nature coast

Nature Coast of Florida

OHHC takes the Show on the Road

by

The Old Homosassa Heritage Council (OHHC) has been busy getting the message out about preserving and enhancing the heritage of our unique community.

Last week DeeDee Wilcox and Marianne MacRae, Co-chairs of OHHC, and I went to the Homosassa Elementary School and put on a presentation for the fourth grade classes.  

Gotta say, those kids were adorable!

We asked the teacher, Mr. Barlow (whose classroom we were invading) for three volunteers. One from each class.

And here they are:

volunteers
Mr. Early Settler, Mr. Mullet Train Engineer, and Ms. Tigertail.  (aka Ichabob Borton as William Cooley, Carson Edwards as Wade Wildon, and Josie Maglio as TigerTail.)These kids are natural born ENTERTAINERS!

The classes learned all about Homosassa History and Heritage.  

And we had a rapt audience!

OHHC takes the Show on the Road
Three classes of fourth grade kids.

And they had a lot of comments and questions.  And they hardly wiggled at all!

Seriously, these were some GREAT kids!

TigerTail
Here’s DeeDee telling about how the native Americans first discovered Homosassa.

 

And here's the first settler in Homosassa. His house was where the Homosassa Wildlife Park is today.
And here’s the first settler William Cooley in Homosassa. His house was where the Homosassa Wildlife Park is on Fishbowl Drive today.
OHHC takes the Show on the Road
Gotta love those mustaches! And little Ms. TigerTail got to take one home with her.
OHHC takes the Show on the Road
And here’s the Engineer Wade Wildon from the Mullet Train!
OHHC takes the Show on the Road
“Is it time to blow the whistle?” He never said that but you could just tell that’s what he was thinking. This kid is a natural! We’ll be seeing him on Jimmy Fallon in 10 years!

So what exactly were we doing there?

Besides telling the students about the history and heritage of Old Homosassa, DeeDee also told them about Wyland, the artist.  

And how we REALLY WANT WYLAND TO PAINT THE WATERTOWER!

So the kids are writing letters to Wyland asking him to do just that.

Isn’t that the coolest thing ever?

Mr. Barlow told his class that they only had two essays to write before the end of the year. And one of them was the letter to WYLAND!

It is so fun being part of the OHHC.  Lots of work.  But FUN!  Because everyone is so enthusiastic and all they want is EVERYTHING and WHY CAN’T WE HAVE THAT!

Wyland, you will be painting our water tower.

As soon as we raise the gazillion we need to repair and restore it.  Which means we have a sell a lot of t-shirts or we need to find a wealthy benefactor!

And I want to give a shout out to the teachers:

Mr. Barlow, Ms. Crosswhite, and Ms. Crispino!

Thank you!