Gainesville is home and so hard to rate. It's changed so much over the years, and sometimes…read moreunrecognizable. Graduation and the annual Nutcracker performance at the Phillips Center, plays at the Hippodrome, UF cheer and basketball camps at the O'Connell Center, proms held at the Women's Club, walking in the Gator parade, and UF homecoming being a local, public school holiday-- because #GatorNation. The Harn Museum of Art and Reitz Union after-school visits while waiting for my mom to get off work. It's a small, hipster, college town that's so full of art and culture. Now, I can liken it to having a tiny "keep Austin weird" -ish vibe. All in all-- Ode to Gainesville-- the backdrop of my childhood, and the occasional nostalgia-filled stomping grounds of my adulthood! Fave spots: The Top Sidecar/V Pizza Baby J's Dragonfly Mojo's Public & General Satchels Pizza Cheers!

For many, the city of Glainesville, Florida is known best as where Tom Petty came from. Others…read moreembrace it as the college town that it is. Gainesville, Florida was established in 1854 and was named in honor of Edmund Pendleton Gaines. Gainesville was incorporated in 1869 and chartered as a city in 1907. Gainesville has a lot going on for it and while the area around the university can be a bit crazy traffic-wise, it for the most part is an enjoyable place. Business takes me here somewhat frequently and I do have my favorite places to grab a meal and they have some nice parks to walk. Whatever your reasons might be to find yourself in Gainesville, Florida, I am sure you can make this an overall positive experience. Gainesville, Florida has come a long way since it was established in 1854 and Gainesville will continue to evolve and move forward.

Such a proactive and positive place with so many resources and people who follow through with the…read moreassistance they're able to give. pls support this place. (At a show they went out of their way to find me to give me the emergency contraceptive I asked for much earlier in the night) wow 10/10

This is a great meeting/event/organization space. It is spacious and has tables and chairs…read moreavailable. Media-wise, there are a LOT of resources here. There are tons of magazines, books, encyclopedias, journals, zines and other printed materials on subjects from labor to racism to grassroots organizing. If you are looking to get involved in any sort of liberal cause come here and find your people.

Gator Stompin' is one of the great traditions of Gainesville. When you buy your ticket, you get a…read moret shirt that is your free admission into several bars in Gainesville as well as some tokens for food and drinks. I had 10 tokens when I went and that was more than enough to get all the food and drinks I wanted. Basically you barhop among the bars of midtown and downtown with thousands of your closest friends and Gator fans! Also, there is traditionally a kickoff concert/event in Bo Diddley Plaza with food trucks and drinks available. I've never heard anyone say a negative word about Gator Stompin' (and I've been when it was pouring rain)! Do yourself a favor and check out what it's all about!

Located along SR24, this marker is the pointer in front of the Haile Homestead and is easily…read moreaccessible from the road. You might not be touring the homestead but reading the marker at least gives you an idea of what you can expect. It reads, "One of the oldest houses in Alachua County, the Historic Haile Homestead was the home of Thomas Evans Haile, his wife Esther Serena Chesnut Haile and 14 of their children. The Hailes came here from Camden, South Carolina in 1854 to establish a 1,500-acre Sea Island Cotton plantation which they named Kanapaha. Enslaved black craftsmen completed the 6,200-square-foot manse in 1856. The 1860 census showed 66 slaves living here. The Hailes survived bankruptcy in 1868 and turned the property into a productive farm, growing a variety of fruits and vegetables including oranges. Serena Haile died in 1895; Thomas in 1896. The Homestead, which passed to son Evans, a prominent defense attorney, became the site of house parties attended by some of Gainesville's most distinguished citizens. The Hailes had the unusual habit of writing on the walls; all together over 12,500 words with the oldest writing dating to the 1850's. The Homestead was placed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1986. A restoration was completed in 1996. Still partly owned by descendants of Evans Haile, the Homestead is one of the few remaining homesteads built by Sea Island cotton planters in this part of Florida." It is marker number F-548 and it was erected in 2005 by the Historic Haile Homestead and the Florida Department of State. It was too early in the morning to tour the home. Maybe the next time I'm in Gainesville. [Review 364 of 2025 - 2016 in Florida - 23926 overall]

This plantation house, built in 1854, is a national historic landmark, maintained by the Haile…read morefamily and a public historical foundation. It is open 10-2 Saturday and 12-4 Sunday. It's $5 to get in, which includes a guided tour. Can you even comprehend the value?! Oh, the value! The most interesting thing about the house isn't that it's pre-civil war, but that there are names, dates, records, and more scrawled across the walls. The Haile family who lived there were evidently encouraged to practice their handwriting on the walls. My favorite scrawling reads "THE HOUSE WAS BRIEFLY ALIVE." There's so much material written, though, that you're likely to find something even better.

Century Tower is an icon of the UF campus. It can be heard on the hour or when the carillon studio…read morehas students performing music on the bells. Great place for photo ops for those visiting or graduating on campus.

