Florida Cattle, Wiregrass, Weeds and Politics

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:20):
You make me feel so young.

Speaker 2 (00:23):
You're listening to every Greenmeada Network. I am Sydney Schwartz
and this is our Veterans Vice radio show today.

Speaker 3 (00:28):
It is also the book Worms.

Speaker 4 (00:30):
Yes, did you realize that Frank Sinatra took my song
and he's making it popular? Hello everybody, we are going
to have a ball today. You remember a couple of
weeks ago we talked about Land Remembered, And do you
remember about a year ago we talked about the Wiregrass Country. Well,

(00:52):
there's been so much talk and so much interest in
the book Wiregrass Country.

Speaker 1 (00:58):
They have my popular man.

Speaker 4 (01:02):
Uh, we have Jill and Charles Sirci back with us,
if you remember, Uh, Charlie and Jill are my neighbors.
And we got to talking and turns out that who
are your parents and in laws?

Speaker 3 (01:17):
And they are Herban Munsey Chapman and Herb.

Speaker 1 (01:21):
And Munsey.

Speaker 4 (01:23):
Really famous, not just as your parents, but what are
the infamous for? What are they really famous for? LifeWise?
Professional wise?

Speaker 1 (01:33):
What did they do?

Speaker 3 (01:35):
Well? My father actually was in beef cattle research.

Speaker 5 (01:39):
He was a professor at University of Florida, and my
mom was She was a stay at home mom's taught
piano lessons and and then later on when we all
grew up, she helped run a wholesale plant nursery, a
plant industry plant nursery nursery.

Speaker 1 (01:56):
Yes, the description in the books I wrote those.

Speaker 3 (02:01):
The descriptions are incredible.

Speaker 4 (02:03):
Yes they are. Now let's go backwards a little bit.
Where are your mom and dad?

Speaker 1 (02:12):
Where?

Speaker 4 (02:13):
Individually? Where were they raised? Or they both Floridians.

Speaker 3 (02:17):
My mother's a native Floridian. She was born in Lakeland.

Speaker 5 (02:21):
My dad, I was not born in Florida, but he was.
He came here as a child, so most of his
life he spent in Florida.

Speaker 1 (02:32):
And your and your mom and your dad? Where was
she born? What do you remember?

Speaker 3 (02:36):
He was born in Kansas City, Missouri.

Speaker 4 (02:39):
Wow.

Speaker 1 (02:40):
Okay, now they met probably in college or something.

Speaker 3 (02:44):
They actually met in Florida.

Speaker 5 (02:47):
My dad was in college and my mom wasn't in
college at the time.

Speaker 4 (02:50):
But yes, and how long How long ago did Charlie
and Jill?

Speaker 1 (02:57):
How long ago did you meet? And where'd you meet?

Speaker 6 (03:01):
Fifty nine years ago?

Speaker 1 (03:05):
That's fantastic.

Speaker 6 (03:06):
Ye, you were married fifty eight years.

Speaker 4 (03:09):
Wow.

Speaker 1 (03:10):
I'm glad you didn't say it the other way around.

Speaker 6 (03:13):
I know exactly when that happened.

Speaker 1 (03:15):
That was yeah, probably where the best thing's ever happened
to you?

Speaker 4 (03:19):
The shevv and me also wow, yeah, how about that?

Speaker 7 (03:26):
Yeah?

Speaker 2 (03:27):
Congratulations Yeah, for you usually say yeah, that's her, that's mad,
that's beautiful.

Speaker 1 (03:32):
You still love birds of course.

Speaker 4 (03:35):
Okay, So now how did I need to get right
into the meat of the subject. Why are Grass Country?

Speaker 1 (03:43):
Now?

Speaker 4 (03:44):
It's not fair to bring the land land Remembered always?
But I remember within the first couple of years when
I moved there after twenty ten, two different people the
same day mentioned to me, you got to read the
Land Remembered was the Locksmith? And got who the other
one was? And I got the book right away and
I couldn't put it down. And Cindy, I think you

(04:08):
will be that book too. So I have no idea
what happened. Every two three years I read the book again,
either I forgot or I see read what I don't
I didn't catch the first few times. I have no
idea where originally I got Wildgrass Country, except probably the
book bookstore at the library, because they every so often

(04:31):
you just book there and I remember reading it and
then what two three years ago, you're on your Daily Walk.
I have no idea how we got on the subject,
but we're talking.

