James Gamble Rogers Ii

This well-illustrated book illuminates the life and career of one of Florida's premier architects, whose elegant homes and design aesthetic shaped the architectural character of Winter Park and influenced urban development throughout central Florida. James Gamble Rogers II (1901-1990) created homes known for their human scale and proportion and for their suitability to the environment. This work highlights twelve of these residences designed for Winter Park, the beautiful small city adjacent to Orlando and the headquarters of the Rogers family architecture firm, Rogers, Lovelock, and Fritz, which exists today under the leadership of Rogers' son. Ingeniously meeting the special needs of Florida's climate--heat, humidity, termite control, and air circulation--the residences incorporate details from a variety of historical styles, including eccletic and authentic features that emulate vernacular Spanish farmhouses and villas. The book includes critiques of each design and its evolution, particulars about the site, and stories about the lives and tastes of the clients--men and women of wealth and status who influenced the heady era of the Florida land boom in the 1920s and 1930s. Numerous floor plans, modern and historical photographs, and Rogers' own drawings augment the discussion. The book also presents an entertaining biography of Rogers, with information on his schooling, a history of the firm he founded, and his familial connections with the architectural profession (his uncle and namesake designed more than 20 buildings for Yale University). It describes his success in the areas of governmental, military, and university architecture, including his designs for buildings at Rollins College in Winter Park, and evaluates his impact on 20th-century architecture in Florida and throughout the nation. Coauthors Patrick and Debra McClane have studied Rogers' original drawings, toured his homes, and interviewed clients and family members; Patrick McClane worked at the Rogers firm during the architect's last years there and brings a personal connection to this work. Their book documents an exceptional contribution to Florida's architectural heritage, the life and work of a man who created stylish and desirable homes and distinctive public buildings. With a detailed appendix that lists dates and addresses for nearly 275 houses, most of them still extant, the work will serve as the definitive guide to Rogers' work in Winter Park.

The work of James Gamble Rogers represents a significant chapter in American architectural history. This text covers the entire span of Rogers's career, paying particular attention to his more important buildings such the Harkness mansion and various buildings at Northwestern University.

Florida Book Awards, Bronze Medal for Florida Nonfiction Florida Historical Society Charlton Tebeau Award Beloved raconteur, environmentalist, and down-home philosopher, Gamble Rogers (1937–1991) ushered in a renaissance of folk music to a place and time that desperately needed it. In this book, Bruce Horovitz tells the story of how Rogers infused Florida's rapidly commercializing landscape with a refreshing dose of homegrown authenticity and how his distinctive music and personality touched the nation. As a college student, motivated by personal advice from William Faulkner to stay true to himself, Rogers broke away from his family's prestigious architecture business. Rogers was a skilled guitar player and storyteller who soon began performing extensively on the national folk music circuit alongside Pete Seeger, Doc Watson, and Jimmy Buffett. He discovered a special knack for public radio, appearing frequently as a guest commentator on NPR’s All Things Considered. Rogers was known across the country for his intricate fingerpicking guitar style and rapid-fire stage act. Audiences welcomed his humorous homespun tales set in the fictitious Oklawaha County, which was based on places from his own upbringing and populated by a cast of unforgettable characters. His stories evoked rural life in Florida, celebrated the state's natural resources, and called attention to life's many small ironies. As Florida was experiencing colossal growth embodied by the new Kennedy Space Center and Disney World, Rogers's folksy style cheered and reassured listeners in the state who worried that their traditional livelihoods and locales were disappearing. Horovitz shows that even beyond his genius as a performing artist, Rogers was loved for his compassion, integrity, connection with people, and courage. Rogers displayed these widely admired traits for the last time when—on a camping trip to the beach—he tried to save a drowning stranger despite back problems that made it almost impossible for him to swim. This heroic effort led to his untimely death. The life of Gamble Rogers is a window into an important creative subculture that continues to flourish today as contemporary folk artists take on roles similar to the one Rogers established for himself. A modern-day troubadour, Rogers delighted in entertaining audiences with what was familiar and real—by championing the ordinary people of his home community who were closest to his heart.

The University of Central Florida has stood at the edges of Orlando for 40 years, a major institution of research, culture, education, and professional development stitched into the fabric of one of the nation's most dynamic and influential metropolitan areas. Conceived in 1963, at the height of America's fascination with the space program and less than an hour from Florida's Space Coast, the school began as Florida Technological University, a vast and remote tract of wild palmettos and swampland that held the promise of a cutting-edge "Space University." But 1963 was the same year that Walt Disney made his fateful fly over Central Florida and chose the location for Walt Disney World, a decision that would ultimately transform the entire region. Florida Tech found itself growing along with the surrounding community in size, prominence, and power into a diverse institution that no one in those early years could have envisioned. Renamed the University of Central Florida in 1979 to better reflect its broad curriculum and its strong marriage with the region, the school has blossomed into the prototype for the modern metropolitan university.

Florida is a state of transplants. Even people who relocated here decades ago still claim their birthplace as their home. They might change their mind if they knew that the Sunshine State owns one of the richest histories in the nation. Decades before the Pilgrims, the Spanish celebrated Thanksgiving in Florida. Centuries before the first St. Patrick's Day Parade in New York, the holiday was celebrated in St. Augustine, where urban renewal was underway when Jamestown settlers arrived. Author James Clark offers a lifetime of places to explore and thousands of facts to fascinate, tracing the state's long history from Pensacola to the Florida Keys.