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An agnostic view of Boca Grande’s alien visits over the years

Written by Garland Pollard on . Posted in News.

In the wake of the recent explosive hearings in the U.S. Congress on UFOs, now called Unidentified Aerial Phenomena, the sole report of a 1999 UFO hovering near the causeway to Boca Grande still remains a mystery.

The report was from Dec. 18, 1999, when an unknown couple is alleged to have come onto the island and seen a “football-field-sized saucer with blinking white lights, that made no sound as it traveled across the sky.”

The report is one of over 8,000 sightings of mysterious things in the air over Florida, according to the National UFO Reporting Center (NUFORC).

GICIA Bike Path landscape project begins

Written by Guest Columnist on . Posted in Community.

The Gasparilla Island Conservation and Improvement Association (GICIA) is pleased to announce that a Bike Path enhancement project began earlier this week.  Each year summer maintenance and improvement projects are established for the five miles of the GICIA Bike Path.  The focus this year is returning GICIA’s Bike Path property to pre-hurricane condition.  

Hurricane Ian destroyed much of the island’s beautiful vegetation.  It is estimated that approximately 300 trees and countless grasses and shrubs along the Bike Path were lost to the storm. This week crews began planting nearly 2,500 trees, shrubs and grasses to replace what was lost to Ian.

Celebrate National Golf Month by warming up and cooling down

Written by Boca Grande Health Clinic on . Posted in Health & Wellness, Sports & Outdoors.

Back in 1993, the Professional Golf Association deemed August National Golf Month. For the golf obsessed, this is a great excuse to get out and play a round with family and friends. The month-long celebration is a way to promote the game and introduce new people to the sport. 

Tiger Woods was 17 in 1993 and had won the last of his three straight U.S. junior amateur championships. For the majority of the golfing world and certainly for those in the mainstream, not much was known about this 17-year-old from California, but golf insiders thought he could be golf’s next great champion. Fast forward to April 1997. “Tiger Mania” was about to explode, and the “win for the ages” at The Masters cemented him as golf’s best player and changed how golf was perceived as a sport.

Hurricane Ian book features Boca Beacon article about Little Gasparilla Island

Written by Staff Report on . Posted in Community History.

Gulf Coast Writers Association Inc. (GWCA), Southwest Florida’s 28-year-old meeting ground for writers, editors and their associates, announced today that Leoma Lovegrove, internationally-known artist whose work is in the collections of the Carter and George W. Bush Presidential Libraries, has painted the artwork for the cover of “Storm Stories – Hurricane Ian,” its anthology of personal experiences during the storm as recounted by local residents and photographers. The book is planned for publication on September 1.

The Boca Beacon will be featured in the book, with a story that ran not long after the storm, called “This may be our slice of paradise, but putting it back together will be no piece of cake.”

OBITUARY: Sackett Snow Cook

Written by Staff Report on . Posted in Obituaries.

Sackett Snow Cook died peacefully August 1 at Westview on Main in Fairhaven MA, with his wife of 41 years, Mary Elizabeth (White) Cook, by his side. He was born in Providence RI to Martha Sackett Snow Cook and Benjamin Ladd Cook Jr., president of Starkweather and Shepley Insurance Brokerage. Sackett attended Deerfield Academy and […]

OBITUARY: Joe D’Angelo

Written by Staff Report on . Posted in Obituaries.

Sadly, our family announces that Joe D’Angelo departed this world on August, 1, 2023, at the youthful age of 86. He peacefully passed away at his home in Rotonda West, Florida.  Joe was born in Passaic, New Jersey to Elsie and Tony D’Angelo, a proud Italian family. After Belleville High School he joined the U.S. […]

PROFILE: Amy Cyr

Written by Sheila Evans on . Posted in Profiles.

Amy Cyr loves music, and she has since she was very young. Now she has joined The Island School as its music teacher, and she hopes to pass that love on to the young people there. 

Amy is excited about her new position at The Island School, and she feels it is the ideal place for her. 

“I’ve never really wanted to overextend myself to the point where I’m not giving my best to anything. You know, it’s easy to get like that when you want to have your hands in so many different things – you’re not giving your best to any of them. So, I’ve never pursued a full 9 to 5, because I work at night a lot and I’m a stay-at-home mom. Because The Island School is a smaller school, the schedule works out a lot better for me than a traditional K –12 public school. So it was an ideal situation, especially now, with both of my children being in school full-time. That opens up a brand new world. Now I have 8 a.m. to 3 p.m.open; it’s completely different.”

THIS DATE IN THE BOCA BEACON

Written by Marcy Shortuse on . Posted in Columns, Community History.

FIVE YEARS AGO Was it red tide or Vibrio vulnificus that was making young stomachs upset, or back-to-school jitters? Either way, we had both. TEN YEARS AGO South Beach was missing three of their colorful Adirondack chairs, and sea turtle nests were being relocated thanks to an impending beach renourishment. FIFTEEN YEARS AGO A “Tinseltown […]