Mama Hokie

(This article was written just before Mama Hokie died in 1996)

Travelers on the Tamiami Trail speeding past the cryptic "BEER WORMS" sign in Ochopee may imagine a vat of drunken fish bait. But beer and worms have been sold mutually exclusive of eachother by Mama Hokie and her husband Sam for over 30 years.

Hokie, whose real name is Clara McKay, has also been referred to as "Alligator Lady" and more recently as "Tough Old Lady" by her Seminole Indian neighbors. She earned this last name in 1990 when an alligator bit her right forearm off. With true pioneer hardiness, she recovered and continues to look after nearly a dozen stray cats.

Hokie recalls a time of plenty. "Plenty of people, fresh water and fish," she says. "Now there ain't nothing anymore."

Sammy Hamilton

Sammy Hamilton, Jr. owns the Everglades National Park boat concession on Florida's Gulf coast in Everglades City, a tiny fishing village next to his native Chokolos-kee Island. He has seen many changes to the Ten Thousand Islands -- not all of them good ones. So, in the late 1970s, he decided to make a difference by becoming mayor of Everglades City.

He left office to continue his many entrepeneurial and philanthropic ventures, remodeling the historic former train depot (where "Wind Across the Everglades" was filmed) into the Captain's Table restaurant, as well as serving on the local Chamber of Commerce.

Progress is coming to Everglades City. In order to make sure his town plans carefully, Hamilton has thrown his hat back in the ring: Once again, he was recently elected mayor of the back yard for which he cares so deeply.

Jim McMullen

After a harrowing tour of duty in Vietnam, Jim McMullen escaped to the jungle-like terrain of the Everglades. His therapeutic hikes led to an intense interest in tracking a panther, helping him forget his violent past and giving him material for his book, Cry of the Panther.

The Naples resident has been employed by the Big Cypress Nature Center while serving as a naturalist, teacher, guide and researcher of Everglades flora and fauna. He also adopted a wild panther cub which he named Tracker.

Today, McMullen continues his quest to save the panther by offering lectures, producing wildlife tapes for school systems and writing another book.

Robert Warren

Robert Warren came to the Big Cypress area as a Miami teenager. His love for the wide expanse of land and trees inspired his crusade to have U.S. 41 (the Tamiami Trail) designated a scenic highway.

Since 1994, Warren has been lobbying for historical markers, nature trails, wayside pull-offs and boardwalks allowing visitors access to the wide-open spaces along the Trail.

"Understanding the Everglades is how to save them," Warren says. "If you want to speed across the state doing 90 miles per hour, take Alligator Alley. If you want to enjoy the scenery, take the Trail!"

A.C. Hancock

A.C. Hancock, 75, was born on Sand Fly Pass, just across the bay from the Everglades National Park ranger station in Everglades City. For 12 years, Hancock presided as a Collier County commissioner before becoming a Collier County deputy for another dozen years.

Hancock also built boats and gave guided tours for some 25 years. He crafted the "school boat" that transported the Chokoloskee Island children over to Everglades City before the road was built in 1955. He married Nancy Smallwood, daughter of pioneer Ted Smallwood who ran Smallwood's Store, now a museum. Today they own and operate the Blue Heron Motel on Chokoloskee, less than a block away from the old trading post.

"All the people moving in, and all the mobile homes scattered about," are the biggest changes Hancock has seen to the area.

Miss Jimmie, Voice of the Fishermen

Thirty years ago, Everglades City native Jimmie Robinson founded the Organized Fishermen of Florida (OFF), whose purpose is to provide a voice for local fishermen to the government. "Being both a fisherman's daughter and wife, I knew the life of a fisherman and their love for the water and the freedom to work," she says. Because of these strong beliefs, in the mid-1960s "Miss Jimmie" went off to Tallahassee, with her young children in tow, to lobby for the local fishermen when government officials threatened her family's livelihood.

Miss Jimmie is a true pioneer in every sense of the word, although she reacts modestly when people praise her for her steadfast stance. Here was a woman in a man's role, looking out for the local people. Without her tenacious spirit, there would be no OFF today.

Copeland Farmer: Carl A. Webb

Miami-born Carl A. Webb became a Copeland resident when he was 12 years old, coming with his family to farm. Webb remembers growing up when Lee Cypress was a farming village.

Webb attended Everglades City School until the ninth grade, moving to Tennessee to finish high school before returning to Copeland to farm until 1960.

In 1961, Webb opened a hardware store in Everglades City (the former Everglades Inn), which burned down 10 years ago.

"I watched both the end of farming and the big boom of the Lee Cypress logging industry. However, the biggest and worst change I ever saw was when the government (Everglades National Park) came in and took over and banned fishing and hunting. Now this area's turned into a tourist town," Webb says.

Granville Hill, Builder of Everglades City

Few people can recall when Everglades City was nothing but a gleam in developer Barron Collier's eye, but Granville Hill was there from the town's beginning. Hill played a fundamental role, helping dredge and build Collier County's former government seat.

Now 89 years old, Hill came to Florida with his family when he was five. He lived in Everglades City off and on from 1927 to 1980 until he retired to Naples.

Hill was also there 50 years ago for the dedication of Everglades National Park. He vividly remembers the streets being blocked off to traffic when President Truman came. However, because Hill's son was a paper boy, their car had a press pass and they were able to travel around in the area.

Fishing Guide Cecil Ogelsby, Jr.

