Eva Hirschenstein Appelbaum survived the Holocaust
in Yugoslavia, moved to the United States and has written
a book on how Italian soldiers helped save Jews during
World War II. She will read from her book at 5  p.m.
March 8 at the Highland Beach Library. Photo by Tim Stepien

In 1941, a little Yugoslavian girl watched from her window as German tanks rolled down the street in Zagreb, where her family lived. Eva Hirschenstein was 7 and had no idea about the haunting events to follow.

It wasn’t long before her family was on the run from Nazis, managing to escape death camps through strokes of luck and with help from many kind souls along the way — particularly, she said, the Italian army.

Before her mother packed their two suitcases, she pulled apart the seams of her daughter’s teddy bear, hid money inside, and sewed it back together. As the family moved from place to place, the money was never discovered. 

She and her parents made it through WWII, despite several close calls, but her grandmother, uncle and stepfather died in an extermination camp close to Zagreb. Many family friends also perished.

Dr. Eva Hirschenstein Appelbaum chronicles those events in her book, Free Confinement: Survival in Europe 1942-1945 (available at Amazon.com).

“It’s about how my parents and I, a Jewish family, escaped from Nazi-occupied Yugoslavia and were protected by [members of] the Italian army by whatever means necessary,” the Highland Beach woman said. She wants to let people know how Italian soldiers risked their lives to save Jews.

“My memoir took many years to complete,” she said. “It is a very emotional subject for me. I write several days a week, usually in the evening, for an hour or two. I am now writing the sequel about growing up in Rome as a refugee.”

A third book will cover her move from Rome, where she went to medical school and met her husband, Dr. Jerry Appelbaum (an oncologist) to New York, where she worked as neurologist and teacher until a few years ago. 

She began making notes for the booking the early 1970s, when Holocaust recollections surfaced.

The story was worth telling, she wrote in the book’s introduction,  “first, because my parents and I managed to escape death …; second, to relate how a young child experienced these harrowing events, often finding more adventure than fear; and third, to preserve these memories for my children and grandchildren.”

When she went to medical school there were few women studying to become doctors, but Appelbaum graduated with honors. 

She and her husband, who is also retired, spend winters in Highland Beach, where she enjoys leisurely strolls on the beach, sculpting and writing.  She speaks five languages.

Appelbaum, 77, still has the teddy bear that stored her family’s cash during those difficult times seven decades ago. “I call him by the Serbo-Croatian equivalent of teddy bear, which is medek,” she said. “He sits high on a small bookcase in my Manhattan apartment.” 

 — Mary Thurwachter

Q. Where did you grow up and go to school?

A. After my parents and I escaped from German-occupied Yugoslavia, I grew up in Rome, Italy, where I went to school and graduated from medical school. 

 Q. What are some highlights of your life?

A. The birth of my three children and my two little granddaughters.

Q. How did you choose to make your home in Highland Beach?

A. My husband and I came to visit relatives and, driving along A1A, I fell in love with the beachfront. Delray reminded me of summer resorts in Italy.

Q. What is your favorite part about living in Highland Beach?

A. Warm weather, friendly people, walking on the beach, collecting seashells and pretty stones. Also, barbecuing and looking at the beautiful sunsets.

Q. If someone made a movie of your life, who would you like to play you and why?

A. Helen Mirren; I watched her in Prime Suspect and [portraying] Queen Elizabeth and find her very versatile.

Q. What music do you listen to when you need inspiration? When you want to relax? 

A. Mostly classical music, Mozart, Beethoven.

Q. Do you have a favorite quote that inspires your decisions?

A. “To thyself be true.”

Q. Have you had mentors in your life? Individuals who have inspired your life decisions?

A. My art teacher in high school, my parents, a professor in medical school and Bruno, someone I talk about in my memoir.

Q. What’s the last book you read and would you recommend it?

A. The Tiger’s Wife, by Tea Obreht. It is by a very young American writer from Serbia who illustrates the 1992 war in Yugoslavia with magic realism and stories within stories. I recommended it to all my friends.

