How the New Deal Built Florida Tourism: The Civilian Conservation Corps and State Parks by David J. Nelson (review)

One of the prevailing questions in southern history is “what defines the South?” Many historians have attempted to grapple with the nuances, uniqueness, and possible exceptionalism of the South. However, the generally accepted conclusion is that the South is a container for many different competing identities. David J. Nelson’s book is a good example of how these different identities competed in a specific place (Florida) and at a specific time (the 1930s and 1940s). By focusing on the development of the Florida Park Service and the role of the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC), Nelson expertly examines how debates about Florida’s identity during the New Deal era paved the way for the creation of Florida’s modern tourist industry. Nelson argues that the Florida Park Service is the “direct product of the New Deal,” and the philosophy of conservation promoted by the CCC is closely linked to Florida’s extensive history of tourism (p. 1).

There is much to unpack in the history of the tourism industry for a state like Florida, but Nelson is able to uniquely link the exotic persona of Florida to the efforts of the CCC to construct and reconstruct nature. Leadership in Florida worked closely with New Deal initiatives to create a specific tropical space defined by orange groves, palm trees, and “a safe but exotic ‘natural’ environment” (p. 5). Florida was not, however, immune to the race and class issues that plagued the South during the Jim Crow era, such as lynchings, Confederate memorialization, conservative politics, and an influx of the poor, migrant working class. The chapters that discuss the conflict between so-called old and new Florida mention the CCC’s continued quandary with African American companies, particularly in the South, but this portion of the book needs further development. Additionally, the chapters that discuss Florida’s cracker culture and Florida’s presentation at the 1933 Century of Progress International Exposition in Chicago read as a bit disjointed from the central argument. These few weaknesses do not detract from the book’s ability to take the reader through a well-researched pivotal moment in Florida’s history.

A good deal can be learned about American history from a deep analysis of the development of different state park systems. Nelson’s work on the Florida Park Service is a good example of how New Deal progressivism of the 1930s and 1940s and the wider forces of the Great Depression influenced the economics and identity of an entire state. The CCC provided much-needed relief for unemployed young men during the Great Depression, and states like Florida capitalized on the manpower and resources to reconstruct the state’s environment, physically and metaphorically, toward an economy centered on tourism. Nelson boldly argues that this period in Florida’s history provides the clearest evidence of how Florida’s identity as southern became contested. Yes, the influx of northern migrants and tourists diluted Florida’s southernness, but the reshaping of Florida’s landscape and imagery pushed Florida away from a conventional southern identity. Nelson succinctly concludes that the “[p]olitical, cultural, and social clashes in Florida in the latter half of the twentieth century originated in the selling of Florida in the 1930s” (p. 165).

I highly recommend this book to scholars of southern, environmental, or New Deal and Depression-era history. Additionally, this book will fit well in a course on early-twentieth-century United States history or in an environmental history course.