FLORIDA HISTORY RESOURCES: Chase Family Travel Grant

The story of the Chases in Florida began in 1878 when Sydney Octavius Chase (1860-1941), having read about orange groves in Scribner's Magazine, came to Florida from Philadelphia. His brother, Joshua Coffin Chase (1858-1948), joined him in 1884 and together they formed Chase and Company that year.  The citrus enterprise eventually involved all of the family over several generations. 

The Chase Family Grant was first established in 2009 in honor of Cecilia L. Johnson, granddaughter of Joshua Cofin Chase, with additional support in memory of Joshua C. Johnson.  The grant program now continues through an endowment created by members of the Chase family.  We gratefully acknowledge their generosity and public spiritedness in supporting this travel grant, which provides $1200 to the recipient to conduct research in the P.K. Yonge Library of Florida History.  

Previous Recipients of the Cecilia L. Johnson Award

Awards for 2011

Robert Hutchings (Carnegie Mellon) did research on his dissertation Agriculture, Environment, and the Transformation of the Florida Orange Industry in the Twentieth Century (awarded 2014).  He is currently a Program Manager at Cisco Systems

Diane M. Boucher (Clark University) conducted research for her dissertation Networks and Empires in the Maritime Borderlands: East Florida, 1763-1811 (awarded 2014).  She teaches U.S. history at the U.S. Coast Guard Academy and is an independent consultant in historical research.

Awards for 2010

Cameron Strang (University of Texas, Austin) researched his doctoral thesis on scientific knowledge on the Florida frontier.  Strang is associate professor in history at the University of Nevada-Reno.  His first book, Frontiers of Science: Imperialism and Natural Knowledge in the Gulf South Borderlands, 1500-1850, based in part on research at the Yonge Library, was published in 2018 and won the Summerlee Book Prize from The Center for History and Culture of Southeast Texas and the Upper Gulf Coast (Lamar University) and the Michael V.R. Thomason Book Award from the Gulf South Historical Association.  Listen to a Podcast about his research presented by the Consortium for History of Science, Technology and Medicine.  

Clark Barwick (Indiana University, Bloomington) conducted research on Zora Neale Hurston and Florida jukes. Barwick is a senior lecturer in the Kelley School of Business, University of Indiana.

Awards for 2009

Christopher Wilhelm (Florida State University) received a travel grant to conduct research on the creation of Everglades National Park. An article based on this research, "Conservatives in the Everglades: Sun Belt Environmentalism and the Creation of Everglades National Park," has been published in the Journal of Southern History. (82:4) 2016.  Wilhelm is  currently associate professor of history at Georgia Coastal College.

Jonathan DeCoster (Brandeis University) received a travel grant for his research into early colonial alliances and rivalries among the native peoples of Florida. DeCoster is currently associate professor of history at Otterbein University, Ohio.  His article "Entangled Borderlands: Europeans and Timucuans in Sixteenth-Century Florida" appeared in the Florida Historical Quarterly in 2013.

Charlie Fanning visited the P.K. Yonge Library of Florida History in March 2020 where he worked extensively in the Chase Family Papers and our publications from the citrus industry as part of his research on the transformation of agriculture in South Florida.  Only a few days after he finished his work, the COVID-19 crisis forced us to close the library to the public!  We are grateful that Charlie was able to safely make his visit and his return home, and look forward to his upcoming dissertation.   

The Chase Family Grant is made possible through the Sydney O. Chase and Joshua C. Chase Endowment created and supported by members of the Chase family, pioneers in Florida citrus growing.  Its purpose is to enable graduate students to conduct research in the P.K. Yonge Library of Florida History at the George A. Smathers Library, University of Florida.

The recipient for 2020 was Charlie Fanning.  Charlie is a PhD candidate in history at the University of Maryland, College Park, where he is writing a dissertation preliminarily titled “Empire of the Everglades: Agribusiness, the Land, and Labor in 20th Century South Florida.” created by members of the Chase family, pioneers in Florida citrus growing. Its purpose is to enable graduate students to conduct research in the P.K. Yonge Library of Florida History at the George A. Smathers Library, University of Florida.

"In my dissertation project, I seek to unravel the intertwined local and global processes that transformed rural South Florida from a scarcely-inhabited “river of grass” into an expansive agro-industrial complex and hemispheric hub for commodity production and labor migration. . .   I accessed and examined material related to growers’ associations, agribusiness, agricultural labor, and environmental politics from various collections during my week of research. The Chase family, Ernest Graham, Braga Brothers, and Nathan Mayo collections, in particular, have been important to understanding the social and political world of Florida’s major growers, their political positions and associations, and how they operated within and contributed to an environment of increasing agricultural consolidation." 

Funding for this award comes from Sydney O. Chase and Joshua C. Chase Endowment and through the generous support of members of the Chase family.