JFK: It Was 46 Years Ago Today

46 years ago, on November 18, 1963, President John Fitzgerald Kennedy arrived in Tampa for a day of public events and speeches. Just four days later, on this date, President Kennedy would ride in his last motorcade as it moved through the streets of Dallas, Texas. His assassination shocked and saddened our nation and people throughout the world. To those in Tampa who had just experienced the excitement and vigor of our young president, his visit still fresh in their minds, it was numbing and especially hard to believe.

In 1964, by unanimous vote of Tampa City Council, the road which was originally Lafayette Street and later Grand Central Avenue, was renamed John F. Kennedy Boulevard. Part of his visit that November day to Tampa took him on Grand Central Avenue, past the spot where I took this photo. The sculptor Bernard Zuckerman created this statue in honor of Kennedy. It stands in a small plaza designed by architect Cesar Alfonso on the campus of the University of Tampa and faces the boulevard that was renamed in honor of the slain president.

Turned to solid stone

I must confess that our Pekingese is a good dog, 99% of his waking time. Dr. Eliot Porter or simply Porter to family (friends?) is a typical Peke. This photo isn't a perfect likeness but it comes close. This stone statue sits proudly in front of a Chinese restaurant on North Dale Mabry. It was a very busy parking lot at noon hour as I tried my darnedest to get one shot of this figure. It’s pretty big, probably 4-feet tall without its base, and very detailed. Called the Foo Dog or Fu Dog, it was created in ancient China using dogs like our Peke. They are the ancient sacred dogs of Asia who guard Buddhist temples. They were made to represent what the Chinese thought a lion looked like. Because at that time the Chinese had never seen an actual lion, they looked to the closest animal in the palace that they thought from descriptions must be close – the Pekingese, also called Lion Dogs, the fearsome canine creatures running through the palace and entertaining royals.

As I twice wrote about our dog Porter in the past (he complained once that he’d never been featured in the blog, HERE, and proudly (?) wearing his yellow rain slicker during a Florida downpour, HERE), they are independent little dogs, assertive and very stubborn. They have a strong sense of territory and will protect it against all threats (that includes adorable Halloween trick-or-treaters, mailmen, UPS deliverymen and neighbors looking for a glass of wine.) After their initial fury and bearing of ferocious teeth, they become itty-bitty babies who sleep away most of their day. But stubborn and bull-headed? Oh, yes.

It struck me as I pondered the ancient transition of these lovable imperial household pets into huge lion-like statues, that it is possible, even likely, that in some period in Chinese history that smart and brave Peke keepers would sternly warn the herd that if they grew too bullish, misbehaved or snippy (I wonder how to say that word in Chinese) that they would be turned into stone. That’s it. I’d had a Eureka moment. It became abundantly clear that my frustration at times trying to argue with our too-smart for his britches, pint-sized Peke - you know, an intelligent and all-too-human conversation with an imperial dog whose ancestors were all raised in palaces from Peking to London – might result in his transformation into a statue standing guard outside a Chinese eating establishment. Do you think that the next time he stops dead in his tracks and absolutely refuses to budge a centimeter, and gives a look of utter disdain, that I should pull out a photo of this stone Foo Dog? I could fire a stern, verbal warning shot over his head (which wouldn’t be hard to do at 10-inches off the pavement) he’d realize his mistake and stop pretending to be a 1,500 lb. water buffalo?? I’m considering my course of action. The next time he acts like a member of an imperial household, I may mush his face up to my computer screen and show him, SHOW HIM, this stone statue. Yep, that’ll change his ways.

As to rumors that he has taken to riding on a Golden Retriever with a custom leather and silk saddle, well, I ask you, where’s the proof?

I am so pleased to welcome
a new followers to Tampa Daily Photo.
Sumedang Daily Photo provides a fascinating window into the colorful world of Indonesia. Be sure and visit his site for an intimate glimpse at the people and places of his homeland. HERE

Christopher Columbus: Does everyone celebrate 1492?

Does everyone celebrate Columbus Day? No, everyone does not celebrate the explorer and his "discovery of the New World" in 1492. It's a fact that there are national and local observances of the discovery of the Americas by Christopher Columbus, but not everyone thinks it was such a marvelous occasion in world history or cause for a party or celebration.


Columbus Day became a federal holiday in 1934, but, people were celebrating as far back as the American colonial period. In 1792, New York City and other U.S. cities celebrated the 300th anniversary and in 1892, President Benjamin Harrison rallied the nation to celebrate Columbus Day on the 400th anniversary of the event. It was quite patriotic and was seen in a positive and popular light. But even though many Native Americans may not have seen reason or have any cause to join in the celebration - I wonder how the big day went in schools on Indian reservations - the idea of replacing Columbus Day with Indigenous Peoples Day didn't come about until 1977. It was first proclaimed by representatives of Native nations and participants gathered in Geneva, Switzerland at the United Nations-sponsored International Conference on Discrimination Against Indigenous Populations in the Americas. In that year the planning began for the 500th anniversary of Columbus Day in 1992. It was decided in 1990 to transform Columbus Day, 1992, "into an occasion to strengthen our process of continental unity and struggle towards our liberation." (Wikipedia has details regarding Columbus Day and the Native American's reaction to it HERE.)


The International Columbian Quincentenary Alliance and Spain '92 planned a Tour of the Discovery Ships. The official schedule of the recreated Nina, Pinta and Santa Maria included their departure from Spain and, by February 1992, they were sailing along our East Coast; they visited 13 cities in 11 states. Festivities were planned at the parks and harbor fronts at Miami, Houston, Tampa, Norfolk, Boston, New York, Philadelphia and Baltimore. The ships also docked at New Orleans, St. Augustine, Charleston, Newport, RI, and Wilmington. The final celebration of the voyage of the Nina, Pinta and the Santa Maria was with the tall ships in New York's harbor on July 4th.


The ships were in Tampa, tied up at the docks alongside the Tampa Convention Center for ten days, from April 3-12. I went to see the ships in 1992, and sat down on the grass to hear the Native Americans who came from all over the United States to celebrate Indigenous People's Day. Russell Means, an Oglala Soiux, and one of the best known activists for the rights and freedoms of American Indians, led their celebration. As a backdrop to their words that day, the Nina, Pinta and Santa Maria looked pretty small and one had to wonder how they ever sailed across the Atlantic to begin the exploration of the European's "New World."


The statue of Columbus in Tampa was sculpted by the artist Albert Sabas. It stands at the western end of the Platt Street Bridge and was dedicated on this day in 1953.

Don Quixote embraces the eBook

The great Don Quixote sits astride his charger, Rocinante, and has obviously stopped reading from those tasteless books printed on paper and bound in leather. Note that he appears to have switched to the eBook reader, Kindle, or such. No man should be seen living in the past, so he proudly, emphatically embraces the newest technology; the better to explore and discover the vast reaches of the world around him without lugging books...or weighing down his magnificent steed, or even life itself. Heavens no. Quixote is clearly shown here comparing the heavy tome under one arm with the devilish splendor of the much smaller, and smarter electronic device. What his trusted squire, Sancho Panza, may think we cannot tell from the statue. (Although I am smoking a Honduran Sancho Panza cigar as I type this.)


This life-size statue of Quixote stands in the center of the lobby of the SunTrust Financial Centre building in Tampa's downtown. (It is the towering skyscraper with the ziggurat roof design and color display at night.) The statue really must be seen closeup to appreciate its detail and exquisite workmanship. It is just inside the lobby but it is too bad it's not in a more public location so more people can see it closeup.) The artist, sadly, is unknown to me at this time and that's a shame.)