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Title: Rebuilt and Remade: The Florida Citrus Industry, 1909-1939.
Creator: Padgett, James, Lester, Connie, Pineda, Yovanna, French, Scot, University of Central Florida
Abstract / Description: Prior to orange juice concentrate, Florida citrus was already an industrialized agricultural sector. This thesis explores the early-20th-century Florida citrus industry and demonstrates that contemporary farming practices were influential in advancing how citrus was produced, processed, worked, marketed, and regulated in early-20th-century Florida. Restarted after devastating freezes in 1894-1895, resolute Florida growers rebuilt their groves into marvels of large-scale citrus fruit...
Show morePrior to orange juice concentrate, Florida citrus was already an industrialized agricultural sector. This thesis explores the early-20th-century Florida citrus industry and demonstrates that contemporary farming practices were influential in advancing how citrus was produced, processed, worked, marketed, and regulated in early-20th-century Florida. Restarted after devastating freezes in 1894-1895, resolute Florida growers rebuilt their groves into marvels of large-scale citrus fruit production. Continuing a legacy in experimental crossbreeding, improved varieties of citrus were developed to lengthen the season and markets. Advocated by nurserymen and university educators, biological innovation helped the citrus thrive in the 1910s and 1920s from adverse weather effects, pests, and diseases. Scientists were agents of modernization whose research influenced its industrialization. With the inclusion of machines in the processing of citrus, technological innovation materialized significantly in Florida's packinghouses by the 1930s. These changes affected the lives of agricultural workers and small growers. Whether by prejudice or by resisting collective efforts, big growers gained power and influence in the industry, Their power concentrated into the Florida Citrus Codes and Florida Citrus Commission in 1935, which effectively allowed large-scale growers to direct the industry's development into the rest of the 20th century. In all, this reexamination into Florida citrus exemplifies the remaking of this industry into a modern agricultural system as well as the gradualism of southern agricultural modernization in early-20th-century America.
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Date Issued: 2018
Identifier: CFE0007906, ucf:52745
Format: Document (PDF)
PURL: http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFE0007906

Title: Sanford, DeBary Hall and the New South Movement in Central Florida.
Creator: Thorncroft, Sarah, Lester, Connie, French, Scot, Walker, Ezekiel, University of Central Florida
Abstract / Description: The so-called New South movement coincided with national industrialization in the Gilded Age and Progressive Era. In the New South, modernization focused on the development of small diversified farms, mills that processed cotton and tobacco, and small cities that connected the countryside to national markets and provided area residents with mass produced goods. Florida's experience and more specifically development around Lake Monroe in Central Florida complicates and expands our...
Show moreThe so-called New South movement coincided with national industrialization in the Gilded Age and Progressive Era. In the New South, modernization focused on the development of small diversified farms, mills that processed cotton and tobacco, and small cities that connected the countryside to national markets and provided area residents with mass produced goods. Florida's experience and more specifically development around Lake Monroe in Central Florida complicates and expands our understanding of the New South. Located in what was considered a frontier area, Sanford on the south shore of the lake and DeBary Hall on the north shore illustrate the development of Central Florida in the context of the New South movement. Finally, an analysis of two museums, Sanford Museum and DeBary Hall House Museum, assesses the community understanding of the role of New South in the development of the area and offers suggestions for writing the New South into the story.
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Date Issued: 2018
Identifier: CFE0007256, ucf:52185
Format: Document (PDF)
PURL: http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFE0007256

Title: The Christian Methodist Episcopal Church in the Memory of the Civil Rights Movement.
Creator: Nightingale, Brandon, Lester, Connie, Gordon, Fon, Walker, Ezekiel, University of Central Florida
Abstract / Description: The Christian Methodist Episcopal (CME) Church is a historically black church rooted in the South that was established in 1870. The church had been viewed historically as an (")old slavery(") church, due to its close relationship to the White Methodist Episcopal Church (formerly Methodist Episcopal Church, South (MECS). The history of the denomination encouraged the view that CME churches and schools had not been active in the Civil Rights Movement. Closer research into the denomination's...
Show moreThe Christian Methodist Episcopal (CME) Church is a historically black church rooted in the South that was established in 1870. The church had been viewed historically as an (")old slavery(") church, due to its close relationship to the White Methodist Episcopal Church (formerly Methodist Episcopal Church, South (MECS). The history of the denomination encouraged the view that CME churches and schools had not been active in the Civil Rights Movement. Closer research into the denomination's archives from 1954, when the church changed its name from (")Colored(") to (")Christian(") up to the 1970s, when the movement transitioned, challenges that interpretation. From the individual activist leaders across the South, to CME-affiliated historically black colleges associated with the black student movement, and the work of members of local congregations, the CME church can be shown to have been at the forefront of the movement. By focusing on three groups(-)CME leaders, church affiliated colleges, and a local congregation(-)this thesis argues that activism took many forms. Narrowly defining what constitutes civil rights activism risks overlooking important figures in the movement and failing to acknowledge the struggles individuals and church communities faced in the struggle to end disfranchisement and Jim Crow segregation. Understanding the role of the CME church in the Civil Rights Movement calls for expanding the meaning of the word activism to include acts of defiance and courage less well-understood.
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Date Issued: 2019
Identifier: CFE0007843, ucf:52832
Format: Document (PDF)
PURL: http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFE0007843