Speaker 7 (04:45):
I always ask everybody new person that I made, have
they read A Land Remembered? When that leads right into this, okay.

Speaker 6 (04:56):
All right?

Speaker 4 (04:57):
Instead of me, you know, I'm host, send you the producer.
This is your show explained to everybody out there. It's
a natural flow to me. A Land Remembered Wiregress Country.
It's like the index fingers in the middle finger right
next to each other. What first of all, what what

(05:20):
do you have? What prompts you to ask me or
everybody else? Have you read their Land Remembered?

Speaker 7 (05:24):
What A Land Remembered was probably the best book I've
ever read. Michel Uh My dad died at ninety eight,
and he graduate. He dropped out of school in the
eighth grade, and to my knowledge, he had never read
a book until we gave him Wiregrass, and he read

(05:47):
the book so many times. He just continued to read
it and the pages were falling off, you know, they
that was remembered, That was.

Speaker 6 (05:55):
A land Remembered.

Speaker 7 (05:57):
But that's and it was so important to me that
he was reading and he loved it, and he would
relate the story to everybody that he talked to that's great,
but that's the reason I recommend that too different people.
And in addition to that, I also bring in these
books Wiregrass Country because it's so it's uh uh has

(06:20):
a lot of the same stuff, yes, about about the
real Florida, and it's just it's amazing reading, amazing.

Speaker 1 (06:29):
Reading both books.

Speaker 4 (06:30):
And I told you I didn't really want to talk
more about the land, remember, because this show is really
about you guys and the Chapmans and the books that
they wrote.

Speaker 1 (06:39):
But when you read.

Speaker 4 (06:41):
Wire Grit's Country, when I read it, I didn't want.

Speaker 1 (06:44):
To put it down.

Speaker 4 (06:46):
It's just I wanted to see what's it? And it
was easy reading Siddy. You said that to you.

Speaker 2 (06:50):
It was so easy to keep in your mind. Like
some books jump all over the place and I can't
remember who this one that one is, and this one
was just easy. You remembered from one because it so
descriptive of who the actual character was.

Speaker 4 (07:03):
And see, to me, it's just like I forgive me,
but I need to bring something up so you'll see
it all kind of relays together. This past weekend, I
was very fortunate. I went to Jupiter, my friend Elliott,
my coworker drove me because I can't drive at night.

(07:23):
And there was the initial premiere showing of the movie
of regarding the High Woman, which is called Legends of
the Highway. And the reason I'm bringing it up is
because people then asked me how was the acting like?
What was the scenery like? And I said, I hope
you don't mind. I didn't give a hang about the acting.

(07:45):
I didn't give a hang about the old cars. I
didn't give a hang about the buildings. I wanted the story.
This is something that's part of my life. It's in
my blood, the High Women, the saga and Legends of
the Way. What's a good movie is a good movie.
And I will be having the three co producers on

(08:07):
the show, hopefully uh sometime in November to discuss the movie,
because it's going not only just going to be in
the Jupiter Stewart, the Elliott Museum. Then it's going to
be in Orlando, I think, Tampa, Philadelphia, a few yeah,
all over the country. And the next thing is this

(08:28):
week you should be able to I don't know the
names unless it says it so, UH doesn't. The movie
can be live stream with is it is it Fandaglia
or something like that. One of the one of the
livestream people. Uh, you know the service providers.

Speaker 2 (08:48):
I don't know if trying to remember you mean Vimeo
or YouTube?

Speaker 5 (08:52):
Is it not?

Speaker 3 (08:52):
It's probably it's not either.

Speaker 1 (08:55):
Initially you're gonna have to pay like a payper movie.

Speaker 4 (08:58):
Yeah, and the DVDs wild available after next week. So
the reason I'm saying it go back to the book,
and that's the important thing is when we talk about
the land, remember the Wiregrass Country? To me, how more
beautiful a way to teach us the history of a

(09:18):
particular area, in this case central Florida. How by taking
a novel creating a story, a lovely, happy, sad, real
life story in the eighteen hundreds that we human beings
can't fathom. Can you imagine not having hot water and

(09:39):
having dirt in the floor instead of cement or tile
or carpet. How about an outhouse? And if you wanted
something to how are you going to cook your egg
real quick? There's no free minute microwave mashed potatoes. So
the point is that, and when you read a Wiregrass Country,
you're in that era.

