You’re walking through St. Pete’s Crescent Lake Park on a Wednesday afternoon and you see a particularly colorful rock. Unable to resist, you pick it up. This is no ordinary glittery stone. It’s painted orange and pink and blue with a goofy cartoon bird winking at you from its smooth surface. Is it game piece? A lost toy? You flip it over and there’s a message: Go to St Pete Rocks Facebook page.

Before you can even pocket the stone, you’ve got your phone out. That’s when you learn that there’s a whole community – a seemingly secret world – of “painters, hiders, and posters” of painted rocks sharing their art and telling stories about their finds. … Read More

In “Exploring St. Pete’s Jewish History, Part 1” historian Monica Kile introduced many of St. Petersburg’s early Jewish families and how they helped to shape the culture and economy of the city. In part two, we take a closer look at their challenges and successes. Read part one here.

In the last issue, we met Old Northeast resident Jay Miller, and learned about how his and other Jewish families came to live and build successful businesses alongside each other in St. Petersburg in the first half of the 20th century. But, particularly in the early years, they also faced widespread antisemitism. … Read More

We are now well into the 2023 hurricane season, though St. Petersburg thankfully has not seen a direct hit since 1921. Known as the Tarpon Springs Hurricane, the 1921 hurricane was a Category 4 while over the Gulf, with winds declining to a Category 3 by landfall. A six-to-eleven-foot storm surge flooded low-lying areas throughout Pinellas County, including St. Petersburg. Since then, there have been many near misses, two of the most recent being Hurricane Irma in 2017 and Hurricane Ian just last year. Irma, a Category 5 over water, brushed St. Petersburg with a negative surge that emptied the bay.… Read More