Author Archives: Lois A. Bolin, Ph.D.

I figure the moon must be in the seventh house as Jupiter aligns with Mars, because opportunities to explore Southern culture, my roots and local history keep rising up. Could there be a connection between my visit back home to the Carolinas (South, to be exact; we only believe in one), followed by a memorylane trip to Chokoloskee and a visit to Bartstown, Ky., via Louisville, the home of Walter Haldeman, one of our town’s founding fathers?

Labor Day has a double celebratory meaning. “The day before back to school day” — a silent but glorious celebration for moms who would have called it Independence Day had that day already not been taken. Oh, the sweet tradition of shipping those little darlings off to earn their place in this world.

Forty-nine years ago today — at 8:30 a.m. Sept. 10, 1960 — the fifth-strongest hurricane on record in the United States hit Southwest Florida. The eye of Hurricane Donna went directly over Bonita Springs and left three people there dead in its wake; winds were clocked at 168 mph in Naples and 123 mph in Fort Myers.

“How can I be sure? In a world that’s constantly changing. How can I be sure? Where I stand with you?”