Tag Archives: Seminole

Chant for the Okefenokee –Jane Ross Fallon 2024-01-04

As Jane Fallon sings,

There is no right way
To do the wrong thing.

[Movie: Chant for the Okefenokee --Jane Ross Fallon (8.5M)]
Movie: Chant for the Okefenokee –Jane Ross Fallon

You can help stop a strip mine too near the Okefenokee Swamp for titanium dioxide for white paint:
https://wwals.net/issues/titanium-mining

Georgians, ask your statehouse delegation to pass HB 71 to stop further such mines on Trail Ridge east of the Swamp.
https://protectgeorgia.org/okefenokee/#/366/

Floridians, ask your friends and relatives in Georgia to do this, and ask the Florida Department of Environmental Protection (FDEP) to ask the Georgia Environmental Protection Division to deny the permits for this single point source of pollution upstream of Florida.

Jane Ross Fallon wrote, “I recently won the Suwannee Riverkeeper Songwriting Contest. The contest video of my performance did not turn out, and it was suggested I film one myself. John S. Quarterman, Suwannee Riverkeeper, sent me a banner to use. So I made a video with my cell in my house. I didn’t think the sonic quality of the phone was adequate, so I recorded the song on my computer, overdubbing the video. Never done that before. Then I decided, it’s not about me, it’s about the song and its purpose. So I made a more elaborate presentation. Let me know if it works.😏”

Lyrics

Here is Jane’s video of her Chant for the Okefenokee.
https://youtu.be/UQx9eEWbEcI Continue reading →

Floyds Island 1838, Hebard Cabin 1925, Okefenokee Swamp

Answers to some popular questions about Floyds Island, up the Middle Fork of the Suwannee River in the Okefenokee Swamp.

Meanwhile, you can help stop a proposed strip mine near the Swamp:
https://wwals.net/issues/titanium-mining

[Collage, Floyds Island]
Collage, Floyds Island

Who was Floyds Island named for?

The Okefenokee was a Creek hunting ground in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. Briefly in 1836 and for most of 1838 theSecond Seminole War in Florida extended into the Okefenokee. Roads and forts were built around the perimeter of the swamp, and Georgia militia and U.S. army troops patrolled intensively. They burned down a Seminole village on an island that they subsequently renamed Floyds Island, for Charles Rinaldo Floyd. In response to this violence, the Seminole began to leave the swamp in 1838, but skirmishes continued to occur along the Georgia-Florida boundary as late as 1840.

C.T. Trowell, New Georgia Encyclopedia, Originally published Sep 20, 2002, Last edited Feb 23, 2022, Human History of the Okefenokee Swamp.

Who was Charles Rinaldo Floyd? Continue reading →

Trailmarker Tree Trails 2020-11-04

Second of a series of posts from Dr. Ken Sulak, USGS, retired. He is aware that Indian Trailmarker Trees are still speculative. Maybe with enough examples we can all determine whether they are what they seem to be. Please send pictures and locations of any trailmarker trees you may have seen, especially along old trails that crossed the Alapaha, Withlacoochee, Little, Suwannee, or Santa Fe Rivers, such as Old Coffee Road or various versions of El Camino Real.

[Old Trails]
Old Trails

Thanks for your reply. The trailmarker tree thing is an offshoot of my research on historic settler fords, ferries and bridges. Certainly early settlers traded with Seminoles and followed their trails. This Motte map is one of the few I have encountered that shows trails from GA coming into FL. There has also been more published on the ‘Alachua Trail’ figured in the next map. But that is of less interest to me because folks using that trail were primarily headed to the St. Johns River area—a distinct migration thing from the GA and SC folks headed for ‘Middle Florida’ where the best farm land and ample water was available.

I have been trying to confine my studies and field explorations to that area—but have inevitably gotten involved with what was happening in S GA. I have made several foot and solo kayak trips to the GA/FL border, and up into GA a bit now.

Many coming south from GA crossed into Spanish FL at Warners (Beauforts, Hornes) Ferry over the Withlacoochee, then headed south to Deadman’s Bay (Steinhatchee) to boil down salt water to make several barrels full of salt to take back to GA in wagons. This is one of the several ‘Old Salt Trails’ that later immigrant settlers used. All six of the so-far discovered trailmarker trees fall right on one of the dotted trails in this map

[1838 Motte Seminole War trail map]
Motte’s 1838 Seminole War map showing trails with dotted lines.

Warners Ferry or Horn’s Ferry was near where the current Horn Bridge is over the Withlacoochee River just upstream of State Line Boat Ramp and the GA-FL line.

