Many Tee Shirts

Yesterday afternoon Ginny and I visited our friend Barbara White in the hospital; she does not appear to be doing well. Her doctors have scheduled more tests.

All morning long Ginny and I worked on tee shirts.

Over the past three decades Jacksonville artists often expressed their talent for design by creating tee shirts featuring various aspects of the city’s culture.

As part of my mania for collecting Jacksonville historical materials I have amassed dozens of such tee shirts.

They feature varied themes from boats at the Florida Yacht Club to the mighty air craft carriers Saratoga and Kennedy—200,000 Tons Of Diplomacy. Sports team shirts range from the long-defunct Jacksonville Bulls (football) to the Jacksonville Lizard Kings (hockey).

Organizations as diverse as HabiJax, building homes and the Cummer Museum Of Fine Art, business as diverse as Dave’s Dinner and LifeFlight Helicopter Rescue, events as diverse as scout hikes and Jacksonville Jazz Festivals—all in all, for over 30 years I’ve collected over 50 tee shirts representing the city in its varied aspects.

In preparing my whole collection of books, notes, clippings and historical artifacts for sale, yesterday we unpacked these tee shirts from their plastic containers, photographed them for the sale catalogue, fresh laundered them, ironed, refolded, and packed them away again—a massive amount of work.

These odd bits of ephemera depict my hometown as a city mighty as an army with banners…

Well, if not an army with banners, at least as a city where residents sport a bunch of colorful tee shirts.