Title: A Place in the Sunshine State : Community, Preservation, and the Parliament House.
Creator: Montgomery, Erin, Lester, Connie, Gannon, Barbara, Pineda, Yovanna, University of Central Florida
Abstract / Description: A Place in the Sunshine State, is a thesis project focused on the Parliament House Motor Inn in Orlando, Florida. This project nominated the Parliament House Motor Inn for inclusion on the National Register of Historic Places. This nomination was completed using both oral histories and more traditional historical source material. The Parliament House Motor Inn was evaluated using National Register Bulletins and the Secretary of the Interior's Standards for Preservation. This nomination was...
Show moreA Place in the Sunshine State, is a thesis project focused on the Parliament House Motor Inn in Orlando, Florida. This project nominated the Parliament House Motor Inn for inclusion on the National Register of Historic Places. This nomination was completed using both oral histories and more traditional historical source material. The Parliament House Motor Inn was evaluated using National Register Bulletins and the Secretary of the Interior's Standards for Preservation. This nomination was presented to give voice to a long-underrepresented community within the national narrative of the United States, along with giving the Parliament House the recognition it deserves as an integral institution within the gay community. This nomination sheds new light onto early gay life in Orlando and concludes that Parliament House is a significant historic and cultural resource. This conclusion is vital to the preservation of LGBT history; it allows for a more complex interpretation of Orlando and central Florida history and helps to recognize LGBT history and the sites associated with them. This thesis also discusses Parliament House and its role as a site of the intersections between gay community and identity creation, place making, and the intricate history of the southern United States. ?
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Date Issued: 2017
Identifier: CFE0007128, ucf:52319
Format: Document (PDF)
PURL: http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFE0007128

Title: Making Our Voices Heard: Power and Citizenship in Central Florida's Black Communities.
Creator: McPherson, Gramond, Cassanello, Robert, Lester, Connie, Walker, Ezekiel, University of Central Florida
Abstract / Description: This thesis examines the impacts of government policies on community mobilization in Orlando's Parramore neighborhood and the all-black town of Eatonville in Central Florida. The scope of this thesis covers the history of both communities from their formation in the 1880s to the end of the twentieth century. This research reveals the relationships between the predominantly black residents of Parramore and Eatonville and the largely white government officials over the development and...
Show moreThis thesis examines the impacts of government policies on community mobilization in Orlando's Parramore neighborhood and the all-black town of Eatonville in Central Florida. The scope of this thesis covers the history of both communities from their formation in the 1880s to the end of the twentieth century. This research reveals the relationships between the predominantly black residents of Parramore and Eatonville and the largely white government officials over the development and maintenance of each community. By understanding the social creation of both communities during the era of Jim Crow, this thesis reveals the differing levels of power each community possessed that would impact their ability to turn their defined black spaces into black places. Moving forward, each community had to adjust to the impacts of integration that weakened the communal bonds that helped the community endure Jim Crow. However, in detailing the rise of citizen activism in the post-World War II period, the theory of infrastructural citizenship shapes this thesis in revealing how black residents in Parramore and Eatonville exercised their rights as citizens in making their voices heard surrounding various infrastructural changes. While their efforts did not always achieve their ultimate goals, it forced decision makers to anticipate and accommodate the opinions of the residents impacted by these decisions. This thesis uses historical analysis to place Parramore and Eatonville within the broader social, political, and economic contexts of events occurring in Florida, the American South and the country at large.
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Date Issued: 2019
Identifier: CFE0007685, ucf:52494
Format: Document (PDF)
PURL: http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFE0007685

