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Lake Okeechobee is Florida's largest lake, the largest lake in the Southeast United States, and the second largest lake contained entirely within the United States. The history of this inland sea is marked both by natural processes, and more recently human development and intervention. Adventurers can explore this behemoth of a waterway via the Lake Okeechobee Scenic Trail that enriches it, a part of the Florida National Scenic Trail. This paper synthesizes major natural and human-induced perturbations that shaped the lake and ultimately the trail that encircles it to create a narrative of Florida's great lake. The story of Lake Okeechobee is a story of battles, first between the land and sea, then between the lake itself and humankind. For the past few centuries Lake Okeechobee's natural perturbations in water flow and flooding resisted the control of man, until recently when man triumphed, managing to control the flow of water in and out of the lake. Unfortunately, with this new found control a new bioecological threat in the form of harmful algal blooms has emerged, which again threatens the health and livelihood of South Floridians. Currently there are new efforts that seek to restore Lake Okeechobee towards a more natural state in an effort to thwart the blooms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Self-drive tourism is popular in Florida and an under-researched academic area. Given electric vehicle sales grew significantly in the last few years, this paper investigated how electric cars could impact drive tourism in Florida. For self-drive tourists the quality of facilities and destinations drive satisfaction. Yet, supply side limitations can hinder an innovation’s adoption and diffusion. Investigating the availability of electric rental vehicles and necessary charging times while travelling between tourism destinations in Florida showed a limited availability of electric cars through established car rental companies. Turo, an example of a person-to-person car sharing service, had several electric cars on offer. Yet, charging facilities for electric vehicle renters and charging times between tourism destinations seem to be within acceptable thresholds. This limited supply of EVs could slow down the EV adoption for self-drive tourism. Given the infancy of the electric vehicle market, factors driving electric vehicle self-drive tourism will change significantly over time and tourist behaviour related to this new drive trend seems an interesting and growing research avenue. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses the preservation of the path of peace and the diplomacy during the frontier panic in Florida from 1849-1850. It explores the Armed Occupation Act which fulfills the ambition of the U.S. Congress to resettle the interior of the state without the necessity of military presence. It highlights the use of white cloth by American officers to symbolize the encouragement to Seminoles to believe that engagement in negotiations with the U.S. is safe.

In 2014, a year of record tourism in the state of Florida, SeaWorld saw a drop of one million visitors to its theme park in Orlando. The decline followed Gabriela Cowperthwaite's 2013 documentary film Blackfish, which presented the circumstances of orcas, or "killer whales," held in captivity at parks like SeaWorld as cruel to the animals and dangerous to their trainers. In 2016, SeaWorld announced it will stop breeding orcas, and phase out its orca theatrical shows by 2019, a move widely attributed in the press to the impact of Cowperthwaite's film. This article examines the film Blackfish as a rhetorical alignment of the symbolic functions of theme parks and documentaries, analyzing the work of the film's discourse to influence audiences and challenge to SeaWorld's use of captive orcas to entertain tourists. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents a description of cattle ranches, pasture land and planted fields in Florida based on the book "Guide to the Southernmost State."

In this article, the author focuses on the beginning of tourism in Florida and romanticism in the tourism.

The 2004 hurricane season was the worst in Florida's history. Four hurricanes made landfall, causing at least 47 deaths and $45 billion in damages. In this study, we use survey data to estimate the housing damage and population displacement caused by these hurricanes. We estimate that some 2.6 million housing units sustained at least minor damage and almost 1.6 million people were forced to move out of their homes at least temporarily. In some regions, more than 80% of the housing units were damaged and more than 30% of the residents were forced out of their homes. Most moves were short-lived, however, as most displaced residents soon returned to their prehurricane homes. Based on this and other studies, we conclude that hurricanes and other natural disasters often have a substantial impact on population growth in the short run but generally have little or no impact on growth rates in the long run. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]