Our Okeechobee, Florida neighbors (Ted and Pat) invited us to see the murals in Lake Placid, Florida. Lake Placid is the home of eight lakes and attracts thousands of vacationers yearly. But, we were headed here to enjoy the murals scattered throughout the city. Ok...ok, our real motivation was their famous bodacious banana split!
We arrived in Lake Placid late morning and began our tour at the Tour and Information Center located at the Chamber of Commerce building where we viewed a 10-minute video about the mural program. There are 40 murals painted on various building around this small quaint town. We did a walking tour viewing three or four murals. Many of the murals have things hidden in the mural and we had fun trying to find them. It wasn't long before we decided we needed to get something to eat. It's hard to concentrate on murals where our stomachs are screaming "feed me, feed me!" Knowing there was a great restaurant just a couple blocks away that has great food and great banana splits made the decision a no brain'r.
Main Street America restaurant is a great place to eat. The food was great, the portions were big, and you won't leave hungry. Most of the time we eat out, we try to save room for dessert. However, here, we should have started with dessert and then order a sandwich if we had room. We weren't smart enough to do it this way and ordered sandwiches and thought we had saved enough room for dessert. Wrong! The bodacious banana split could easily feed four people and we had two of them to split between three people. I had apple pie alamode and that left Kitty with an entire banana spilt to eat. We didn't realize it was so big until the waitress brought it our from the kitchen. An hour later, the three of us had to carry Kitty out of there while she was screaming "more ice cream"! Ha.
After lunch, we gladly resumed the walking tour hoping to walk off the 10 pounds we just gained.
The following pictures are a small sample of the 40 murals in Lake Placid along with a brief explanation about each mural.
Here's our tour group. Ah... we are the ones in the front row!
Front row L to R: Ted, Pat, Kitty, and me.
This mural is called Decades of Green Dragon Basketball.
Artist: Keith Goodson
Size 31 feet wide by 10 feet high.
The team was named Green Dragon in 1939.
They played all home games outdoors on a cement tennis court.
At night, automobiles would surround the court to provide light for the game.
Title: Caladium Fields
Artist: Tom Freeman
Size: 60 feet wide and 30 feet high
Lake Placid is the Caladium capital of the World where over 95% of the worlds caladiums grow.
Annual Caladium Festivals draws thousands of people.
Most caladiums grow in 1,500 acres of black bottom muck.
Title: Birding
Artist: Thomas Brooks and Terry Smith
Size: 67 feet wide and 12 feet high
Florida has the third greatest number of different bird species of any state in the nation.
Thirty-six species of birds are officially listed as endangered in Florida.
The two pictures above are titled: Cracker Trail Cattle Drive.
Artist: Keith Goodson
Size: Too large for one picture (175 feet wide by 30 feet high)
Cracker Trail drives traveled just north of Lake Placid on what is now Rout 66 and 98.
Cattle would loose 200 to 300 pounds on a drive.
Title: Eddie Mae Henderson - Sharing and Caring.
Artist: Charles Peck
Size: 22 feet wide and 13 feet high.
For over 20 years, Eddie Mae Henderson cooked Christmas dinner for the less fortunate.
Eddie Mae and over 25 volunteers serve over 700 dinners each Christmas.
Title: Layers of Time (no, Ted is not part of this mural! Ha!)
Artist: Dean Quigley
Size: 89 feet wide by 16 feet high.
This mural takes us back 10,000 years when Mastodons roamed this area.
This is a pond at the entrance to the Layers of Time Mural
Title: Dr. Melvil Dewey
Artist: Roy Hampton and Terry Smith
Size: 35 feet wide and 18 feet high
Dr. Dewey invented the Dewey Decimal system at the age of 21
In 1927 he convinced the Florida legislature to change the name of the town from Lake Stearns to Lake Placid, Florida.
Title: Tea At Southwinds
Artist: Thomas freeman
Size: 60 feet wide and 30 feet high
This was the first mural dedicated on May 15, 1993.
These were the glory days of Lake Placid where the rich and famous came to play.
Title: Turpentine Industry
Artist: John Gutcher
Size: 62 feet wide by 14 feet high
In camps scattered throughout this area, workers collected gum that was distilled into turpentine. The extraction process is shown in the above mural.
We had a lot of fun walking around town looking at these beautiful murals and trying to find the hidden items in the murals. We will return to see more murals and have more banana splits. But, we have to be sure Ted is with us. He is a master at find the hidden objects in these murals. We'd still be there if he wasn't along to find those tricky little devils!
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