Wakulla Springs Story told by Charles Laughton

Okeechobee Joe

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Entertaining story about a well known place in Florida just south of Tallahassee. On the LP recording it is mistakenly spelled "Waculla Springs".
 
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CDGator

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Thanks for posting that story. It’s a trip down memory lane. I remember the jumping fish too. I thought you might have spelled the name wrong though. What’s the story with that?

when we were kids there was a 3rd story to the tower that we could jump off. They took it down. I’ve taken the kids there a few times too over the years.
 

cover2

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Best Wakulla Springs story I remember was sometime in the early ‘80’s an FSU student was swimming and decided to venture beyond the roped off area. An alligator promptly attacked and killed him. The next day an account was reported in the Florida Flambeau, FSU’s student newspaper, under the headline of “Seminole Killed By Gator!” True story.

*As an aside, I was sorry that the student lost his life, but there was a reason there was a boundary not to be crossed in the swimming area. Man 0, Nature 1.
 

CDGator

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Best Wakulla Springs story I remember was sometime in the early ‘80’s an FSU student was swimming and decided to venture beyond the roped off area. An alligator promptly attacked and killed him. The next day an account was reported in the Florida Flambeau, FSU’s student newspaper, under the headline of “Seminole Killed By Gator!” True story.

*As an aside, I was sorry that the student lost his life, but there was a reason there was a boundary not to be crossed in the swimming area. Man 0, Nature 1.

I told the kids not to swim beyond the rope because there are alligators out there. They asked if the alligators could swim under the rope? :bwahaha:


Gorgeous park with some fascinating history. I have some family that has a license to dive and retrieve dinosaur fossils around there.


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cover2

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@CDGator weve taken our kids down to the springs many times. They’ve also gone on school trips. One year, 5th grade for my son I think, the teacher took them out on the walking trail, only she failed to notice it was closed due to ticks! We spent about an hour picking ticks off all the kids. The teacher caught holy hell from several moms.
 

CDGator

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@CDGator weve taken our kids down to the springs many times. They’ve also gone on school trips. One year, 5th grade for my son I think, the teacher took them out on the walking trail, only she failed to notice it was closed due to ticks! We spent about an hour picking ticks off all the kids. The teacher caught holy hell from several moms.

ugh, not fun! Especially the tiny ones you can hardly see. Dad was bit once in Tallahassee and didn’t think much about it until he ended up with in the icu with undiagnosed Rocky Mountain Spotted fever. They finally figured it out thankfully.
 

Gatordiddy

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Wakulla Springs - yep.
This would have been around 1978 and my family and my girlfriend were enjoying the day until the usual late afternoon thunderboomer comes into the area. I was coming up the hill from the water with my girlfriend and hear a loud boom and I look up and see a shower of sparks from the parking lot. Lightning had hit something but I couldn't tell what...
As I got closer I see my Dad lying on the ground with my Mom kneeling next to him crying. A crowd was gathered and an ambulance was on the way... Turns out he caught an indirect hit from the lightning when he was loading a cooler in the back of the Vista Cruiser (yes...that one with the really cool simulated wood paneling).
The lightning had hit a tree near the car, knocked a few squirrels out, hit the antenna on the top of the car and caught my Dad right below the knees where he was touching the bumper... He had burn marks circling down his legs, his shoes were blown off and big holes in the bottom of his socks. He was thrown back about 15 feet from the car and was paralyzed... could not move any extremities.
The doctors at Tally Memorial really didn't know what to do for him since they only saw those lightning strike victims go right to the morgue. So... the next day my Dad said ..."Well, if you don't know what to do for me then I'm checking myself out of here". By that time the feeling had returned in his arms and legs and my wheeled him out of there and drove him home.
Years later when taking his physical for the Army reserve unit, he got really gassed while doing the treadmill. Come to find out, the electrical issue from the lightning had damaged one of his heart valves. One pacemaker later and he was good as new... felt a ton better.
The only other time I went was when I was a senior in high school and my former girlfriend came back from her first year in college... she spent the afternoon spending 98% of her time with my "best" friend...

So Wakulla Springs can EABOD :lol:
 

CDGator

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Wakulla Springs - yep.
This would have been around 1978 and my family and my girlfriend were enjoying the day until the usual late afternoon thunderboomer comes into the area. I was coming up the hill from the water with my girlfriend and hear a loud boom and I look up and see a shower of sparks from the parking lot. Lightning had hit something but I couldn't tell what...
As I got closer I see my Dad lying on the ground with my Mom kneeling next to him crying. A crowd was gathered and an ambulance was on the way... Turns out he caught an indirect hit from the lightning when he was loading a cooler in the back of the Vista Cruiser (yes...that one with the really cool simulated wood paneling).
The lightning had hit a tree near the car, knocked a few squirrels out, hit the antenna on the top of the car and caught my Dad right below the knees where he was touching the bumper... He had burn marks circling down his legs, his shoes were blown off and big holes in the bottom of his socks. He was thrown back about 15 feet from the car and was paralyzed... could not move any extremities.
The doctors at Tally Memorial really didn't know what to do for him since they only saw those lightning strike victims go right to the morgue. So... the next day my Dad said ..."Well, if you don't know what to do for me then I'm checking myself out of here". By that time the feeling had returned in his arms and legs and my wheeled him out of there and drove him home.
Years later when taking his physical for the Army reserve unit, he got really gassed while doing the treadmill. Come to find out, the electrical issue from the lightning had damaged one of his heart valves. One pacemaker later and he was good as new... felt a ton better.
The only other time I went was when I was a senior in high school and my former girlfriend came back from her first year in college... she spent the afternoon spending 98% of her time with my "best" friend...

So Wakulla Springs can EABOD :lol:

Wow- that's crazy! The last time I was there, there was one of those intense "pop-up" showers with lightening and flooding. So glad your dad was ok.

My bff in HS (before I met her) was on the way out to Wakulla Spring with their neighbors. Her two brothers decided to ride shotgun in the front and back seats of the neighbor's car while her and her parents/sister followed a few minutes behind in their car. Back then you came to a very dangerous Y split and turned left to go to the springs. Unfortunately the neighbor must have turned in front of an on-coming car that t-boned the passenger side. The parents came up on the accident a few minutes later and both brothers died shortly after. Awful. As a parent I don't think you would ever recover from losing your kids.

They've redone that part of the road now.
 

Gatordiddy

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Wow- that's crazy! The last time I was there, there was one of those intense "pop-up" showers with lightening and flooding. So glad your dad was ok.

My bff in HS (before I met her) was on the way out to Wakulla Spring with their neighbors. Her two brothers decided to ride shotgun in the front and back seats of the neighbor's car while her and her parents/sister followed a few minutes behind in their car. Back then you came to a very dangerous Y split and turned left to go to the springs. Unfortunately the neighbor must have turned in front of an on-coming car that t-boned the passenger side. The parents came up on the accident a few minutes later and both brothers died shortly after. Awful. As a parent I don't think you would ever recover from losing your kids.

They've redone that part of the road now.

oh wow.. that is awful. no coming back from that one...
what timeframe was that ...because that is vaguely familiar
 

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