Sarasota News Leader

01/17/2014

Issue link: https://newsleader.uberflip.com/i/243343

Contents of this Issue

Navigation

Page 100 of 136

Sarasota News Leader January 17, 2014 Ever since then, Bartram has been "accompanying" travelers on their own odysseys, real and fictional. John Muir brought along a copy of Travels on his thousand-mile walk through the South. Cold Mountain's W.P. Inman carried it with him on his perilous journey back home. My copy languished on a bookshelf until I saw a quote from it at Paynes Prairie. Now I read it to revive my spirits when I see Florida disappearing beneath my feet. John Bartram is celebrated in the City of Brotherly Love, but William has captured Florida's heart. Jacksonville has Bartram High School, a Bartram library and a development called Bartram Park. A modest soul, he would be embarrassed by the adulation. Page 101 Bartram's Florida is a mere ghost of itself. Most places he visited have been eclipsed by development; landmarks such as Spalding's Lower Store remain in name only. But Paynes Prairie is restoring the Alachua Prairie back to the way it was in William's day, using Travels as a guideline. Once again bison graze on the prairie. Over the years, William Bartram has been the lodestar in my walks around Florida. The wilderness he explored may be gone, but the magic of his experience remains. He crops up at every bend of the trail in a wildflower, tree or bird. Sometimes I will glance over my shoulder to see a shadowy figure hurrying to his next appointment with nature. % A Florida scrub jay gives a visitor a quizzical look.

Articles in this issue

Archives of this issue

view archives of Sarasota News Leader - 01/17/2014