Country roads and small towns quilt north-central Florida, a region as rural as a spit of tobacco juice. Year to year in Suwannee River country, nothing much changes.
In tiny White Springs (Pop.: 900), located on U.S. 41 and State Road 136, everybody picks up mail at the post office. Ask a fellow over coffee at the Home-town Cafe whats happening in town and hell tell you, Youre here.
At the Miss Hamilton County High Beauty Pageant in nearby Jasper, the winning contestant sings about Jesus, then pops eyeballs when she vamps back onstage for the gown competition packaged in a dress of red, white and blue sequins.
Hamilton County and the Suwannee Valley offer exceptional sightseeing. Best are roads unfunded for a few fiscal cycles, where the bush comes close alongside and the moss from canopy oaks hangs in solemn bunches. Stop, turn off the cars engine, and the only sounds are birds and a lone plane droning overhead.
Wellborn, a town 11 miles south of White Springs on U.S. 90 and County Highway 137, is a wisp of a place sliced through by railroad tracks linking Jacksonville with New Orleans. The 1909 McLeran House Bed & Breakfast, a Victorian establishment that recently opened, spins gossamer hopes of revival.
In Huntsville, near Lake City, theres a Hallelujah Farm and Tractor Service between the Methodist Church and the Baptist Church. Just north of Lake City, back in the woods where a side road cuts off U.S. 41, a waterfall roars. Amber waters cascade over a limestone edge. You wont see anything else like it in Florida.
About 30 miles north of White Springs on U.S. 41 is Jasper. Early-morning fog hangs damp as rain. Once-white fence boards have weathered to gray. Rust corrodes tailgates of passing pickups. And here youll gasp, startled by the moonscape of phosphate mining. Gargantuan rigs swivel in the doom of gray.
After exploring the outlying area, youll want to work your way back to White Springs, a town where too much sits closed or recently vanished but still a fascinating place to spend a day.
The main visitor attraction in town is the Stephen Foster State Folk Culture Center and its spring house, located on a wooded knoll beside the river. With its Georgian colonial buildings, the center celebrates Floridas surprising diversity.
Visitors discover the Czechs of Masaryk-town through their decorated Easter eggs, the Greeks of Tarpon Springs through their sponge-diving suits, the Scotch-Irish pioneers through their quilts, blacksmith tools and corn-shuck scrub brooms.
Dioramas, illustrating Fosters songs, are moving, toy-like scenes that capture the legacy of Fosters 19th-century America. Outside on the grounds rises the brick carillon tower where Fosters songs chime every half hour.
Down from the Adams Country Store, which has been closed for years, are the offices of the Suwannee Cycling Association, the hub of organized bicycle touring in Florida.
The Telford is the last surviving country hotel from White Springs heyday of 80 years ago. Behind its big rocking-chair porch, guests checked in until a couple years ago $28 a night, it was, including full breakfast for two. But then the authorities complained about some regulation or other. No more overnighting, no more restaurant.
Whatever the reason for the Telfords shutdown, it makes grist for radio talk-show host Chuck Harder. His mishmash of For The People views gets aired from studios in the hotel. Folks have different explanations for what has prevented White Springs from becoming a bigger tourist destination, but most agree the interstate is a huge factor.
People used to come on Highway 41, says historian Virginia Daniel, and before that we had two trains daily north and south. Ever since I-75 came through weve had nothing.
Others, like landowner Watkins Saunders, say I-75 might be the towns salvation now that the state has put signs up promoting the Stephen Foster Center.
Saunders recently finished restoring the family mansion, a grand Victorian thats more than 100 years old. Hes considering turning the house into a bed-and-breakfast and selling antiques.
For White Springs, call it all a little motion of hope. But nothing too fast, thank you.
HERB HILLER is a freelance writer who in 1979 introduced bicycle tours to Florida in White Springs.
