Remembering Paradise Park ─ Tourism and Segregation at Silver Springs

“A strange and unsettling glimpse of the land of sun and surf in the waning moments of segregation in the South.”—Gilbert King, author ofDevil in the Grove: Thurgood Marshall, the Groveland Boys, and the Dawn of a New America

“A testament to the efforts of a black community determined to provide wholesome recreation for their families in a segregated society. This masterpiece of local history changes the way we think about the history of tourism and civil rights.”—Susan Sessions Rugh, author of Are We There Yet?: The Golden Age of American Family Vacations

“The story of Florida tourism has been told in many ways, but this book gives a perspective that has been missing from most of them. Vickers and Wilson-Graham finally open the gates to Paradise Park so that all are welcome to sample its wonders.”—Tim Hollis, author of Selling the Sunshine State

“An invaluable time capsule. This bittersweet book vividly describes the joys of Paradise Park, while acceptance and endurance of racist practices are also remembered and voiced.”—Marsha Dean Phelts, author ofAn American Beach for African Americans

Paradise Park was the “colored only” counterpart to Silver Springs, a central Florida tourist attraction famous for its crystal-clear water and glass bottom boats. From 1949 to 1969, boats passed each other on the Silver River—blacks on one side, whites on the other. Though the patrons of both parks shared the same river, they never crossed the invisible line in the water.

Full of vivid photographs, vintage advertisements, and interviews with employees and patrons,Remembering Paradise Park portrays a place of delight and leisure during the painful era of Jim Crow. Racial violence was at its height in Florida—the famous Groveland rape case happened right as Paradise Park opened—and many African Americans saw the park as a safe place for families. It was a popular vacation spot for the area’s strong black community, which outnumbered the white community as early as the Civil War and had become one of the most cohesive and prosperous black populations in the South.

This book compares the park to other tourist destinations set aside for African Americans in the state and across the country. Though Silver Springs was Florida’s only attraction to operate a parallel facility for African Americans, Paradise Park has been just a whisper in the story of Florida tourism until now.

Lu Vickers is coauthor of Weeki Wachee Mermaids: Thirty Years of Underwater Photography and the author ofCypress Gardens, America’s Tropical Wonderland: How Dick Pope Invented Floridaand the novel Breathing Underwater. Cynthia Wilson-Graham is an educator, lecturer, and advocate of the cultural history and interpretations of Paradise Park.