstration today down the road from us at the old Dudley farm! I loved this video today. I love to see how my ancestors lived in Florida. I love the sound of a screen door! Just a fun video.

[@JungleJayAdventures]

Thank you so much. I appreciate this comment!

[@angeliabeach3741]

Hi JJ, wouldn't that be a cane grinder?

[@JungleJayAdventures]

Nice! Good job!

[@berthaday3473]

Well, I was gonna say it was for corn squeezens for moonshine. Fantastic tour! TY. Ur flute music enhanced it !

[@gregknight293]

That looks like a cane press but I dont know whether for sugarcane or sorghum syrup . Really nice collection of artifacts. The grounds are beautiful . Thanks for the tour . Best regards to you and yours always .

[@JungleJayAdventures]

You're Right! Sugar cane was a big crop here, still is. Brown Sugar, Molasses and Rum were huge industries here. Thank you my friend, same to you!

[@DeanTheTurkeyLegster]

Enjoyed this video! I live in Oviedo and I love making regular visits to Fort Christmas. It's very interesting seeing the historical aspects of the park but also I find Fort Christmas very relaxing as there's almost always nobody (or very few people) there! 😊

[@JungleJayAdventures]

It is great! One of the best locations to visit. I tell a lot of people from all over the world about it during my tours. Because aside from nature and Bioluminescence information I talk to people about, I also talk about history and I find people are very engaged in Florida history and want more.

[@Chargerspeed07]

Very Nice Video!

[@JungleJayAdventures]

Thank you so much! I appreciate that.

[@smetlogik]

"I had these toys. Man, I didn't think I was that old" 🤣 I also saw one of those typewriter things you guys probably used instead of computers. That Cracker Christmas event sounds legit. I think they also used that press to make sure the kids behaved in school. "See this sugar cane going through? That could be YOU if you don't behave!!" Ok, Fort Christmas is the real deal, sooooooo much history. On my list if we're ever in that area. Nice tour JJ.

[@JungleJayAdventures]

Lol, yep, we played Oregon Trail on that old ribbon typewriter lolol. That press was a great deterrent for bad behavior, lol. But yes! This is where it's at man. It's an absolute must see. Also the amazing Orlando Wetlands Park is right next door.

[@smetlogik]

@@JungleJayAdventures Both of those places sound like they're right up my alley.

[@JungleJayAdventures]

The wetlands park is chock full of pygmies.

[@keithspooner23]

looks like to squeeze the sugar cane so they could make boil it and make cane syrup. my grandpa had one. but his had a long wooden pole he hooked his mule up to. But he wasn’t using any longer when i came along.

[@JungleJayAdventures]

You're 100% right! I've seen one in use before but I think it was just a demonstration.

[@JungleJayAdventures]

I saw your other comment on the Boat, but I think YT may have removed it, I cant seem to find it to reply. But thank you so much for letting me know what that part of the barge is actually called.

[@tombrown3449]

A sorghum mill, similar to molasses.

[@JungleJayAdventures]

I know this one is set up for Sugarcane but the tech would be the same.

[@obliograce3551]

When I saw that one room cabin for eight children and two adults it made me remember how differently we view life today than we did back then. It wasn’t just the size of that cabin either. For one thing, back then houses did not have separate bedrooms. There was no privacy. What the mother and the father were doing to continue to make babies they had to do right there in front of and beside all of their children. I wasn’t there but I would suspect that intimacy in those days was more about the pragmatic reality of getting your wife pregnant and having more children that it was about lust or romance or fantasies of love. Death was the same way. You could not hide death. When a child caught a deadly disease the chances are that either his or her siblings also caught the disease, or they had to watch him or her die. Same with the mother and the father. I went on a historical exploration of my family roots once that went from Florida to southern Georgia. I found some of my ancestors in an old family graveyard that had been born in the 1700s. I discovered that in many old graveyards behind old churches, there was quite a lot of very small cement squares left in the ground amongst the larger tombstones, some ornate, some plain. I realized that I was looking at the graves of children. So many children died in those days as penicillin, sterile conditions, and generally the toughness of life did not guarantee living all the way to adulthood. Women would sometimes die in childbirth leaving the father to find a new wife to help raise his children and of course to have even more children. With such a high rate of infant mortality the name of the game was to have as many kids as you could for as long as you could have children. This is why the girl getting married at 16 was not a surprise, I am sure women got married younger than that back then. When I was in the service back in the 1970s I remember meeting a man who came from the hills of Arkansas. He said that his mother was fourteen years old when he was born. Not only that but, he also had an older brother. Yikes!

[@JungleJayAdventures]

Oh yeah of course! It's not to say mom and couldn't just take a quick wagon ride out of view. LOL But yes the life expectancy was quite short. I did an earlier video of a cemetery out at Atsena Otee. A lot of the people there weren't but in their 30s.

[@obliograce3551]

Thank you for replying. I have been enjoying your videos and your love for and exploration of Florida wilderness. @@JungleJayAdventures

[@JungleJayAdventures]

Thank you so much. Pleasure is all mine!

[@starlfussell5288]

That’s a sugar cane press. The juice is good way better than cane syrup

[@JungleJayAdventures]

I agree! I used to love just gnawing on sugarcane when I was a kid.

[@Bigwes91]

I’m guessing the press is for orange juice lol

[@JungleJayAdventures]

Nope, but that is a good guess based on some of Florida's agricultural history. Its for Sugarcane.

[@pastorcdb4247]

sugar cane press

[@JungleJayAdventures]

Bingo!

[@theresasequera5453]

Sugar cane I think.

[@JungleJayAdventures]

That's the one. They still use it since it has modernized components.