The Laura (Riding) Jackson Foundation celebrated its 30th-anniversary with a real chuckle fest, drawing a packed house to the Community Church of Vero Beach for (LOL) Laughing Out Loud with Carl Hiaasen.
During her welcome, Marie Stiefel, LRJF president, shared that having a sister who is a writer and documentary filmmaker has given her a great respect for the effort it takes to produce a good poem, book or film, and said that she was hooked after learning about all the foundation does to nurture writers of all ages.
“The support of writers, together with my interest in caring for the environment and preserving history, as we do with Laura’s 1910 house, attracted me to this foundation,” said Stiefel.
“This year, LRJF is celebrating 30 years of service to this community. Something that seems so remarkable when we recall our first days as a small group of people, passionate to save a house and the incredible literary legacy of Laura’s work.”
Over the past 30 years, she said, LRJF has preserved the historic ‘Cracker’ style home of Laura (Riding) Jackson, a noted poet of the 20th century. The nonprofit lovingly moved the house and pole barn to its current location on the Mueller campus of Indian River State College and planted a native Florida garden there. The foundation offers literary-based adult and teen writers’ programs and workshops, and hosts fundraising events so that all can rejoice in the love of language.
Xaque Gruber introduced the “renowned newsman and novelist,” Carl Hiaasen, and noted that this was the single largest fundraiser for LRJF in its 30-year history.
Hiaasen, a Florida native and Vero Beach resident, had a storied career as a Miami Herald columnist, which gave him endless fodder to humorously address environmental issues and political corruption in his numerous Florida-based novels over the years. Two of his novels, “Striptease” and “Hoot,” have been made into feature films, and an Apple TV series starring Vince Vaughn, based on “Bad Monkey,” is scheduled to air sometime this year.
Hiaasen said his writing style evolved during his newspaper years, noting, “You write every day so that muscle gets pretty tuned up and then I would go home at night and work on the books.”
Miami in the ’70s, ’80s and ’90s provided him with a mountain of material for books, including stories that struck him as “bizarre and warped,” such as men sleeping with alligators, the theft of nativity figures, a woman who hid a baby gator in her pants, and even the theft of a foot stolen from a car accident.
As a satirist Hiaasen said he takes the ridiculous and cranks it up a notch. For instance, his book “Razor Girl” was inspired by a car accident in the Keys that was caused by a woman who had been shaving her “private parts” while driving.
“I have lived in Vero for about 17 or 18 years. There’s not a lot of headlines that come out of Vero or this area compared to what the rest of the state generates. That’s probably why a lot of us live here,” he added.
On April 22, LRJF will host its 12th annual Poetry & Barbecue fundraiser. For more information, visit lrjf.org.
Photos provided