Title: Entering Nam: A Comparative Study of the Entrance Experiences of Volunteer and Drafted Service Members into the Military During the Vietnam War.
Creator: Wilt, Ashley, Lester, Connie, Gannon, Barbara, Sacher, John, Walker, Ezekiel, University of Central Florida
Abstract / Description: Many historians have conducted oral history interviews with Vietnam War veterans in an attempt to offer a more personal perspective to the study of the Vietnam War; however, most historians do not consciously differentiate between drafted and volunteer veterans. Identifying whether a veteran was drafted into service or volunteered is critical because the extent to which this service was voluntary or coerced may affect the way a veteran remembers his military service. By conducting oral...
Show moreMany historians have conducted oral history interviews with Vietnam War veterans in an attempt to offer a more personal perspective to the study of the Vietnam War; however, most historians do not consciously differentiate between drafted and volunteer veterans. Identifying whether a veteran was drafted into service or volunteered is critical because the extent to which this service was voluntary or coerced may affect the way a veteran remembers his military service. By conducting oral histories, one can consciously delineate service members who volunteered as opposed to those who were drafted to determine if the veterans' experiences change based on the nature of their entry into the military. Additionally, examining the implementation of a national draft and its effects on service members' experiences will offer a better understanding of American military history. While much of the attention of scholars has been on drafted soldiers in Vietnam, little research has been conducted on the experience of the volunteer soldier.This study relies on oral history interviews conducted with volunteer and drafted service members of the Vietnam War to determine if there were differences between draftees and volunteers based on their entrance into the military. The research and oral history interviews with the two veteran groups establishes that the dissent detailed by draft protesters was not always the case and service members, volunteers and draftees alike, more often than not accepted their military service. The interviewed veterans' responses suggest that resistance to military service during the Vietnam War may not have been as great as one might think given the attention that has been placed on the anti-draft movement.
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Date Issued: 2012
Identifier: CFE0004211, ucf:49025
Format: Document (PDF)
PURL: http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFE0004211

Title: The Afro-American Slave Music Project: Building a Case for Digital History.
Creator: Cepero, Laura, French, Scot, Lester, Connie, Larson, Peter, University of Central Florida
Abstract / Description: This public history thesis project experimented with the application of new technology in creating an educational resource aimed at twenty-first century public audiences. The project presents the history, musicology, and historiography of Afro-American slave music in the United States. In doing so, the project utilizes two digital media tools: VuVox, to create interactive collages; and VisualEyes, to create digital visualizations. The purpose of this thesis is to assess how the project...
Show moreThis public history thesis project experimented with the application of new technology in creating an educational resource aimed at twenty-first century public audiences. The project presents the history, musicology, and historiography of Afro-American slave music in the United States. In doing so, the project utilizes two digital media tools: VuVox, to create interactive collages; and VisualEyes, to create digital visualizations. The purpose of this thesis is to assess how the project balances the goals of digital history, public history, and academic history.During the production of the Afro-American Slave Music Project, a number of the promises of digital history were highlighted, along with several of the potential challenges of digital history. In designing the project, compensations had to be made in order to minimize the challenges while maximizing the benefits. In effect, this thesis argues for the utility of digital history in a public setting as an alternative to traditional, prose-based academic history.
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Date Issued: 2013
Identifier: CFE0004663, ucf:49901
Format: Document (PDF)
PURL: http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFE0004663

Title: Experiencing the World of Franklin: The Making of an Immersive and Interactive Historical Exhibit.
Creator: Webster, Daniel, Beiler, Rosalind, Larson, Peter, Lester, Connie, University of Central Florida
Abstract / Description: This thesis involves the creation of a historically-themed museum element. The element, titled (")Improving Community,(") is a virtual interactive game that allows players to explore certain realities of colonial American life. Within the game, players are presented with a number of civic-related issues that existed throughout the eighteenth century, and they are then given options to improve the situation. Interactivity and immersion are key features of the game, and they have been...
Show moreThis thesis involves the creation of a historically-themed museum element. The element, titled (")Improving Community,(") is a virtual interactive game that allows players to explore certain realities of colonial American life. Within the game, players are presented with a number of civic-related issues that existed throughout the eighteenth century, and they are then given options to improve the situation. Interactivity and immersion are key features of the game, and they have been incorporated so that players may engage with the past and assume a more active role in the process of historical reconstruction. Research for the games draws mostly upon historical primary sources, including first-hand accounts, letters, diaries, periodicals, pamphlets, meeting minutes, and legal documents. In addition, the process of developing the games was informed by a number of secondary source works, and therefore this study inspects the ways in which (")Improving Community(") fits within the ongoing scholarly debates. Ultimately this project contributes to the field of public history by demonstrating the usefulness of games as a tool for historical exhibition. (")Improving Community(") is both entertaining and educational, and as a result, the game provides individuals with a unique outlet for exploring and experiencing the past.
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Date Issued: 2012
Identifier: CFE0004196, ucf:49005
Format: Document (PDF)
PURL: http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFE0004196

