Collections

Michael A. Spencer assembled this collection of publications, photographs, drawings, correspondence programs and other materials focusing on the discovery, taxonomy and cultivation of bromeliads. Mulford B. Foster, Racine Foster and Lyman B. Smith are among the significant bromeliad collectors whose work is documented here.

Henry Nehrling was a horticulturist famous for his gardens in Gotha and Naples, Florida. These materials were collected by Michael Spencer because of his interest in botany and his links with Central Florida. Of particular interest are Nehrling's notebooks, correspondence, photographs and plant labels. The collection also contains a few materials, which belonged to Mr. Spencer concerning the attempts to save Nehrling's Palm Cottage Gardens.

Julian Nally grew bromeliads and other plants on the property that had once belonged to Henry Nehrling at Gotha, Florida. This collection documents both his work at the property and his personal life.

Theodore Mead was a horticulturist who owned an orange grove in Eustis, Florida and developed a property in Oviedo, Florida to research and hybridize plants. The collection contains Mead's notebook and family correspondence, together with a brochure and news clipping about the founding of Mead Gardens in Winter Park, Florida.

This collection contains 21 photographs taken by Michael Berman that pertain to the Florida Women's Conference of 1977. The first Florida Women'’s Conference was held in July of the 15th, 16th, and 17th. It was run by forty Florida women selected by Jimmy Carter in order to help deal with the rift between those for Equal Rights Amendment and those against it.

In the 1970s, Michael Berman was taking photographs for the Theatre Department of the Florida Technological University (now, University of Central Florida) and the campus newspaper, the Central Florida Future. Taken while attending and then working at the university, the collection contains black and white and color negatives that depict moments of the everyday life at the university, theatrical acts, various events both on and outside of campus, portraits, as well as nature scenes.

The Michael D. Kolb collection includes materials related to the Kolb's feature film screenplay and stage script, "The Lectors." Supplementary materials provided by the author provide the following synopsis: An elderly Julian Abuzmann, a hand rolling cigar maker and cigar shop owner, tells his grandson and his friends the story of the great Lectors strike that rocked the cigar industry in Ybor City – Tampa, Florida at the start of the Depression. After cigar manufactures cut wages, John Crawford, a communist organizer for a new cigar makers union, asks Julian, a young lector in a factory, to persuade the lectors to distribute propaganda and speak out for the union. To the chagrin of Isobel, his wife, Julian speaks along with Benito, an elder lector who is his best friend, at a labor rally broken up by the KKK. Later that evening, vigilantes beat Julian. After an inflammatory reading to the factory workers, Moses Castillo, the boss at Benito's factory, bans him and tears down his lector's platform. During another rally, violence erupts between KKK vigilantes and the cigar makers. Then the communists cause several factories to strike. Benito persuades Julian to let him lead the strike because he says Julian has a family. Julian and other lectors continue reading in the factories, as the tension rises. On Thanksgiving, John Crawford's communists agitate the cigar makers to go on strike. Then the manufacturers, led by Charles Jeffers, change the strike into a lock out. The cigar makers march violently to the factories in protest and hold more rallies. Julian and Benito hatch a plan to play good guy/bad guy with the manufacturers. Julian begins to seek a peaceful solution, while Benito continues to protest. Violence and negotiations last for several weeks. A federal injunction and threats by the secret committee of the twenty-five, a vigilante group, stops the cigar makers. During a climatic rally, Julian, Benito and several other lectors make passionate speeches about patriotism and the flag in order to persuade the cigar makers to resolve the strike. Intertwined into the story is how Julian and his wife confront their differences to conceive another child, along with scenes depicting the Spanish culture, the holiday celebrations of the cigar makers and the society balls of the manufacturers, and the cigar makers performing their craft.