Palm Beach County’s first tourists were the early settlers. These earliest visitors became the first residents of the area. The first permanent residents of Palm Beach County date back to 1872. They struggled to clear the dense marshland for building homes and growing crops.   

Farming was the way that most of the early homesteaders and pioneers made their living. Most people probably do not know that Palm Beach County was once the largest pineapple growing area in the continental United States (at that time Hawaii was still a territory). Pineapple growing in Florida goes back to 1860, when Benjamin Baker planted the first pineapples in the Florida Keys at Plantation Key from plants he had brought in from Cuba. By 1876, pineapple farming was…

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Lilly Pulitzer (1931-2013), the famed Palm Beach clothing designer, thought it would be fun to incorporate her name in the patterns of her dresses. Look closely and you will spot the ‘Lilly” signature hidden in her whimsical designs. Since the 1950s, Lilly Pulitzer items have been recognized as one of the iconic styles that represent the Palm Beach resort life.

Lilly and husband Peter Pulitzer settled in Palm Beach shortly after their marriage. They owned orange groves and, with produce from these, she opened a fruit juice stand on Via Mizner in Palm Beach. While working at the stand, Lilly found that squeezing juice made a mess of her clothes. Seeking to camouflage the juice stains, she designed a cool shift dress without sleeves made of bright,…

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Did you know that there are only two marked graves in Palm Beach?  Hidden among the dense green ferns of the Pizza Al Fresco courtyard off Worth Avenue, you will find the only cemetery in Palm Beach proper. Side-by-side in a lushly landscaped courtyard, down a Via, just off Worth Avenue you will find to old headstone markers. Neither belongs to a human being.

The more famous of the little-known pair is Johnnie Brown, the “Human Monkey”. Johnnie Brown was the pet spider monkey of Addison Mizner. According to Palm Beach history and folklore Mizner was an eccentric Palm Beach character of the roaring twenties. Johnnie Brown was just one of Mizner’s exotic and unusual pets. The monkey accompanied Mizner to all his Gilded Age high society events.…

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It is easy to experience the Florida Everglades just west of Boynton Beach. Arthur R. Marshall Loxahatchee Wildlife Refuge is located just west of Boynton Beach, and a short drive from West Palm Beach.

Water in south Florida once flowed freely from the Kissimmee River to Lake Okeechobee and southward over low-lying lands to the estuaries of Biscayne Bay, the Ten Thousand Islands, and Florida Bay. For thousands of years this intricate system evolved into a finely balanced ecosystem that formed the biological infrastructure for the southern half of the state. early colonial settlers and developers the Everglades were potential farmland and communities. By the early 1900s', the drainage process to transform wetland to land ready to be developed was…

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The River Center continues to collaborate with the US Coast Guard Auxiliary “Flotilla 52” to provide a series of Boating Safely Classes targeted specifically to young boaters in our community. The River Center is in Burt Reynolds Park on US 1, just north of Indiantown Road in Jupiter.    

These virtual classes are provided through a generous sponsorship by the AustinBlu Foundation. The foundation is a not-for-profit dedicated to raising awareness and promoting educational programs to improve boater safety. The mission of the AustinBlu Foundation is “to make available to boaters of all ages the tools and technology which can help prevent near shore and off-shore boating accidents and to improve the chance of survival and recovery, should such…

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The Town of Jupiter’s Loxahatchee River Center, located at 805 North U.S. Highway One, invites you to flutter on over to the second annual Atala Butterfly Festival and Family Day.  On Saturday, January 30th, 2021 between 10:00 am – 1:00 pm.  The River Center will be celebrating the Atala butterfly! Once thought to be extinct, this beautiful butterfly is local and flourishing in our own backyard. 

The Atala is a small colorful butterfly in the family Lycaenidae. It is found in southeastern Florida, the Bahamas, Cuba, the Cayman Islands, and on other Caribbean islands. Its coloration and habits are unique among butterflies within its scale. Due to the decline in the butterfly’s host plant, triggered by overharvesting the root of the plant for starch…

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The City of Palm Beach Gardens government office, located at 10500 N Military Trail, Palm Beach Gardens, is encouraging residents to get healthy and stay healthy with the entire family.  Keep your 2021 resolution and blaze into the new year with a virtual family fun run.  The 5K is designed for runners and walkers alike.

The Virtual Gardens Trailblazer 5K takes place anytime, anywhere between February 26th-28th. You can use the treadmill, trot around your block, or find a nearby trail to complete your race. This event is designed to encourage everyone to get out and be active anyway you see fit!

Once you complete your race, take a finisher selfie using the hashtag #TRAILBLAZER5K for a chance to be featured on the PBG Recreation Facebook Page,…

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Covid-19 has changed the world we live in.  Here in Southeast Florida, it has been realized that a multifunctional home is the name of the game in 2021. Now that everything such as: living, working, learning, exercising, eating/cooking, teaching, creating and anything else one can imagine, has moved inside the home, our home and interior spaces need to become multi-functional. Having a place of calm in which you can perform some of your household duties and a little extra work, is an incredibly valued addition to a home.

No longer is the home a sacred space where one merely relaxes and unwinds. Multifunctional spaces must do double duty! A home must work in a multifunctional way, allowing our whole life to take place within its four walls.  A lot…

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Thai Lotus brings an unforgettable dining experience with three locations in Northern Palm Beach County. The restaurant is committed to serve traditional, savory Thai and Japanese dishes with the freshest ingredients, while remaining reasonably priced. Thai Lotus offers customary native dishes and a large selection of fresh sushi on the menu at all three locations in Jupiter, Tequesta and in North Palm Beach.  

Thai cuisine places emphasis on lightly prepared dishes with strong aromatic components with a spicy edge.  The dishes served at Thai Lotus are authentically Thai incorporating knowledge of traditional Thai spices, herbs, and authentic methods of preparation.  The guidelines for flavor are subtlety and delicacy.

There are an estimated…

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Thursday nights on the waterfront in West Palm Beach just got entertaining! If you are looking for some live music to add to your Thursday night circuit, look no further than Clematis by Night. This weekly al fresco occasion is FREE to attend and takes place at Meyer Amphitheater in downtown West Palm Beach on Thursday evenings from 6-9 p.m.

Clematis by Night has been an institution in the Palm Beaches for the last twenty-two years.  It brings the community together for fun on the downtown waterfront with live music from the area’s best musicians & groups.  In 2021, the popular weekly music event will look a bit different to maintain social distancing. It now requires advance pod registration. General admission will open on Sundays at 12 p.m. for…

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