Speaker 1 (09:57):
You had to boil the water, you got to go out.

Speaker 3 (09:59):
There, get it, they may biscuits on sticks and.

Speaker 4 (10:03):
Yeah, right, that's how we used to cook potatoes and
onions over the fire too. So that's why I want
to discuss the book because you won't realize it as
you're reading the book. When you get done reading Wiregrass Country,
you're going to know part of the history of the
state of Florida. And for me, uh, in the town

(10:25):
of Arcadia, I don't recall was it first in Wiregrass
Country or was it later in the Sea the second
and third book, because I love Arcadia. It's one of
the most romantic cities, uh, towns, villages, whatever you recall.
But I never realized the significance of Arcadia until your
father's book. I really never did, and that adds a

(10:49):
charm to it.

Speaker 1 (10:51):
So now what I want to do. We're going to
take a break.

Speaker 4 (10:54):
In about minutes, so let's just kind of wrap up
what we did, and then when we go to the
second quarter, you guys tell us about a wiregrass country,
tell us about weeds in the wiregrass, and we put
weeds in there for a bunch of you out there
so you'd listen to the podcast. And the third one,
which was phenomenal people normally would not. As soon as

(11:17):
I tell you the name Wiregrass Politics, your probably saying, yeah,
poo pool, I don't want politics. You'll want this politics
because this is really like literally like in the movies,
the cigars, the smoke, the dark room, and this is
really love one time and really, now.

Speaker 1 (11:36):
Am I mistake? Didn't they have you all junction in
here to somewhere or ually?

Speaker 5 (11:41):
Uh?

Speaker 1 (11:42):
In the politics the Wiregrass Politics.

Speaker 3 (11:44):
Some of the towns were different names than they are now.
So that's that's kind of a And I would what
was the lake?

Speaker 5 (11:53):
And I know that they shortened the lake of Papka,
And I mean even like Gaines it was town, okay,
And so a part of the story is kind of
in the Gainesville area also, yes, so.

Speaker 1 (12:11):
So, But all I can tell you is we got
to figure out how to make it.

Speaker 4 (12:17):
Everybody out there. You can find Wiregrass Country everywhere. I
don't know how many books they publish. And I got
a brand new one in my hand unsigned. Most of
my copies are signed. But the Weeds in the Choir
Grass number two, wire Grass Politics number three for the trilogy,
they're not available very readily.

Speaker 1 (12:35):
They can't find it.

Speaker 4 (12:36):
Easily.

Speaker 1 (12:37):
So we're going to take a break and we come back.

Speaker 4 (12:40):
Uh, Jill and Charlie are going to talk to us
about wiregrass country. They're going to kind of tempt the
heck out of you, so you're going to want to
read the book. And then we're going to discuss the
weeds and the wiregrass and then number three wiregrass politics.
And that's the the like the appetizer or the four

(13:00):
to becoming at the state becoming the State of Florida
and accepted into the Union.

Speaker 1 (13:06):
By what to do that you need a constitution. So
based on that, we're going.

Speaker 4 (13:10):
To take you a couple of seconds for our commercial
and we'll be right back. This is our Veterans Voice Radio,
the Bookworms.

Speaker 8 (13:20):
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Speaker 1 (14:22):
Hey, did you hear the latest about our Florida High Woman?

Speaker 4 (14:25):
No?

Speaker 10 (14:25):
What?

Speaker 1 (14:26):
There's a new High Woman art gallery in Vero Beach.

Speaker 4 (14:28):
Really where eighteen seventy two Commerce Avenue?

Speaker 5 (14:32):
Wow?

Speaker 3 (14:32):
When's it open?

Speaker 1 (14:33):
Seven days a.

Speaker 4 (14:34):
Week called ninety five four five five seven six two
two six or an appointment.

Speaker 3 (14:39):
Any time, No kidding.

Speaker 4 (14:41):
Just call for your appointment nine five four five five
seven six two two six and then go to eighteen seventy.

Speaker 1 (14:47):
Two Commerce Avenue. Wow, that's good news.

Speaker 2 (14:50):
A member of the Itex trading community, your I text
dollars are welcome.

