Florida Crackers

[spuwho]

The name of this new eatery kind of caught me off guard as I thought it was a joke at first.  I didn't hear the term "cracker" used until I moved to Florida, but to hear a restaurant will named that seemed kind of odd. Maybe its just me.

Per the Daily Record:

http://www.jaxdailyrecord.com/showstory.php?Story_id=549884

Florida Cracker Restaurant, an extension of the Florida Cracker Kitchen in Brooksville, is in development at Pablo Station at northwest Beach Boulevard and San Pablo Road.

Robert Tilka, vice president of strategy with ServStar Management Group, said today it will serve breakfast and lunch and is the first Florida Cracker in Jacksonville.

He said about 10 are possible through franchising throughout Florida. He said sites have been scouted for the next two or the in Northeast Florida.

Tilka said there is no firm opening date for the Pablo Station location, but said it could be within 45 days.

"It's a great concept," he said.

Plans show that the group will redevelop a former tire store on the property.

A building-permit application shows the contact as Tilka.

ServStar Management Group is a bar management company whose properties served include the three Hoptinger's area locations, Surfer and The Shim Sham Room in Jacksonville Beach, Scarlett O'Hara's in St. Augustine, and three locations for Dos Gatos.

Plans call for conversion of a 3,647-square-foot metal building that housed the tire shop for a 177-seat restaurant, according to a letter by the Genesis engineering firm filed with the St. Johns River Water Management District.

An existing car wash at the site will be converted into storage.

HHH Management Inc. is the landlord. Real estate director Donald Rosenthal said Wednesday that the restaurant was going through permitting at the former Tires Plus location. He said the tire shop closed early last year.

Rosenthal said the property drew a lot of interest from automotive users, but the landlord was looking for a different type of tenant.

Permits are in review.

In addition to an exemption verification sought with the water management district, the city is reviewing site plans and a permit application.

The permit application is for Flint Construction Services Inc. to demolish the interior of the property at 14329 Beach Blvd. It shows 3,000 square feet of interior space and 1,000 square feet of exterior space.

The city issued an electrical permit Feb. 13 for Happy Cat Electric Inc. to perform a safety inspection because the power had been off for more than a year.

Power is needed to clean the building to prepare it for being rented, the permit said.

Site plans show the property is on 2.19 acres and the restaurant proposes patio seating as well as indoor dining.

[acme54321]

Why do you see it as odd?  I would guess it's an old Florida theme.

My grandmother's branch of the family is a bunch of citrus and cattle farmers from Central Florida that has identified as crackers as long as I can remember.  They came south from the panhandle around 1900, I'm a 5th generation cracker.

[spuwho]

Why do you see it as odd?  I would guess it's an old Florida theme.

My grandmother's branch of the family is a bunch of citrus and cattle farmers from Central Florida that has identified as crackers as long as I can remember.  They came south from the panhandle around 1900, I'm a 5th generation cracker.

I have only heard the use of "cracker" in derogatory terms. This is why it seems odd.

Enlighten me, 5th generation, where does the term come from?

[remc86007]

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Florida_cracker

I agree, simply because it is used derogatorily, it's a strange name for a restaurant.

[RockStar]

As I'm involved in this, I'll chime in. My hospitality company is the licensee for this concept.

First, it's Florida Cracker, no plural. In fact, it's not the first place named this; in St. Aug, there is Florida Cracker Cafe (no relation).

I'd describe it as Cracker Barrel, with a full bar, meets the lifestyle component of Salt Life, but country, if that makes sense.

The old Tire center on Beach and San Pablo we are re-purposing should be applauded; as we're taking a raging eyesore and making a really cool eatery out of it.

Keep an open mind til you check it out. Gonna be fun stuff.

Cheers,

J 

[spuwho]

As I'm involved in this, I'll chime in. My hospitality company is the licensee for this concept.

First, it's Florida Cracker, no plural. In fact, it's not the first place named this; in St. Aug, there is Florida Cracker Cafe (no relation).