Born in Perry, Fla., Cecil Oglesby, Jr. arrived with his family in Everglades City in 1950. He was schooled in the Copeland Logging Camp, where his father was a logger who ran the Number 2 train, transporting lumber from the swamp until 1957 when the mill closed down.

Ogelsby has worked as a fishing guide in the beautiful Ten Thousand Islands for the past 40 years. A current city councilman, Oglesby feels the biggest change in the area came about after Hurricane Donna, resulting in so many people leaving the area, coupled with the relocation of the county seat from Everglades City to East Naples.

"Now, we have to depend on tourism, rather than fishing, for our economy. It's not like it was in the good ol' days," he says.

Annie Mae Perry, Mother of 500

Annie Mae Perry and husband Willie arrived in Copeland in 1947. Because doctors were scarce, Perry soon began delivering babies (a skill she learned from her grandmother) and became Collier County's first licensed midwife. She had no car in the beginning, so the sheriff would take her to the various homes.

From 1947 to 1972, Perry delivered over 500 children, (both black and white, but no Indians) in Copeland, Ochopee, Everglades City, Immokalee and Naples, before retiring. Her fees ranged from three to 15 dollars. Most of her birth records, which she kept in a box under her bed, were literally blown away by Hurricane Donna.

One of Perry's proudest moments was when she got to shake hands with President Harry S. Truman at the national park's 1947 dedication.

Fire Fighter Vince Doerr

When Vince Doerr first arrived in Ochopee back in 1964, there were, he remembers, "not a lot of people." Doerr was involved with electrical work when, in 1975, he just happened to volunteer as a fire fighter. He was hooked. Today, Doerr and nine other men volunteer their time and talents fighting fires in this Everglades region. Doerr's area covers 11,000 square miles, from Royal Palm Hammock east to State Road 29 and Immokalee. He's been Fire Chief since 1979.

Of the changes he's seen, Doerr says, "With the Federal government buying land in the Big Cypress, it limited all future growth for this area, even though this preserved the watershed which is good for the future."

"Unfortunately," he adds, "with the addition of tourists, our fishing down here needs regulating -- our biggest draw is tourism. The locals don't like these regulations, but some are definitely required."

The Osceolas: Everglades First Family

Fifth-generation Seminole Indian O.B. Osceola is a descendant of the famous Chief Osceola who died in 1838. Osceola was born and raised in a chickee in the Ochopee Village near Everglades City and remembers working with his father, Cory, building chickees from the time he was eight.

A chickee is an open structure hand-made from cypress wood with layers of palm fronds comprising the roof. The cypress is cut, cleaned and left to dry. Then it is stripped by hand, a process called "draw knife." Palm fronds are also gathered and nailed, one by one, to the frame, overlapping in a pattern to keep out the rain.

Even though the art of chickee building is alive and well, Osceola realizes it is becoming a lost art within the younger Seminole generations, and he hates to see the tradition die.

Lieutenant Charles Sanders: Maintaining Law and Order

A former race car driver for NASCAR, Lieutenant Charles Sanders of Jerome is one tough deputy. He remembers about 300 people living in Everglades City in 1960 when he first arrived and worked in a marina.

In 1965 Sanders began his law enforcement career and served as the Everglades City substation commander for 25 years. Sanders was in command during the big "Operation Everglades" sting -- his biggest case, in which 125 local people were nabbed during that famous drug bust.

"I've seen a whole lot of changes and I feel the biggest transition for the area was going from fishing to tourism during the past 10 to 12 years," Sanders says.

"I'd really like to see the fishing industry open back up so that the local fish houses could prosper again. It's the only way we can keep the older generation alive."

M.G. Iles

Having majored in political science in Los Angeles, Calif., it was not surprising that Everglades City resident M.G. Iles became the Supervisor of Elections for Collier County back when Everglades served as the county seat.

She remembers Everglades City with more people in 1954, when she first arrived, noting that the Collier Corporation was located there then, and all the employees lived in town. She also remembers a time and a place when people genuinely cared about eachother and helped eachother out. That was before Hurricane Donna, when so many people moved away.

"Unfortunately, today the little home town seems to be getting more newcomers who really couldn't care less about that 'old neighborhood feeling.' I just wish it could stay the same way as it was," Iles says.

"Dinks" Boggess

Eighty-seven-year-old "Dinks" Boggess has lived in Everglades City all his life, having been born on Sand Fly Pass in 1910. He made his living as a commercial fisherman and was fortunate to have lived and worked in a different time -- before the Federally-imposed fishing ban was enacted, affecting every family somehow in this tiny fishing village.

Of all the changes he's witnessed through the years, the biggest would be "the new road," which finally connected Everglades City to Chokoloskee in 1955. "That was a big deal," he says.

He recalls the various hurricanes he's survived, rum running and buying various goods at the old Smallwood Trading Post. The worst change? "When the government came in and stopped us from making a living."

Sandy Dayhoff

Twenty-five-year Everglades National Park ranger and Loop Road resident Sandy Dayhoff was born in Miami. She works as the Outreach Education Coordinator, helping educators in Broward, Collier, Dade, Hendry, Lee and Monroe counties teach the importance of the park.

What's so special about this park, we asked? "It's a treasured resource, and there's nothing like it anywhere else." Of her mentor and friend, Marjory Stoneman Douglas, Dayhoff says, "She had the tenacity of a bulldog. She always encouraged me to fight for whatever I've believed in."

Since her arrival in 1962, Dayhoff has seen a sharp decline in wading birds and water delivery. She says that to save the Everglades, the water must be restored to its natural flow. "It will take a lot of people working together to retain the Everglades and make it as healthy as possible."