Speaker 1 (14:54):
Very can come true.

Speaker 4 (14:59):
It can happen to you.

Speaker 2 (15:01):
It can happen to you, and today it's the Bookworms
on our Veterans Twist radio show with Brolt Nathan Oko
and I.

Speaker 4 (15:08):
Will throw the testimonial. It can happen to all of
us in this country. However deficient you think we are,
however imperfect you think we are, this is the absolute
God's greatest country in the world. We are the best.
And if you forget that, look around, read around. It's

(15:28):
a wonderful country. So thank you Frank for reminding us.
So we have with us Charlie and Jill Charles.

Speaker 1 (15:36):
And Jill Circe.

Speaker 4 (15:38):
They're dear, dear, dear friends of mine. They told me
to tell you that after my dear neighbors and this
whole thing, as we told you finding out from my
neighbors Jill and Charlie is that Jill's parents, Herb and Munseyman,

(16:00):
wrote Wire Gas Country and the second and third sequels,
which we call the trilogy. So I really this is
your show now. Jill and Charlie tell us without we
want them to get the book. There's nothing in it
for us, obviously, but we want them to read the book,
to enjoy it. We want to tease them, but literally

(16:21):
they appetized, just salivate. I can't wait to get the book.
And h I don't know. I may have an extra
one Wiregrass Country. So if you have any of you
give me a call at ninety five four five five
seven six two two six daylight hours, seven days a week.

(16:44):
Whoever calls first. I have an extra copy of Wiregrass Country.
It's not going to be brand new. But if you
want them to read it only one condition. When you
get through, you pass it to somebody else free of
charge and ask them to read, and then they pass it.
So now Joe and Charlie tell us about Wiregrass Country,

(17:05):
and I might interject in between with questions, Okay, why
do you found out? First of all, what'd your father
write the book? What prompted to write thing?

Speaker 5 (17:12):
I think they were interested in the Florida the history
of Florida, and of course my dad was interested in
the cattle for you know, the cattle industry. They didn't
want to write at the Civil War time, and so
they're really kind of in between like the Second Seminole
Indian War and the period when A Land Remember was written,

(17:37):
So they kind of follow each other and they traveled
the state of Florida and.

Speaker 3 (17:44):
Learned all about the history.

Speaker 5 (17:45):
And you know, it starts out in the Panhandle kind
of in Pensacola, and it ends up in the town
of Saint Joe's which is now for Saint Joe's, which
ended up being really that center of like a lot
of activity, good and bad.

Speaker 1 (18:05):
What was that. But on the west coast, like towards
the Tampa.

Speaker 3 (18:08):
More north of that was kind of where the state.

Speaker 6 (18:12):
Yeah, where this is west of Tallahassee.

Speaker 5 (18:14):
So you're but there's that's not where they had the
cattle industry. That was really where the state started forming
and they but that comes later in the in the
politics book. But in the first book, it's just how
the cattlemen would come down into Florida, and there were

(18:37):
so many hardships that they had, you know, between the
Indians and the cattle wrestlers, and the mosquitoes.

Speaker 3 (18:45):
And and snakes.

Speaker 5 (18:46):
It's just everything, and so a lot of them didn't
make it. And so this book is it tells like
how the family made it. It has but one thread
that goes through all the books, and it kind of
goes through all of the even other books, is that
they all had their family groups. They were in there

(19:07):
close with their neighbors, and it was just that kinship
kind of feeling with with each other. And they had
strong families and strong beliefs.

Speaker 1 (19:18):
You bring up a question we never discussed. Now, your
father's a professor.

Speaker 4 (19:24):
M I mean you're talking about the plastic pocket holder
with pens profess No, I mean if.

Speaker 3 (19:31):
He was a research professor, how the.

Speaker 1 (19:34):
Hell did it come up with a love romantic family novel.

Speaker 4 (19:39):
Seriously, get married right?

Speaker 1 (19:43):
You are a good son in law. Oh, you couldn't
have done that better.

Speaker 5 (19:50):
But you know what, my dad would say this to you.
I can write a sentence like he has the factual,
he said, I can write a senate and your mother
can make a.

Speaker 3 (19:59):
Chapter out of it.

Speaker 5 (20:00):
And so I had a book critic one time, somebody
that wrote for the press journal.

Speaker 1 (20:05):
Huh.