I'd describe it as Cracker Barrel, with a full bar, meets the lifestyle component of Salt Life, but country, if that makes sense.

The old Tire center on Beach and San Pablo we are re-purposing should be applauded; as we're taking a raging eyesore and making a really cool eatery out of it.

Keep an open mind til you check it out. Gonna be fun stuff.

Cheers,

J

Absolutely want to check it out as I do all new establishments and yes I drive by the old tire place on Beach daily, I know the place.

Mind is open. I like Cracker Barrel. I am sure i will enjoy it and will post back on it here.

If I had just arrived in Jacksonville yesterday, I wouldn't have known any different. After living here for 14 years, it has a different take for me. Hopefully, just me.

Cheers back at ya!

[acme54321]

Why do you see it as odd?  I would guess it's an old Florida theme.

My grandmother's branch of the family is a bunch of citrus and cattle farmers from Central Florida that has identified as crackers as long as I can remember.  They came south from the panhandle around 1900, I'm a 5th generation cracker.

I have only heard the use of "cracker" in derogatory terms. This is why it seems odd.

Enlighten me, 5th generation, where does the term come from?

No need to get snippy you dirty Yankee.

There are a couple supposed roots of the term, but the version I know is from the sound of the cattlemens' whips.  Raising cattle was the main source of income of early Florida settlers that for the most part lived off of the land.  My grandmother can remember being very little and all of the men leaving for a couple of weeks while they drove cattle to Ft Pierce (They lived in BFE 20mi south of Plant City, not so BFE anymore).  That was in the early 1930s and the tail end of that era.  The descendants of these people don't find it a derogatory term.   

Lots of info on Google.

[strider]

Here's an entertaining definition:

A 1783 pejorative use of "crackers" specifies men who "are descended from convicts that were transported from Great Britain to Virginia at different times, and inherit so much profligacy from their ancestors, that they are the most abandoned set of men on earth.

Entertain to me because it appears to one side on my family tree!

[FlaBoy]

Why do you see it as odd?  I would guess it's an old Florida theme.

My grandmother's branch of the family is a bunch of citrus and cattle farmers from Central Florida that has identified as crackers as long as I can remember.  They came south from the panhandle around 1900, I'm a 5th generation cracker.

I have only heard the use of "cracker" in derogatory terms. This is why it seems odd.

Enlighten me, 5th generation, where does the term come from?

No need to get snippy you dirty Yankee.

There are a couple supposed roots of the term, but the version I know is from the sound of the cattlemens' whips.  Raising cattle was the main source of income of early Florida settlers that for the most part lived off of the land.  My grandmother can remember being very little and all of the men leaving for a couple of weeks while they drove cattle to Ft Pierce (They lived in BFE 20mi south of Plant City, not so BFE anymore).  That was in the early 1930s and the tail end of that era.  The descendants of these people don't find it a derogatory term.   

Lots of info on Google.

This is correct from what I know. Every Floridian should read the book, "A Land Remembered" which takes you through a lot of the history in a novel setting.

[Tacachale]

"Cracker" isn't inherently derogatory depending on how it's used. While it's often used as a slur for white bigots or white people in general, the context is somewhat different in Florida and Georgia. Especially when it's couched it as "Florida Cracker" and "Georgia Cracker", the people of those backgrounds would never take offense. I'd go so far as to say that most people with cracker roots are proud of them (myself included).

The roots of the term as it applies to people from Georgia and Florida is pretty obscure. A lot of people believe it comes from "whip cracking" in either the cattle-driving or slave-driving senses. The cattle sense would make sense in Florida, but not really in Georgia, where "cracker" was apparently used long before. Others say it comes from corn-cracking ("corn-cracker" is best known today in Kentucky but was used for Georgians as well). However, people were called "crackers" for hundreds of years before that.

