Historic Preservation

Marty Baum's family has been in Florida since before Potsdam (Stuart's original name)existed as a town. Why his family's presence here predates I95, DDT, the Army Corps of Engineers, air conditioning and animal control. And today a gathering of women from the Stuart Branch of AAUW had the pleasure of hearing what life was like in 1883just a bit south of Martin County as Marty "became" his great-grandfather, Capt. Hannibal D. Pierce.

Marty had the good fortune to have a great-grandfather who was not only an enduring pioneer in the jungle that Florida was in the 1800s but a journalist. Detailed records have prevailed and many books are now available. Marty mentioned several including the Barefoot Mailman. For a complete list of historic books on Florida check Stuart Heritage's website bookstore or please call them.

Marty is a research consultant on Florida History, the Indian River, Lake Worth, Biscayne Bay, the US Life Saving Service and the Florida Houses of Refuge. He does lectures in period costume. For more information or to reach him, e-mail him at: indianrivguy@bellsouth.net

Meanwhile, Martin County has declared this Historic Preservation Month. The month is half over but there are still two weeks worth of lectures at the Palm City Library on Wednesday evenings and Stuart Heritage is doing tours on Thursday - call for reservations on the tram. And, to finish off the event, the Historic Preservation Board is holding a costume ball entitled: Meet Me at the USO at the Flagler Recreation Center. For more information go to www.martin.fl.us

See you soon!
Sheila

You Mean Martin County Has a 'History'?

Chris Sawicki’s name is mentioned quite a lot in Stuart Florida. Chris has been the executive director of Stuart Heritage for more than a dozen years. That’s the museum in downtown Stuart that looks like a feed store (‘cause it once was just so).

Chris studied textiles in her college days and is an expert at id-ing when a piece of fabric was probably made. She parlayed this knowledge into quilt collecting and has amassed a collection of more than 100 (and that’s probably too low a number) quilts representing more genres of quilting, styles and periods than the average person knows about!

If you asked me what her passion is I’d be hard pressed to tell you. She loves quilts, her dogs, all rescue critters) and Stuart’s history which she can recite from memory. She conducts tours twice weekly throughout much of the year – and, by the way, they’re free BUT, if you’re worth your salt, you’ll make a donation to the museum if you like your experience. After all, you’ll want it to still be up and running when you bring your next set of visitors to town.

You can find Chris at Stuart Heritage, 161 SW Flagler Ave., Stuart, FL, 33494
The telephone number is: 772-220-4600
Or go to the Stuart Heritage website (created by her very talented, rocket scientist husband - yup, for real). http://www.stuartheritage.org