As a proud double Gator, Century Tower has served as a beacon of hope. It represents the heights…read moreyou can reach with whatever you decide to purse at the University of Florida. Located in the center of campus, it demonstrates the fact that everything you decide to do is within reach after leaving the Gator Nation. It is a symbol for our university and is a beautiful one at that. You can sometimes hear your favorite tunes chiming from its bells, offering a reminder of how Florida Gators like to be whimsical and silly sometimes too. It stands tall and can be seen anywhere from campus like the Gator Nation which can be found anywhere. It is a part of our tradition keeper book, so at the end of every semester you are allowed to climb it and explore the inside. It serves as a meeting place, a memory and an icon for our fine university and I'm glad that it greets me every morning as I make my way to campus. Go Gators!!

Like the Stolpersteine I have seen across Europe when on vacation, these blue "Lynching in America"…read moreare jarring when you're on vacation. It's a reminder that no matter how much fun you're having, there were dark times in our history and they should be remembered. This marker is on the grounds of the Alachua County Courthouse and the front reads, "After the Civil War, constitutional rights were granted to Black people ensuring equal protection and voting. Many white leaders responded to the emancipation of Black people by violently seeking to maintain racial, economic, and social control over Black residents. By ceding political control back to Confederate veterans, federal officials allowed white southerners opposed to racial equality to re-establish white supremacy through intimidation and violence. Thousands of Black men, women, and children were lynched during Reconstruction, with dozens of large-scale massacres of Black communities between 1865 and 1876. This terror persisted after Reconstruction, largely with impunity. Lynchings of Black people included burnings and mutilation, sometimes in front of crowds numbering in the thousands. Lynch mobs would often seize their victims from jails, courtrooms, or from police, without fear of any legal repercussions. Many names of those whose lives were claimed by these acts of racially motivated violence were not recorded and will never be known, but at least 6,500 racial terror lynchings were documented in the United States between 1865 and 1950. Florida had one of the highest per capita lynching rates in the nation with at least 343 documented victims lynched and at least 12 Black people lynched in Gainesville. This marker honors the victims of this tragic racial terror violence in our community." And the reverse, "The era of Reconstruction following the Civil War opened with great promise in Gainesville but soon gave way to racial terror, unparalleled violence, and racial oppression. White mobs lynched at least eight Black people during this period: Harry Franklin 1868; Mr. Stephens 1868; an Unnamed Person 1870; Christopher Cummings 1870; Henry Washington 1871; Alexander Morris 1871; Sandy Hacock 1871 and Eli in 1874. After Emancipation, Black people made up a majority of the population in Gainesville and opened businesses, churches, and organized political engagement. They advocated for public education, land ownership, and the right to vote. White people hoping to maintain the racial hierarchy that existed during enslavement attacked and lynched Black people for asserting their rights, leaving plantations, participating in politics, working toward economic independence, violating white social customs, being accused of crimes, or for sheer racial terror that was random and arbitrary. In 1874, a white mob set fire to the local jail to lynch a black man named Eli by burning him to death. This type of violence was accommodated by courts, law enforcement, and white officials who removed African Americans from juries, seized Black-owned land, and suppressed Black voting rights, while ignoring or even supporting white mobs who terrorized Black communities. Racial violence continued to terrorize the Black community for decades. The marker was erected in 2021 by Alachua County Community Remembrance Project - Equal Justice Initiative. Dark times, indeed. [Review 358 of 2025 - 2010 in Florida - 23920 overall]

Old highschool being made useful…read more Thats right, the Levy county clerk of court is in the old Bronson High School, making the halls noisy again. We went to pay our land tax, to renew our licenses and get our fishing licenses too. All was handled efficiently and wirh a smile.

Levy County was established in 1845 just a week after Florida officially became a state. It was…read morenamed after David Levy Yulee (Yulee is a city in Nassau County, northeast Florida), a prominent businessman and politician who played a key role in Florida's early development. The county was originally inhabited by Native American tribes, including the Timucuan and Seminole peoples, before European settlers arrived. During the 19th century, Levy County became an important hub for timber, agriculture, and transportation, with the construction of the Florida Railroad linking the Atlantic Ocean to the Gulf of Mexico. The county seat was initially located in Levyville before being moved to Bronson in 1874. The first courthouse in Bronson was built in 1874, after the county seat was moved from Levyville (about 10 miles west). This courthouse is a redbrick Classical Revival-style building and was constructed in 1937. It is the fourth courthouse in Levy County and the third one in Bronson. Some materials from the 1906 courthouse were incorporated into the 1937 structure. On a Sunday morning, it was completely secured and locked up. There is street parking and an adjacent lot. [Review 366 of 2025 - 2018 in Florida - 23928 overall]

There are so many great things to say about this place. The concept most people know about, and…read morethey carry so many different varieties of media and offerings that we already pay for that it's truly a shame that we don't take more advantage, myself included. The folks in this facility are always so incredibly pleasant and very very helpful . They are of course part of the larger Alachua county Netwerk, so you can get virtually anything you can imagine and they do it quickly. The facility has decent hours, it's always clean, and the service is usually pretty darn good.

Nice quiet library . Not many activities for little ones…read more/under 3 but there are couple of tablets .