Title: The Comradeship of the Open Road: The Identity and Influence of the Tin Can Tourists of the World on Automobility, Florida, and National Tourism.
Creator: Burel, David, Foster, Amy, Walker, Ezekiel, Lester, Connie, University of Central Florida
Abstract / Description: The identity of the Tin Can Tourists of the World, the first recreation automobile organization, has been poorly defined in the historical discourse, the factors contributing to the 1919 formation of the organization in Tampa, Florida represents a landmark shift in tourism in America towards the automobile.The group's subsequent solidification of a distinct identity gives insight beyond their organization. The thesis defines their identity as well as looks at their impact on American...
Show moreThe identity of the Tin Can Tourists of the World, the first recreation automobile organization, has been poorly defined in the historical discourse, the factors contributing to the 1919 formation of the organization in Tampa, Florida represents a landmark shift in tourism in America towards the automobile.The group's subsequent solidification of a distinct identity gives insight beyond their organization. The thesis defines their identity as well as looks at their impact on American automobility and tourism. The thesis therefore focuses on the previously undefined concept of recreational automobility giving it definition and showing how the group helped to define it.The group's early role in mass use and adaptation of the automobile for recreation represents the first steps in creating a market for recreational vehicles. The imposition of organization on the camping experience by the Tin Can Tourists and their influence on creating special places for the practice of their activities helped define recreational automobility.The footprint left by the Tin Can Tourists helped shape part of America's modern tourist industry. The legacy of their ideas about recreational automobility also suggests influence they had on later groups using recreational vehicles. This thesis examines and clarifies the identity and influence of the Tin Can Tourists of the World as a window on important trends in automobility and tourism.
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Date Issued: 2012
Identifier: CFE0004306, ucf:49472
Format: Document (PDF)
PURL: http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFE0004306

Title: Joining the "Big Leagues": Politics, Race, and the Pursuit of NBA Franchises in Miami and Orlando, 1982-1987.
Creator: Hillyer, Garrett, Crepeau, Richard, Lester, Connie, Lyons, Amelia, University of Central Florida
Abstract / Description: This thesis analyzes the formation of two National Basketball Association (NBA) franchises(-)the Miami Heat and the Orlando Magic(-)and the efforts of groups representing both cities to procure those franchises between 1982 and 1987. Drawing primarily from discourse found in local newspapers, this thesis serves as a case study of the dual nature of sport to both unite and divide communities. While proponents of the NBA in Miami and Orlando preached the social, cultural, and economic benefits...
Show moreThis thesis analyzes the formation of two National Basketball Association (NBA) franchises(-)the Miami Heat and the Orlando Magic(-)and the efforts of groups representing both cities to procure those franchises between 1982 and 1987. Drawing primarily from discourse found in local newspapers, this thesis serves as a case study of the dual nature of sport to both unite and divide communities. While proponents of the NBA in Miami and Orlando preached the social, cultural, and economic benefits of sport, they ignored the ways in which the pursuit of sport divided local governments and perpetuated historic hostility toward African-American residents in each city. Debates over basketball arena funding created deep divisions within and between city, county, and state governments. Arena construction ultimately displaced hundreds of families in the historically African-American neighborhoods of Overtown (Miami) and Parramore (Orlando). Still, prospective NBA franchise owners in each city promised residents that professional sport would galvanize their community, provide national relevance, and spur economic revitalization. Although city and team officials attempted to shape the discourse surrounding their NBA pursuit as wholly unifying, underlying discourse revealed divisions within each city.Chapter one explores the history of arena and sport-related politics in Miami, relays the history of racial prejudice by Miami government toward Overtown African Americans, and analyzes how these two histories influenced the funding and location of the city's eventual NBA arena. Similarly, Chapter two explores the history of arena politics in Orlando, relays the history of racial prejudice from municipal government toward Parramore residents, and analyzes the relation of these two elements to the financing and planning of Orlando's arena. Chapter three analyzes prospective NBA ownership groups in Miami and Orlando, their structural makeup, characteristics, and their efforts to sell season-ticket deposits in hopes of luring the league to their city. Chapter four analyzes the underlying destructive discourse surrounding the arenas and prospective franchises, particularly as it relates prejudicial language toward Overtown and Parramore and vitriolic language between Miami and Orlando.
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Date Issued: 2016
Identifier: CFE0006324, ucf:51554
Format: Document (PDF)
PURL: http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFE0006324

Title: FARM WOMEN AS PRODUCERS AND CONSUMERS IN THE 20TH CENTURY U.S. SOUTH.
Creator: Kaminski, Joseph J, Lester, Connie, University of Central Florida
Abstract / Description: The intent of this thesis is to examine white, rural women of the South who were directly affected by home demonstration between 1920 - 1950 and to discuss their roles as producers and consumers in the expanding market economy. Home demonstration, a three-tiered bureaucratic agency that provided domestic education and production techniques to Southern women, played a major role in guiding women toward the expanding market economy. Agents often had to temper their programs in order to...
Show moreThe intent of this thesis is to examine white, rural women of the South who were directly affected by home demonstration between 1920 - 1950 and to discuss their roles as producers and consumers in the expanding market economy. Home demonstration, a three-tiered bureaucratic agency that provided domestic education and production techniques to Southern women, played a major role in guiding women toward the expanding market economy. Agents often had to temper their programs in order to compromise with the women they served to accommodate rural restrictions on capital, capability, and confidence. By integrating rural women into a more modernized, less isolated, and more urbanized environment, home demonstration hoped to improve the lives of women through its focus on sanitation, nutrition, and efficiency within household production.
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Date Issued: 2019
Identifier: CFH2000509, ucf:45653
Format: Document (PDF)
PURL: http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFH2000509

