From 1875 to 1886 a total of ten houses of refuge and two life-saving stations were constructed along Florida's shoreline as part of the US Life-Saving Service system. One life-saving station was located on the west coast near Pensacola while the others were on the east coast from south of Matanzas Inlet to Biscayne Bay. These houses and stations and the families who lived in them serviced the Florida coastline for forty years by providing rescues and assistance to those traveling by water and land. This research explores houses of refuge and life-saving stations along the Florida coastline during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries by documenting and comparing the material culture assemblages, associated landscapes and seascapes and historical documents of individual houses and stations both within context and to each other. It yields information about daily life and practices at these houses and stations, considers how these stations were viewed as part of the natural and built environment and documents how the participants fit within the local and the broader economic and social landscape and seascape of nineteenth and twentieth century Florida. This research reviews the anthropological concept "liminal" and applies it to the house of refuge and life-saving station sites in an attempt to explore the multiple layers of activities and life at these houses and stations. Florida's houses of refuge and stations are explored as liminal places through both their physical location within the landscape and seascape and the activities and people living within the structures. / A Dissertation submitted to the Department of Anthropology in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. / Summer Semester, 2010. / May 26, 2010. / Life-Saving, House of Refuge, Historical Archaeology, Maritime Archaeology, Liminal, US Life-Saving Service / Includes bibliographical references. / Rochelle A. Marrinan, Professor Directing Dissertation; James P. Jones, University Representative; Glen H. Doran, Committee Member; Lynne A. Schepartz, Committee Member.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:fsu.edu/oai:fsu.digital.flvc.org:fsu_180810 |
| Contributors | McKinnon, Jennifer F. (Jennifer Faith), 1974- (authoraut), Marrinan, Rochelle A. (professor directing dissertation), Jones, James P. (university representative), Doran, Glen H. (committee member), Schepartz, Lynne A. (committee member), Department of Anthropology (degree granting department), Florida State University (degree granting institution) |
| Publisher | Florida State University, Florida State University |
| Source Sets | Florida State University |
| Language | English, English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Text, text |
| Format | 1 online resource, computer, application/pdf |
| Rights | This Item is protected by copyright and/or related rights. You are free to use this Item in any way that is permitted by the copyright and related rights legislation that applies to your use. For other uses you need to obtain permission from the rights-holder(s). The copyright in theses and dissertations completed at Florida State University is held by the students who author them. |
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