Speaker 5 (20:05):
And she said, I read that book and she said,
I can always pick out who wrote which question? And
she said, I couldn't ever pick out. She said, there's
just blended together. That's how their lives were. Their lives
just blended together.

Speaker 1 (20:18):
So they were love birds under brands.

Speaker 6 (20:20):
Yeah, and they did all the research together.

Speaker 7 (20:22):
Yes, they had desks that budded together, and their computers
are right there and they would talk and write.

Speaker 6 (20:30):
It's I mean, it's.

Speaker 7 (20:31):
Really a neat story if you knew all the facts
about how they made it come together. But Florida history
was important to them, and I think because of the
the cattle industry is what really picked their interest in
the old time.

Speaker 4 (20:46):
Now do you think when they well can go back
to their migrass But when they wrote the first book,
did you think that they already had planned ahead for
a second and the third, for the trilogy?

Speaker 1 (20:56):
Most of the time they don't.

Speaker 3 (21:00):
I know of. But as we we re.

Speaker 5 (21:03):
Read them, because it had been several years since we
read them, and we're just like every time we read them,
we noticed different things, and you know, and a lot
of it is things that we learned, even about us,
We learned about Florida. I'm going to tell you a
wiregrass thing, and it's about the weeds, and I think
Charles really maybe it's going to talk about the weeds

(21:23):
a little more.

Speaker 3 (21:24):
But they would come.

Speaker 5 (21:25):
In the wiregrass was they could burn it, and it
would burned down the pine trees and so between oh
when was it January and March? I'm going to say,
they would go through and burn it and it would
grow back, and whenever it would grow back, it.

Speaker 3 (21:40):
Would be nutritious for the cattle.

Speaker 5 (21:43):
And so that's how they said, Well then they had
to quit burning because you know, we don't like to
have burning forests, and so then the wiregrass.

Speaker 3 (21:52):
Is no good.

Speaker 1 (21:53):
But it was planned fire, right.

Speaker 5 (21:57):
But I mean, those are just things that you know,
I pick up. They're not important things probably in the story,
but it's just little little things.

Speaker 1 (22:05):
You're like your mommy, aren't you.

Speaker 3 (22:07):
I don't know. Am I like my mom?

Speaker 7 (22:09):
Charles, don't make me answer.

Speaker 3 (22:14):
On the spot.

Speaker 4 (22:15):
Okay, so you're you're you're part of the weed section
of the book.

Speaker 7 (22:20):
Yes, well one of the one of the things that
happened when in the book, Uh the reason cattle are
so important. When the Spanish first came over here, they
let cows. They brought cows with them and they let
them go, and they were roaming while forever. And these
folks would go out in the in the palmettas, and

(22:42):
and and and round up all these stray cows and
and sell them and make money, and and and some
of the ones that they got they bred, and they
just kept increasing their herd. Uh, that's what made I
guess the cattle part of it important. But when they
had all the the cattle and they sold the cattle

(23:02):
and they hurted them up, there were weeds or crooks
or bad people that came into the state and saw
these cattle being put together and sold and making folks
making money, and they said, well, we'll just go ahead
and steal these cattle. They've got them all rounded up.

Speaker 6 (23:22):
We'll just do it the easy way.

Speaker 7 (23:24):
And one of the things that's said in Wiregrass, Weeds
and the Wiregrass by the mother of the entire family
was that whatever happens, we're always going to have bad people.
We're always going to have weeds in the wiregrass, and
there's nothing we can do about it. So I thought

(23:45):
that was a neat part of Weeds in the Wiregrass.
There's always bad people that are going to take your money.
They're going to try to figure out a way to do.

Speaker 6 (23:53):
What was going on.

Speaker 7 (23:54):
So if you pick the book up, you won't put
it down.

Speaker 4 (24:00):
We all agree that, okay, we're going to take the break.
I have a analogy and the question when we come back.
But interesting what you just said, and you're talking about
obviously Ace and Emily Dover. Most of the time, when
people write a book, the first book they ever writes
about themselves, that's your parents, Ace and they got you.

Speaker 1 (24:24):
Never thought about that. We'll be right back everybody.

Speaker 4 (24:27):
This is the Bookworms, our Veterans Voice Radio, and when
we come back, we're going to continue to talk about
the wiregrass country and Florida and weeds and politics.