Title: Central Florida School Districts' Responses to Hispanic Growth, 1980-2010.
Creator: Hazen, Kendra, Cassanello, Robert, Lester, Connie, Walker, Ezekiel, University of Central Florida
Abstract / Description: Since the 1980s, Hispanics have been the fastest growing minority in the United States and have been moving into rural, Southern areas where there have previously not been populations of Hispanics. Studies of these demographic changes have concentrated on how communities impacted by the influx of Hispanics have created or adjusted socioeconomic and political infrastructures to accommodate the linguistic and cultural needs of the Hispanic population. The public-school system is a...
Show moreSince the 1980s, Hispanics have been the fastest growing minority in the United States and have been moving into rural, Southern areas where there have previously not been populations of Hispanics. Studies of these demographic changes have concentrated on how communities impacted by the influx of Hispanics have created or adjusted socioeconomic and political infrastructures to accommodate the linguistic and cultural needs of the Hispanic population. The public-school system is a sociopolitical structure that has affected and has been affected by the increase in Hispanics. Whereas the modern Civil Rights movement had created legal precedence for students' language rights and led to the creation of the federal Bilingual Education Act of 1968, nationalist backlash to this rise in Hispanic immigrants led to the eventual defunding of federal bilingual education programs by the No Child Left Behind Act in 2001. This thesis is a policy history of Hispanic growth in the public-school systems in Orange, Lake and Osceola counties in Florida from 1980 to 2010. During that time, the three counties grew and diversified at different rates and made decisions for their English for Speakers of Other Languages programs that correlated with the size of their Hispanic population. This time frame encompasses Osceola's fastest period of growth which led to the creation of the Florida Consent Decree, Florida public schools' framework for remaining compliant with federal and state language policies. Even though federal funds for English acquisition programs replaced funds for bilingual or native language instruction during this time, Hispanic and non-Hispanic teachers, administrators, community or activist groups and parents continued to exert agency in gaining culturally inclusive and linguistically affirming language instruction programs for their children.
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Date Issued: 2019
Identifier: CFE0007649, ucf:52507
Format: Document (PDF)
PURL: http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFE0007649

Title: Florida's Paradox of Progress: An Examination of the Origins, Construction, and Impact of the Tamiami Trail.
Creator: Schellhammer, Mark, Lester, Connie, Sacher, John, Larson, Peter, University of Central Florida
Abstract / Description: This study illustrates the impact of the Tamiami Trail on the people and environment of South Florida through an examination of the road's origins, construction and implementation. By exploring the motives behind building the highway, the subsequent assimilation of indigenous societies, the drastic population growth that occurred as a result of a propagated (")Florida Dream("), and the environmental decline of the surrounding Everglades, this analysis reveals that the Tamiami Trail is viewed...
Show moreThis study illustrates the impact of the Tamiami Trail on the people and environment of South Florida through an examination of the road's origins, construction and implementation. By exploring the motives behind building the highway, the subsequent assimilation of indigenous societies, the drastic population growth that occurred as a result of a propagated (")Florida Dream("), and the environmental decline of the surrounding Everglades, this analysis reveals that the Tamiami Trail is viewed today through a much different context than that of the road's builders and promoters in the early twentieth century. While construction projects that aim to prevent, or limit the once celebrated environmental destruction caused by the Tamiami Trail, the unrelenting and economically stimulating growth of South Florida continues to uncover a (")paradox of progress.(")
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Date Issued: 2012
Identifier: CFE0004597, ucf:49186
Format: Document (PDF)
PURL: http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFE0004597

