Glossie Atkins laughs easily and sometimes uncontrollably at the thought of fun times in Overtown. The daughter of Jay and Nettie Campbell was born in Ocala on December 3, 1917. With her sister Ruby Horton as the leader, she left central Florida to work on a farm in Sarasota picking beans and tomatoes. “We filled a bushel basket of beans for two dollars each.” The unrelenting heat and worms on the plants forced a transition from fieldwork to housework. Horton then operated a café. “We had a good time,” Atkins said, bursting into laughter without offering too many details. She attended the oldest Black house of worship in town, Bethlehem Baptist Church.

“Oh goodness, we had good service and the choir, everything was good.” The mother of Sarasota’s first African American mayor was a surrogate parent to neighbors’ children. For 35 years, she worked as a domestic sewing, cooking, cleaning and rearing other parents’ children. These days, she joins other mature women of Newtown to crochet scarves, quilts, and caps. “God has been good to me. Yep. Oh my goodness. I’ve come a long way. He brought me and still’s got me going strong.”

Vickie Oldham is leading a groundbreaking historic preservation project called “Newtown Alive.” In 2015, her team of scholars and volunteers began tracing the 100-year history of the African American community of Newtown. The project expanded into a cultural heritage tourism initiative. Oldham is a journalist, marketer and chief motivation officer.

Funding for this program was provided through a grant from the Florida Humanities Council with funds from the national endowment for the humanities. Any views, findings, conclusions or recommendations expressed in this program do not necessarily represent those of the Florida Humanities Council or the national endowment for the humanities.

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