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Making Ybor history fresh for children
The aroma of boliche and paella at the Columbia Restaurant. The clang of a passing trolley. The image of a black nail hung with loaves of Cuban bread.
By CATHERINE E. SHOICHET
Published January 22, 2007
TAMPA The aroma of boliche and paella at the Columbia Restaurant. The clang of a passing trolley. The image of a black nail hung with loaves of Cuban bread. For William Durbin, the story is in the details. In El Lector, Durbin tells the tale of 13-year-old Bella Lorente, who wants to read to workers in the cigar factories like her grandfather. The book, presented in serial form, begins today in the St. Petersburg Times. It's part of a 12-week Newspaper in Education project aimed at encouraging young readers. In addition to Durbin's story, we will offer activities for younger readers and discussion topics for teens. El Lector, the cornerstone of our project, is fiction. But its roots are real. Durbin's inspiration was a 1999 NPR program about the legendary lectores, men who read to workers at Tampa's cigar factories. Durbin, 56, lives in northeastern Minnesota and had never been to Tampa. "I thought, man, what a fascinating culture, and I did a little bit of research," Durbin said by phone recently. "The more I got into the story, the more I was really intrigued by it." In 2003, he visited St. Petersburg's Lakeview Fundamental Elementary School to talk about another book. The trip gave him a chance to visit Ybor City for the first time. He saw exhibits at the Ybor City Museum describing the area's growth from "a primitive little town on the Florida frontier" to a bustling cigar capital. He interviewed longtime residents. And he wandered the streets. Development had radically changed the area. "But there's still that wonderful atmosphere," he said, "that different kind of light and feeling. I could just kind of close my eyes when I breathed the air and imagine what it must have been like." Historians from the University of South Florida helped him. So did librarians, museum curators and volunteers. He visited a house where cigar workers once lived. He spent hours in the special collections room at the Ybor City campus library of Hillsborough Community College. Jeneice Sorrentino, the librarian and program manager there, gave him a list of memories she collected from lifelong Tampa residents, from "lightning shows on summer afternoons" to the "aroma of tobacco factories early in the morning." The story of the lectores captivated Durbin. "What a different world, but what a noble thing to honor the oral word to that extent, and to have workers actually pay someone to read to them," he said. He dedicated his book to Ybor City residents, past and present, "who believed in the power of stories to enlighten and transform." A look back Tampa memories To help William Durbin with his book, librarian Jeneice Sorrentino asked lifelong Tampa residents to describe their city. Here are some of their observations: - Men smoking Cuban cigars outside Ybor City's clubs - The Spanish-speaking man who sold tamales and deviled crabs from his bicycle in the 1960s - The aroma of tobacco factories early in the morning as one walked to school - Music coming from the Cuban Theater - Lazy alligators sunning on river banks - Cobblestone streets - Bananas coming through Port Tampa - Gasparilla every spring
[Last modified January 22, 2007, 06:41:39]
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