Title: Sage Illusionists: A Historical Study Using Illusionists as a Reflection of Mass Entertainment, Popular Culture, anf Change During the Late Nineteenth Century.
Creator: Phillips, Clayton, Cassanello, Robert, Lester, Connie, Walker, Ezekiel, University of Central Florida
Abstract / Description: By the late nineteenth and early twenty century both the United States and Europe were experiencing massive shifts in social organization, social attitudes, and global influence due to the effects of the industrial revolution and imperialistic expansion. This birth of a public sphere and the mass entertainment industry was related to a blurring of the lines between traditional social classes. Mass entertainment's growth was directly related to the need to attract large audiences with...
Show moreBy the late nineteenth and early twenty century both the United States and Europe were experiencing massive shifts in social organization, social attitudes, and global influence due to the effects of the industrial revolution and imperialistic expansion. This birth of a public sphere and the mass entertainment industry was related to a blurring of the lines between traditional social classes. Mass entertainment's growth was directly related to the need to attract large audiences with entertainment that appealed in some way to a broad spectrum of the populace. At the same time, stage illusionists or magicians were one of the most recognizable stars of mass entertainment. In fact, they were in the midst of what has been termed the (")Golden Age(") of magic. By recognizing the popularity of their performances in the United States and Europe, this thesis will use them as a reflection of historical trends and popular attitudes in areas such as romanticism, secular/technical superiority, race, and gender. Historians, like Lawrence Levine, have produced a number of historical studies in regards to performance art, mass entertainment, and the historical implications represented in entertainment. Previous studies of magicians during the time period have been primarily biographical or technical in nature. It is only recently that historians have begun to combine the two in regards to performance magic. This thesis will combine previous research on the historical narrative of the time from authors such as Leon Fink, Sean Cashman, and Alan Trachtenburg in order to analyze how magical performances confirm conclusions reached by previous work on the historical context of these performances.The themes that are addressed within this work begin with the birth of mass entertainment, the need for an act with mass appeal to attract audiences, and how the mass entertainment displays a blurring of class lines. It will expand on work by Daniel T. Rogers in explaining how these trends were not exclusive to the United States or Europe and were actually a transatlantic phenomenon. It will use Simon During to explain how magicians, with roots in folk culture, became stars on the stage because of their appeal and their unique position in performance art. It will add to work by authors such as Lawrence Levine, showing how magicians needed to perform acts for mass consumption by working class, middle class, and upper class individuals. Finally, it will use magical performances as text to reflect social attitudes of the time period much in the way that authors such as Eric Green or Katherine Prince have done in their work. ?
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Date Issued: 2015
Identifier: CFE0005988, ucf:50793
Format: Document (PDF)
PURL: http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFE0005988

Title: White and Black Womanhoods and Their Representations in 1920s American Advertising.
Creator: Turnbull, Lindsey, Lester, Connie, Sacher, John, Dandrow, Edward, University of Central Florida
Abstract / Description: The 1920s represented a time of tension in America. Throughout the decade, marginalized groups created competing versions of a proper citizen. African-Americans sought to be included in the national fabric. Racism encouraged solidarity, but black Americans did not agree upon one method for coping with, and hopefully ending, antiblack racism. White women enjoyed new privileges and took on more roles in the public sphere. Reactionary groups like the Ku Klux Klan found these new voices...
Show moreThe 1920s represented a time of tension in America. Throughout the decade, marginalized groups created competing versions of a proper citizen. African-Americans sought to be included in the national fabric. Racism encouraged solidarity, but black Americans did not agree upon one method for coping with, and hopefully ending, antiblack racism. White women enjoyed new privileges and took on more roles in the public sphere. Reactionary groups like the Ku Klux Klan found these new voices unsettling and worrisome and celebrated a white, native-born, Protestant and male vision of the American citizen. Simultaneously, technological innovations allowed for advertising to flourish and spread homogenizing information regarding race, gender, values and consumption across the nation. These advertisements selectively represented these changes by channeling them into pre-existing prescriptive ideology. Mainstream ads, which were created by whites for white audiences, reinforced traditional ideas regarding black men and women and white women's roles. Even if white women were featured using technology or wearing cosmetics, they were still featured in prescribed roles as housekeepers, wives and mothers who deferred to and relied on their husbands. Black women were featured in secondary roles, as servants or mammies, if at all. Concurrently, the black press created its own representations of women. Although these representations were complex and sometimes contradictory and had to reach multiple audiences, black-created ads featured women in a variety of roles, such as entertainers, mothers and business women, but never as mammies. Then, in a decade of increased tensions, white-created ads relied on traditional portrayals of women and African-Americans while black-designed ads offered more positive, although complicated, visions of womanhood.
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Date Issued: 2012
Identifier: CFE0004612, ucf:49939
Format: Document (PDF)
PURL: http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFE0004612

