Avon Park

by Albert R. Taggart
(Marion, Missouri)

Back in the 1960's I was working on a construction project in Avon Park. I stayed in Reed's Motel on the main highway, and I frequented the bar at the Hotel Jacaranda every night.

In those days, maybe still, there was an Air Force bombing range just east of town. When they'd have night maneuvers the entire sky could be lighted up with flares. It looked like daylight and would scare the hell out of you if you were just driving by and didn't know what it was.

The talk around the bar was always about Arcadia and what a hick town it was. Arcadia is west of Avon Park. The Avon Park good old boys liked to drive over to Arcadia and get in fights with the Arcadia good old boys. And vice versa, I think.

I went through Avon Park in late 2009, and noticed that the Hotel Jacaranda is still there and so is Reed's Motel. Not too much seems to have changed in forty years or so.