WATCH // EXPLORE // CRAVE
Streets With Stories Rather than purchasing a guidebook on your next Florida getaway, download the Florida Stories app for local stories from local voices. // B Y M E L I S S A P E T E R S O N
Photos by 500PX courtesy of VISIT FLORIDA
E
ver been to a new city and wandered around aimlessly, looking at buildings and statues while wondering about their significance? The Florida Stories app, designed by the Florida Humanities nonprofit organization, hopes to help. The free Florida Stories app launched in 2015 as part of Florida’s 500th year celebration and offers walking tours of our state’s cities and towns accompanied with photos and audio. “Our first walking tour featured Spanish Colonial Florida in St. Augustine with a plan in mind to develop community walking tours across Florida through our grants program,” says Lisa Lennox, digital media manager with Florida Stories. “Our goal was to reach younger, more technically savvy residents and cultural tourists alike. We currently have 36 walking tours, from Pensacola to Key West.” Florida Stories provides the history and culture of Florida through a mobile app using scholar-researched content. Tour-goers can expect to hear high-quality, fully narrated tours that are GPS-enabled and will guide you from stop to stop. They will also be able to view over 5,000 historical and present-day images that are synchronized with the audio narration.
One such tour visits Lincolnville, in St. Augustine, and features buildings such as Excelsior High School. Built in 1902, the building was originally used as a school for Black students until 1928. It is now home to the Lincolnville Museum. The tour also stops at St. Paul’s American Methodist Episcopal Church, where Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. spoke to hundreds in May 1964 during the Civil Rights movement. Another stop on the tour highlights the Bridge Street Marches, where you can follow the path that the Civil Rights demonstrators took on a night in late May 1964, first along Central Avenue, the street’s name in 1964. Three narrators have lent their voices to the Florida Stories app. Phyllis McEwan, a resident of Tampa, has recorded all of the African American heritage walking tours. McEwan is
a retired librarian and Chautauqua, who for several years portrayed Zora Neale Hurston. Bill Dudley, a resident of Dade City, has recorded several tours. He is a local audio engineer and videographer who can be heard on WMNF’s Live Music Showcase on Fridays from 2-3pm. Chaz Mena is an actor/writer based in Miami and was the first narrator for Florida Stories. Mena currently serves as the executive producer with Vanguardia Films in San Juan, Puerto Rico. “As the state affiliate of the National Endowment for the Humanities, it is our duty to share with as many people as possible the stories of our state,” says Lennox. “We knew from the start that we wanted to create an app that would easily disseminate Florida’s history and at the same time making it accessible to all. It is Florida history in the palm of your hand.” Florida Stories // Download this free app for all iOS and Android devices or accessed via the website’s Web app. Visit floridahumanities. org/media/florida-stories-audio-tours to learn more. AUG ‘20
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