As early as 1509 "cracker" was in use in Britain for people considered braggarts, liars, or big talkers, according to the Oxford English Dictionary (if you can access it). That comes from an alternate, medieval sense of the word "crack" meaning "To utter, pronounce, or tell aloud, briskly, or with éclat" (the OED again). That sense of "crack" survives in phrases like "crack a joke", "wisecrack", and "the crack" or "craic" in Ireland.

That would seem to be the real origin of the term "cracker" for Southerners, based on this quote from 1766:

1766   G. Cochrane Let. 27 June (D.A.),   I should explain to your Lordship what is meant by Crackers; a name they have got from being great boasters; they are a lawless set of rascalls on the frontiers of Virginia, Maryland, the Carolinas and Georgia, who often change their places of abode.

Here is an entertaining history of the word:
http://www.npr.org/sections/codeswitch/2013/07/01/197644761/word-watch-on-crackers

Governor Lawton Chiles was a proud Florida Cracker and often talked about them as his constituency. When he endorsed Jake Goldbold in his mayoral race in 1995, he said "I understand Cracker. He speaks it and speaks it with the right accent", in contrast to my old man, who grew up in Cincinnati and most certainly does not have a Southern drawl. The next year he endorsed Bill Clinton by saying, "I can tell you he knows how to speak cracker". In 2008, Clinton himself spoke about drawing up the "cracker vote" for Obama in Florida.

There are a lot of restaurants around here that serve "cracker" fare and some that even use it in the name. The best, and best known, is Southern Charm (formerly Checkers BBQ) on Old St. Augustine Road, run by Art Jennette, who talks about the art of cracker cooking.

Now, if a restaurant is going to call itself "Florida Cracker", it'll be expected to have some cracker cooking in addition to the general Southern fare you can get everywhere. Maybe some pilau. Whiting, catfish, or an acceptable equivalent. Good cornbread, if not cornpone. And being Jacksonville, there better be shrimp, and it damn sure better be local.

I'm looking forward to this. As RockStar says, the building will be a nice improvement over the eyesore that was there before and should be a great addition to an area that's sorely lacking. Good luck, y'all.

[DTJAXEYE]

Why not just name it the "Peckerwood Cafe" and have done with it? I would never patronize a business that mocks and degrades a person's race or social standing.

[fsujax]

Check out the episode of Bizarre Food with Andrew Zimmern, he did an entire show on Florida which included a segment on Florida Cracker style food culture and the Seminole Indian Tribe.

[spuwho]

When I first moved here my kids would play Andrew Jackson twice a year and their players would call them "crackers" all the time. Then once I was called a cracker by someone in a Zaxbys by JIA, and by the tone of his voice, I took it to be something derogatory.

So until Acme and Tach explained it to this silly Yankee, I didnt know what it truly meant. Now I know.

[acme54321]

I'd like to know how some people came to use it as a deragatory term myself.

[Tacachale]

When I first moved here my kids would play Andrew Jackson twice a year and their players would call them "crackers" all the time. Then once I was called a cracker by someone in a Zaxbys by JIA, and by the tone of his voice, I took it to be something derogatory.

So until Acme and Tach explained it to this silly Yankee, I didnt know what it truly meant. Now I know.

It's one of those words where context is really important. When used as a self-designation or in a celebratory way (like in the name of a restaurant), it's not derogatory. But the word has derogatory senses that have been around for longer than it has been used for back-country Southerners. In the past and still sometimes today, a person might be called a "cracker" or "white cracker" in reference to their lower-class background, similar to "white trash" or "redneck", and that is derogatory. And in most of the country, the word is best known for its use by some African-Americans as a derogatory term for a white bigot, or any white person. There, it's basically a racial slur, though a fairly mild one as those things go. A driver once hit me with his car and laughingly called me "cracker" as he sped off, and I don't think he was saying either that I was poor or that I had cattle-driving ancestry.

But as a self designation, and in uses like "cracker cooking", "cracker architecture, the Florida Cracker breed of horse, and the like, it's a traditional, conventional term, and I hope that the derogatory senses don't cause people to avoid using it in the positive senses.