simple twist of fate?

Sarasota's bayfront Selby Library (1976).  Architect, Walter Netsch - Skidmore, Owings & Merrill.

(Glass atrium retrofitted in 2000.  G. Wiz Science Museum, Dale Parks, architect).

(photo; Ezra Stoller /SOM)



TODAY - developers, city commissioners, and a few locally distinguished 'assholes'

"When losing another little piece of our history, a grieving period is in order".  Quote from columnist, Barbara Peters Smith, from her article titled - So long, and thanks for all the books.  Sarasota Herald-Tribune, May 20th.

Farley family

Recently I had read about someone in the local paper, that I had gone to school with here on the island, and that must have been some 55 years ago.  Back then, it was a graduating class of eight.

Alice Farley had returned from NYC for a short visit, to help sell the family property - and to give a brief talk about her family and their unique home. Her father Walter, was a well known writer of children's books and her mother, a former high model of the New York fashion world.  There was nothing then about the family, that I could remember, that may have appeared grand or particularly exceptional. But really, there was.

So, Sandy and I went down to see Alice, to hear her speak, and to visit their noted home, now aging, and listed on the high-end real estate market.  Architecturally, little seemed to have changed.

Rear view of the house, designed and built by Ralph Twitchell and architect, Jack West (1953)

Screen lanai and footpath out towards the beach

The living room, where a few chairs were set-up for Alice's talk.

Walter Farley, Alice's father, had written the children's classic, 'The Black Stallion' (1941). After publication, the New York Times referred to it's character as, "the most famous horse in fiction".

 

From the Black Stallion series, there were twenty books of written sequels - from which a TV series and a motion picture were eventually made.

In Walter's library, reference books on children's literature, from Aesop's Fables, to tales from Edgar Allan Poe.

Rosemary and Walter, out on the beach (1946).

Alice's mother, Rosemary from her early years modeling in New York

A simple kitchen in a modest, simply designed home - and Farley family owned for over sixty years.

A few collectibles remain of Walter's personal horse memorabilia - a helmet, scarf and a horse-hair crop, left hanging.

Upon leaving, with a few moments left in the kitchen, Alice and I had a good laugh over one of our most difficult teachers during that time spent while attending the Out-Of-Door School. That person was a miserable, difficult and unforgiving woman - our moody art teacher.  Luckily, we had her way before we both began our professional careers in the visual arts.

the Golden bamboo

Got up by 7:00 today, to beat the heat, to finish digging a hole deep and wide enough, after my first failed attempt from over a week ago.  An initial two hours, when I just ran out of steam.  The dug-up roots (rhizomes) left from the old, existing bamboo, were deeply matted horizontally and running nearly three feet deep.

The plan - to replace an area of original Timber bamboo that had died - to fill-in that major gap with a unique 'Golden' variety.  About a month ago, a nursery delivered two 30 gallon tubs of mainly root stock with a few new long and slender "culms" showing. The hard part, the digging - dragging the heavy tubs and getting them placed by myself.  After this second attempt today, I'm finally done.


The newly planted, large root stocks, are now in the ground within the center area of the existing 'Timber' bamboo, with only a few straggler culms (stalks) appearing.

What it will eventually appear as..

Four feet down and a hour in, and shoveling hard with a good sweat - I hit sea shells.

Eventually, the newly planted 'Golden', now planted in the central area of the old growth, will closely reach the same overall height and spread of the original 'Timber' bamboo shown below.