Wintertime trips to Florida became a regular occurrence during Charlie’s Family Years. Today you will read through a timeline of how this came to be, and about some of the many memories that were made in Florida for Charlie and Margaret, their family and friends.
February 1954: Cypress Gardens, down the west coast to Miami and home by the east coast and St. Augustine.
February 1964: Ringling Art Museum, Phosphate Mine, Cypress Gardens with Ida, Ken and Blair Wheeler. “We enjoyed the beach!”
January 1971: stayed in Ida and Ken’s other trailer.
January/February 1972: holiday in Florida.
February 1974: went to Florida for two weeks.
January or February 1975: “I was on crutches (knee injury – kicked by a horse), Father (C.D.) Hunter in a wheelchair, Anne, Mary, Stanley, John and Margaret drove the rented van. We flew to Tampa and had a motel at Sarasota, Lido Beach. Bob stayed home to work at the Lumberyard.”
January 1978 we went to Florida for two weeks. “Wilfrid Burbidge, my father-in-law, asked if we would like to join with him and Pearl to buy a mobile home in Ken Wheeler’s park in Bradenton, Florida. We agreed to share in the purchase of 905 – 50th Avenue West, Bradenton, Florida in Pic-Town Estates and have enjoyed many years of Florida sunshine. Sometimes we would be there only two weeks and at other times for a month or more.”
In the following years there were annual trips to the trailer.
March 1979: Margaret, Aunt Ida, Mother Burbidge, kids and I went to Florida for a holiday. “Now we had a permanent place to stay!”
Early 1980: Margaret & I went to the trailer in Bradenton.
March 1981: we went to Bradenton and visited the Space Center.
January 21 – February 18, 1982
January 20 – February 25, 1983
February 13 – March 20, 1984
1985 Florida holiday with a visit from Gordon and Martha Dagg.
January 28 – March 4, 1986: we had a visit by Mary and Mac February 13 – 27.
January 27 – March 8, 1987
January 26 – March 1, 1988
January 31 – March 2, 1989
February 27 – March 7, 1990
In 1991 Lois and Gordon Carter visited, and we returned home March 10.
In 1992 Celia Windslow visited from February 6 – 17. John and Andrea visited from February 29 – March 7 and were engaged while with us in Florida.
1993 – 1999 continued making annual trips to Florida between January and March. In 1996 we had a visit from Stan, Deb, Leesha and Isaac. In 1998 we had visits from Mary and Mac, and from Margaret Godwin.
We’ll see you again in the next post for the last section of this chapter and more travel experiences!
Til next time,
xo
andrea