I asked Ken a few questions, including: Continue reading →

Searching for Trailmarker Trees 2020-11-02

Here’s the first of a series of posts from Dr. Ken Sulak, USGS, retired, whom you may remember we’ve quoted before about sturgeon jumping in the Suwannee River. He’s got several new pursuits that entwine with Suwannee River Basin rivers, and he’s asking for your assistance. He is aware that Indian Trailmarker Trees are still speculative. Maybe with enough examples we can all determine whether they are what they seem to be.

WWALS riverrats –

While exploring old bridge and ferry sites along the Suwannee River and its tributaries, I have encountered five unmistakable Indian Trailmarker Trees (and Brack Barker has shown me a sixth). I won’t say I discovered these, because some human first shaped each, and thousands of Indians and early settlers used these manmade landmarks to navigate through South Georgia and Florida’s 27 million acres of seemingly endless and trackless primordial Longleaf Pine Forest. Sure, there were Indian trails that the settlers also followed, like the Alachua Trail and the Old Salt Road (plural). But that was not necessarily easy. No welcome to Florida signs back then, no road signs, no road maps, no GPS — although the sun and stars provided compass directions.

[Trailmarker Trees, How To, and old map]
Trailmarker Trees, How To, and old map

The noted naturalist Herbert Stoddard came to Florida with his family as a small boy in 1893. Florida became a US Territory in 1822, with settlers arriving in droves thereafter. But even as late as 1893, there were few real roads to follow. Stoddard recalls: “Came a long ride in a horse-drawn wagon over bumpy, one-track roads through the longleaf woods … They were crooked as snakes, for every time a pine tree fell across the road, Continue reading →

Protect Withlacoochee River from Sabal Trail @ US 84 2016-09-17

Update 2016-09-23: Sabal Trail protests continue, Valdosta Daily Times, 2016-09-23.

Update 2016-09-17: James Bell with WWALS at Withlacoochee US 84 bridge.

Update 2016-09-16: James Bell of the family being bulldozed right now by Sabal Trail will be at the US 84 Withlacoochee bridge with us 9AM Saturday morning.

Get in the picture on the bridge with boats at the proposed pipeline crossing in the background, on US 84 over the Withlacoochee River, half way between Quitman and Valdosta, GA. You, and the news media, too, are invited this Saturday 9AM! You may have seen Tuesday’s Suwannee River action on WCTV; you can come join us at the Withlacoochee River Saturday. No Dakota Access Pipeline #NoDAPL, No Sabal Trail #NoSabalTrail, #WaterIsLife.

#NoDAPL #NoSabalTrail Withlacoochee River @ US 84

Help demand the Army Corps re-evaluate its permit for Sabal Trail just like its permit for the Dakota Access Pipeline (DAPL). Both pipelines should be canceled: keep it in the ground!

This WWALS Outing is part of the Continue reading →

Protest Sabal Trail at Suwannee River Crossing 2016-09-13

Update 2016-09-24: Video from the river and pictures from the bluff.

You are invited to protest Sabal Trail and the Dakota Access Pipeline this Tuesday 5:30 PM! News media are invited. Walk with signs along the bluff to the proposed Sabal Trail Suwannee River HDD crossing, or paddle downstream and back.

Gathering at Sabal Trail proposed pipeline crossing 30.4071464, -83.1569366 We aim to get pictures and video of people on the bluff, beach, and river at the same time demanding the Army Corps re-evaluate its permit for Sabal Trail just like its permit for the Dakota Access Pipeline (DAPL). Both pipelines should be canceled: keep it in the ground!

This WWALS Outing is part of the #NoDAPL Day of Action — Tuesday Sep. 13, tying the Dakota Access oil Pipeline to the Sabal Trail fracked methane pipeline through their ownership by the same companies. This outing is also a followup to Continue reading →

Same owners, DAPL and Sabal Trail

Update 2016-09-23: Not quite: Energy Transfer backed out of buying Williams Co..

DAPL and Sabal Trail: now part of the same pipeline companies.

DAPL owners Energy Transfer, Enbridge, own Williams and Spectra of Sabal Trail The pipeline companies behind the Sabal Trail fracked methane boondoogle through Alabama, Georgia, and Florida are now owned by the companies behind the Dakota Access Pipeline (DAPL) that wants to pump oil through North Dakota where the Standing Rock Sioux have attracted an encampment of thousands of people who have successfully and nonviolently stopped pipeline construction at least for the moment. WWALS was one of 93 Waterkeeper organizations worldwide that co-signed a letter from Waterkeeper Alliance in support of the Standing Rock Sioux. Opponents of these pipelines, including native Americans in Florida and Georgia as well as North Dakota, are no longer just fighting the same industry: they’re fighting the same companies.

The pipeline companies behind DAPL are Continue reading →