Title: "ANIMAL-LIKE AND DEPRAVED": RACIST STEREOTYPES, COMMERCIAL SEX, AND BLACK WOMEN'S IDENTITY IN NEW ORLEANS, 1825-1917.
Creator: Dossie, Porsha, Lester, Connie, University of Central Florida
Abstract / Description: My objective with this thesis is to understand how racist stereotypes and myths compounded the sale of fair-skinned black women during and after the slave trade in New Orleans, Louisiana. This commodification of black women's bodies continued well into the twentieth century, notably in New Orleans' vice district of Storyville. Called "quadroons" (a person with 1/4 African ancestry) and "octoroons" (1/8 African ancestry), these women were known for their "sexual prowess" and drew in a large...
Show moreMy objective with this thesis is to understand how racist stereotypes and myths compounded the sale of fair-skinned black women during and after the slave trade in New Orleans, Louisiana. This commodification of black women's bodies continued well into the twentieth century, notably in New Orleans' vice district of Storyville. Called "quadroons" (a person with 1/4 African ancestry) and "octoroons" (1/8 African ancestry), these women were known for their "sexual prowess" and drew in a large number of patrons. The existence of "white passing" black women complicated ideas about race and racial purity in the South. Race as a myth and social construct, or as Evelyn Brooks Higginbotham explains in her essay, African-American Women's History and the Metalanguage of Race, a "metalanguage" exposes race not as a genetic fact, but rather a physical appearance through which power relations and status were to be conferred. My methodology uses race and gender theory to analyze primary and secondary sources to understand and contextualize how population demographics, myths, and liberal 18th century colonial laws contributed to the sale of black women's bodies. The works of Emily Clark, Walter Johnson, Gwendolyn Midlo Hall and other historians who utilize Atlantic history have been paramount in my research. Emily Clark has transformed the "white-black" women from a tragic, sexualized trope into a fully actualized human being, while Hall has tackled the racist underpinnings inherent in the neglect of black women's history. The writings of bell hooks, particularly her essay Eating the Other, establishes the modern day commodification of black women vis-a-vis their representation in media, as well as through the fetishism of their bodies by a white patriarchal system. During slavery plantation owners could do virtually anything they wanted with their property, including engaging in sexual intercourse. By depicting black women as hypersexual jezebels, they could justify their rape, while establishing their dominance and place in the white male hegemony of that time period. For the right price a white male of a lesser class could achieve the same thing at a brothel down in Storyville at the turn of the twentieth century, for as Emily Clark argues in her book, The Strange History of the American Quadroon, these brothels were a great equalizer, allowing all white men to experience "sexual mastery enjoyed only by elite planters before the Civil War." By democratizing white supremacy, the quadroon and others like her forged solidarity that bridge across all classes, while upholding whiteness and oppressing people of color at the same time.
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Date Issued: 2014
Identifier: CFH0004652, ucf:45310
Format: Document (PDF)
PURL: http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFH0004652

Title: The Seaside Resort Towns of Cape May and Atlantic City, New Jersey: Development, Class Consciousness, and the Culture of Leisure in the Mid to Late Victorian Era.
Creator: Ressetar, Tatyana, Lester, Connie, Crepeau, Richard, Larson, Peter, University of Central Florida
Abstract / Description: (")Victorianism(") is a highly controversial, sometimes ironic, term penned by historians throughout various works that has come to hold dramatic weight in both its meaning and its influence. Though the term is usually most closely associated with nineteenth century England, Victorianism was a highly influential movement in American culture simultaneously as well, specifically in the spheres of home, work, and play. Of those, (")play,(") or leisure, is undoubtedly the least explored,...
Show more(")Victorianism(") is a highly controversial, sometimes ironic, term penned by historians throughout various works that has come to hold dramatic weight in both its meaning and its influence. Though the term is usually most closely associated with nineteenth century England, Victorianism was a highly influential movement in American culture simultaneously as well, specifically in the spheres of home, work, and play. Of those, (")play,(") or leisure, is undoubtedly the least explored, especially before the latter decades of the twentieth century. Prior to this period, most literature about the Victorians, with the exception of a few works, only dealt with masculinity, religion, and the rigid dynamic of the nineteenth century household. Recently, historians like James Walvin, Pamela Horn, and Hugh Cunningham have attempted to draw attention to Victorian leisure with excellent works on pastimes and society during the nineteenth century, but they represent only a few. However, many works of this caliber focus on England, the (")birthplace(") of Victorianism. Thus, this work attempts to emphasize that the cultural phenomenon of Victorianism was just as present in the United States. Despite the recurring themes of the home and the workplace so often chosen by scholars, it is actually within the realm of leisure that the controversial issues of the Victorian period and its people can be best observed. Class, race, and gender were three major components of the Victorian culture that shaped the various forms of leisure and recreation, as well as the specific restrictions on those amusements. All of these factors had a shared, tremendous influence on the progress (or lack thereof) towards a more modern era and society that occurred at the turn of the twentieth century.In the pages to follow, the numerous contradictions and paradoxes of Victorian leisure in America will be examined, ultimately demonstrating how pastimes and recreation (and their outlets) in the mid to late nineteenth century were neither truly Victorian nor truly progressive, but indeed a combination of both. This creates further irony during this controversial period. However, before exploring these outlets, the term (")Victorian(") will be examined while placing it into the context of mid to late nineteenth century Americans who belonged to all classes of travelers. It will become apparent that American Victorians had much invested in their values, but were also willing to break the rules regarding certain amusements and pleasures. Moreover, the (")democratization(") of leisure will be highlighted as the upper and lower classes began to enjoy the same recreations. Marked innovations of the period will also be discussed, as to highlight their importance on Victorian leisure and its development, which will also be referred to throughout the chapters. These topics will be addressed before examining the specific Victorian leisure culture of two of America's oldest seaside destinations: Cape May and Atlantic City, both in New Jersey. The guests, accommodations and transportation, and offerings at these resort towns will act as a mirror into mid to late nineteenth century culture. There, the contradictory ideals and rules of Victorianism are exhibited as the resorts rose to prominence. The decline of (")elite-only(") leisure and the rise of the (")excursionist(") will be examined throughout the progression of the towns' growth and boom periods. Exploring the ironies of Victorian leisure through the proverbial lens of Cape May and Atlantic City proves effective, as the towns came to represent opposite ends of the (")socially acceptable(") spectrum after a short period, and were full of similar inconsistencies and paradoxes themselves. Additionally, their current fates remain a product of their polarized Victorian heydays, further proving the influence of seaside resort culture, the late Victorian period, and its ideals on the broader field of American leisure history.
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Date Issued: 2011
Identifier: CFE0004157, ucf:49038
Format: Document (PDF)
PURL: http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFE0004157

