Deep South

When people think of Florida they picture palm trees and sunsets, Miami Beach retirees, or maybe Walt Disney World. There’s the inevitable spring break mania in Panama City, rockets blasting skyward from Cape Canaveral, or that special brand of wild and crazy you find on Duval Street in Key West where during winter season “it’s never too early for Mai Tais” at the month-long Tiki Party. But up in North Florida where I lived during the first half of the 70’s it blended seamlessly into rural South Georgia and the vibe was much more that of the classic Deep South. I went to school at the university in Tallahassee which in addition to being a classic college town was also the state capital where cigar chompin’ southern politics ran head long into the classic South-Florida-style corruption made famous by Carl Hiaasen (who you should definitely read). Tallahassee was a cosmopolitan island in a rural ocean and it was quite common to find pickup trucks with shotgun racks sporting Wallace for President bumper stickers and confederate flag decals parked at the preferred local restaurants once you got away from campus. It was a favorite pastime of mine to wander the surrounding area with my photographer friends to document life. This collection comes from those early days when I was first studying photography.