Damn Yankees!

SUNDAY, JULY 25, 2010


Damn Yankees!

The year before we became damn Yankees we were aliens to our soon to be new neighbors. Although we lived in that foreign country way up north called the United States we might as well have come from Andromeda. Disdain was even greater than for the Canadians of Toronto that lived in the small motels next to the beach under maple leaf flags during high season. Frogs from Quebec were slightly more hated, only barely.

Yankees came to Florida for Spring Training. More Yankees lolled on the beaches or hung around at the Miami Sea Aquarium, Crandon Park Zoo or Parrot Jungle. Sheet white and lobster colored tourists oohed and aahed. Solarcaine Aerosol Spray commercials flooded the airwaves as Seminoles wrestled alligators in dirt pits, out west close to the Everglades. There was a small tribe of blondes that escaped the wrath of Andrew Jackson and made a living succumbing petite cold-blooded vertebrates.

Yankees spent money and bought bitter oranges out of season. Kids shook snow globes upside down filled with silver glitter. Tightfisted tips were left at local restaurants. Peacocks strutted near the trinket stores at the groves full of souvenirs with gold tags printed in black brush script: Made in Japan.

When vacations were over, Yankees loaded their sunburned kids into the cars or got on airplanes to leave. Some packed into the Silver Meteor that flew on tracks headed north. Mercifully, they left the land of citrus, swamps and tourist traps.


Yankees stayed in pink and turquoise neon outlined motels within sight of the breakers. Yankees finally went home when they ran out of money.

Damn Yankees never went home. Damn Yankees moved into the neighborhood. A constant Cracker calamity was Damn Yankees never went home unless it was next door or down the street.

Damn Yankees called all local residents Crackers. They did not delete… instead they added expletives, using the term nasally with an unconditional disdain. Most did not realize or appreciate the origin of the term. Few cared; less even knew why Crackers were Crackers.

The name Florida Cracker predated the Civil War. Crackers used bullwhips to herd the cattle that fed the Rebels. In central Florida these former Kissimmee Cowboys are presently Disneyworld workers. Crackers are proud of their heritage even if their boss is now a rodent.

Some old neighborhoods in South Florida still had houses not made of concrete blocks with jalousie windows; the architectural blight of this nauseous 50’s and 60’s invasion. Virtually every new dwelling had chalk stucco over the concrete block. White concrete roof tiles covered revoltingly similar floor plans. Houses sat on postage stamp lots book matched so bedrooms were not next to neighbor’s driveways, barely enough room to walk between the houses with a lawnmower.

Most Cracker Compounds were out west between US441 (State Road 7) and the sea of grass… the land of the mosquitoes, cows and biting flies. ‘Heart pine’ clapboards, floors and interior walls defined these tin roofed antiquities. They had real porches and there was no sheetrock or terrazzo inside. Everything except sinks, tubs and toilets was made from wood. ‘Heart pine’ and cypress were the treated wood of their time. Termites could not chew the sap laden pine. Cypress must have tasted like fast food. Wall clocks and tables were made out of slabs of cypress knees. Wrought iron boot scrapers were anchored next to the path ready to trip the unsuspecting visitors.

Cracker houses lasted generation after generation. They sometimes leaned but refused to fall until they were pushed over by sleazy developers eager to turn birthright into greenbacks. Streets carved into the pastures or groves, lined up east to west. Avenues went north to south in some perverted OCD urban blue graph paper symmetry.

Each Cracker house sat nested in its own grove of native shade trees. Family farms held on until the invasion from the north overtook them. Downtown Cracker houses appeared out of place on immense lots among the white stucco ranch houses standing eave to eave all geometrically arranged to face the same direction as the others looking for their ranches.


In town Cracker houses were doomed too. Like Sherman the attack of the Damn Yankees could not be turned back. City center bastions fell to bull dozers instead of fire and cannonballs. Rape and pillage of local heritage continued at an ominous rate. Miniature palm trees, circular drives, landscaping and pavement crowded out the Crackers.


Smallish hereditary plats became shuffleboard courts; larger ones, memorial parks. The Damn Yankees were not dying anywhere near quickly enough. If a Cracker house was close enough to the ocean and the estate big enough it became a small motel to bleed the Yankees and transfuse the locals. When the invasion reached its height these small pastel paradises were grabbed up by other greedy developers smelling of Old Spice and Brylcreem. Concrete dust choked the few locals left as motor courts fell like dominos to make room for the condos.

The sound and sight of a sunrise breaking wave; the confluence of light, sound and beauty became alien to all but the most affluent. More and more Damn Yankees poured in from the north to ride in the elevators and drink martinis on eyebrow balconies. From the south the prosperous and more fortunate Cubans assailed both Crackers and Damn Yankees. Escaping Castro communism was more important than who their neighbors were.

More condos were built and streets torn up for infrastructure. Some old cracker compounds became sewerage treatment plants. The rest of the crap was just pumped into the ocean to flow north with the Gulf Stream in place of the Damn Yankees who would not go home. It was all effluent to the Florida Cracker.

I left for college. When I finally ended up in Tallahassee I realized that history does indeed repeat itself. Like the Cubans I had become a Damn Yankee even though I came from far south.

Around the capital city it does not matter if one is born elsewhere and moves here when less than a month old... the Obituary (if the papers are still around then) will read: “Originally from…”.


The Damned Yankee is just inferred.

© 07.26.2010 steven d philbrick SR+ DakotaDawg
POSTED BY SRPLUS AT 11:45 AM 0 COMMENTS