Category History, Heritage & Cultural Memory

Reading Time: 7 minutesThere is a particular kind of silence inside old photographs. It is not the silence of emptiness, but the hush that arrives when time pauses and the ordinary becomes historic. A century ago, Pensacola looked familiar in outline and unfamiliar in detail. The bay was still the city’s constant, the streets still funneled people toward […]

Reading Time: 6 minutesThe first shovels in the ground mark more than the start of a building project. They mark a shift in how a school district thinks about learning spaces, long-term costs, student well-being, and the environment. With construction now underway on the district’s first green school, the community is watching the promise of a healthier, more […]

Reading Time: 4 minutesYou probably know where to find Pensacola’s best burgers and craft beer or great fishing spots and knockout views. You might even know the exact number of stairs at the historic Pensacola Lighthouse — 177, for those counting. Living in America’s First Settlement, we know it can be laborious to know all the history of Pensacola. With so much history to pride […]

Reading Time: 4 minutesFor centuries, the exact location of Tristán de Luna y Arellano’s 1559 settlement in Pensacola — the first multi-year European settlement in the United States — has been a mystery. Not anymore. Archaeologists from the University of West Florida announced on Thursday the discovery of one of the most significant historical sites in the nation: the archaeological […]

Reading Time: 4 minutesThe history of European presence in Florida has long been shaped by written chronicles, expedition reports, and later historical interpretations. For centuries, these sources defined who the “first Europeans” were, when they arrived, and where they traveled. In recent decades, archaeology has begun to refine, challenge, and sometimes complicate these narratives. New discoveries across Florida […]

Reading Time: 4 minutesPerched on a rugged cliff where wind and sea constantly collide, the old lighthouse has long been a beacon for sailors and a subject of fascination for landlubbers. Beyond its practical purpose of guiding ships safely to harbor, this lighthouse holds stories whispered through generations — tales of mystery, disappearance, and strange lights in the […]

Reading Time: 3 minutesLong before modern cities emerged across North America, diverse Native American cultures built thriving communities, complex ceremonial centers, and extensive trade networks. Many of these settlements are well known today, but countless others remain lost — hidden beneath forests, deserts, and farmland, or erased by time and development. In this article, we explore why so […]

Reading Time: 2 minutesNearly 300 protestors and counter-protestors turned out to Pensacola’s Lee Square Saturday as part of a rally organized in support of the city’s most prominent Confederate memorial. The rally comes after Mayor Ashton Hayward last week called for the monument’s removal. The 50-foot monument — dedicated to Confederate president Jefferson Davis, Pensacolian Confederate veterans Stephen […]

Reading Time: 3 minutesPensacola Mayor Ashton Hayward on Wednesday publicly called for the removal of the Confederate statue at Lee Square, becoming one of several Southern mayors in recent years to endorse rethinking or relocating Confederate monuments. Hayward made the remarks during a radio interview with Andrew McKay of NewsRadio 1620, framing the issue as one of historical […]

Reading Time: 3 minutesRemember Pensacola Beach before cars, traffic, and high-rise hotels? Before restaurants and bars lined the shore? For locals and longtime visitors, the island once felt almost untouched — miles of open coastline, dunes rolling toward the horizon, and only a handful of structures breaking the landscape. The opening of the first bridges to Gulf Breeze […]