Title: The Tragic City: Black Rebellion and the Struggle for Freedom in Miami, 1945-1990.
Creator: Dossie, Porsha, Lester, Connie, French, Scot, Walker, Ezekiel, University of Central Florida
Abstract / Description: This thesis examines the creation of South Florida's tri-ethnic racial hierarchy during the postwar period, from 1945-1990. This racial hierarchy, coupled with discriminatory housing practices and police violence, created the necessary conditions for Dade County's first deadly uprising in 1968. Following the acquittal of several officers charged in the killing of an unarmed black businessman, a second uprising in 1980 culminated in three days and three nights of violent street warfare between...
Show moreThis thesis examines the creation of South Florida's tri-ethnic racial hierarchy during the postwar period, from 1945-1990. This racial hierarchy, coupled with discriminatory housing practices and police violence, created the necessary conditions for Dade County's first deadly uprising in 1968. Following the acquittal of several officers charged in the killing of an unarmed black businessman, a second uprising in 1980 culminated in three days and three nights of violent street warfare between law enforcement and black residents in Miami's northwest Liberty City neighborhood. The presence of state sanctioned violence at the hands of police in Liberty City set the stage for the city's second uprising. Further, the oftentimes murky and ambiguous racial divide that made people of color both comrades and rivals within Miami's larger power structure resulted in an Anglo-Cuban alliance by the late 1960s and early 1970s that only worsened racial tensions, especially among the city's ethnically diverse, English speaking black population. This thesis project uses a socio-historical framework to investigate how race and immigration, police brutality, and federal housing policy created a climate in which one of Miami's most vulnerable populations resorted to collective violence.
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Date Issued: 2018
Identifier: CFE0007173, ucf:52269
Format: Document (PDF)
PURL: http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFE0007173

History (5)	+ -
African-American History (2)	+ -
American History (2)	+ -
Florida History (2)	+ -
Memory (2)	+ -

Miami (2)	+ -
Oral History (2)	+ -
Orlando (2)	+ -
Overtown (2)	+ -
Parramore (2)	+ -
Race (2)	+ -
Social History (2)	+ -
South Florida (2)	+ -
public history (2)	+ -
1920-1929 (1)	+ -
1920s (1)	+ -
19th Century (1)	+ -
19th century (1)	+ -
19th century South (1)	+ -
Advertising (1)	+ -
African-American history (1)	+ -
Afro-American music (1)	+ -
Agriculture (1)	+ -
Amusements (1)	+ -
Arena (1)	+ -
Arthur McDuffie (1)	+ -
Atlantic City (1)	+ -
Bahamians (1)	+ -
Benjamin Franklin (1)	+ -
Black Urban History (1)	+ -

ETD Collection (16)	+ -
Honors Collection (2)	+ -

University of Central Florida (18)	+ -
Walker, Ezekiel (8)	+ -
French, Scot (4)	+ -
Larson, Peter (4)	+ -
Cassanello, Robert (3)	+ -

Sacher, John (3)	+ -
Crepeau, Richard (2)	+ -
Dossie, Porsha (2)	+ -
Gannon, Barbara (2)	+ -
Pineda, Yovanna (2)	+ -
Beiler, Rosalind (1)	+ -
Burel, David (1)	+ -
Cepero, Laura (1)	+ -
Dandrow, Edward (1)	+ -
Foster, Amy (1)	+ -
Gordon, Fon (1)	+ -
Hazen, Kendra (1)	+ -
Hillyer, Garrett (1)	+ -
Kaminski, Joseph J (1)	+ -
Lyons, Amelia (1)	+ -
McPherson, Gramond (1)	+ -
Montgomery, Erin (1)	+ -
Nightingale, Brandon (1)	+ -
Padgett, James (1)	+ -
Phillips, Clayton (1)	+ -
Ressetar, Tatyana (1)	+ -
Schellhammer, Mark (1)	+ -
Thorncroft, Sarah (1)	+ -
Turnbull, Lindsey (1)	+ -

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