Q. Who or what makes you laugh? 

A. My favorite movie — Arsenic and Old Lace — and Saturday Night Live.

A girl’s best friend sparkles in a darker way

White and chocolate diamond starfish brooch is set in 18k
white gold. It was custom-made for a local couple at Jewelry Artisans. 

  Photos by Tim Stepien

By Paula Detwiller

Here’s some Valentine’s Day logic (listen up, guys):  Diamonds are a girl’s best friend. Women love chocolate. Therefore, 

women ought to love chocolate diamonds, right?

Well … yes and no. 

First, a little background.

“Chocolate diamonds” refers to brown-colored diamonds, mined mainly in Australia, but also found in Russia, Africa and Canada. For years, brown diamonds were seen as inferior — a byproduct used in sandpaper, sparkly ceiling tiles and industrial cutting equipment.

Then, a brilliant idea emerged in the diamond industry: Let’s turn these lowly brown gemstones into a sought-after, high-end commodity. In 2000, the world-renowned Le Vian jewelry company coined the now-trademarked name “chocolate diamonds,” and a fashion trend was born.

“Brown diamond doesn’t sound nearly as yummy as chocolate diamond,” acknowledges Gemological Institute of America graduate Emi Ebben, manager of Manalapan’s Jewelry Artisans Inc. She says diamonds are naturally formed in a variety of colors, including blue, pink, yellow, green and black. But until recently, there wasn’t a mass market for colored diamonds.

Harry Bhagia, owner of Harry’s Designer Jewels in Boca Raton’s Royal Palm Place, says exotic color names can make all the difference.

“Fifty years ago, if you gave someone a yellow diamond, they wouldn’t want it,” Bhagia said. “Then the industry started calling them Canary Diamonds, and women looked at them in a whole new light.”

Of course, our celebrity culture also influences trends.

“If Angelina Jolie is seen on TV tomorrow wearing a chocolate diamond ring, it will triple the sales,” Bhagia said.

That’s partly why, local jewelers say, it’s the younger women who are most interested in chocolate diamonds today. Another reason: the lower price point. Large stones in the chocolate color are a rarity in nature, so much of the jewelry is made with pavé settings, using many small, brilliant-cut stones. Such pieces occupy the niche known as fashion jewelry, which is usually less expensive than fine jewelry. 

Ella Riggs, owner of Lake Worth Jewelers, has mostly older, wealthy customers who buy diamonds for their investment value. “My customers aren’t asking for chocolate diamonds, nor have they ever,” Riggs said. “In my opinion, it’s the poorest investment anyone could ever make.”

That opinion is not deterring the fashion jewelry sector, which continues to concoct new commercial names for brown diamonds. 

This 1 carat diamond leaf ring, which contains both white and chocolate

stones, is $1,479 at Harry’s Designer Jewels in Boca Raton.

Designer Charles Krypell, whose jewelry is represented at Kientzy Jewelers in coastal Delray Beach, has a new line of “mocha” diamond pieces. And to distinguish between varying shades of brown diamonds, gemologists refer to champagne (light brown), clove (greenish brown), cinnamon (reddish brown), and cognac (orangey brown) diamonds. It’s easy to forget we’re talking about the world’s hardest rock and not a dessert menu.

Whether the diamond is white or brown(ish), the “4 Cs” grading system still applies: carat weight, color, clarity, cut.  Ebben of Jewelry Artisans says a good-sized brown diamond with an intense color and a beautiful cut would be very valuable.

“Chocolate diamonds can be stunning,” Ebben said. “They have such a warm tone, especially when paired with rose gold and white diamond accents.”

And now we’ve gotten to the heart of the matter. The desire for chocolate diamonds, like chocolate itself, all boils down to taste.         

This 1 carat chocolate diamond pendant sells for $5,700 at Harry’s Designer Jewels. 

Where to find chocolate diamonds

Altier Jewelers

701 S. Federal Highway

Boca Raton

395-3462

www.altierjewelers.com

Harry’s Designer Jewels

300 Esplanade, 

Royal Palm Place

Boca Raton

393-9899

www.harrysdesigner
jewels.com

ZO Diamonds East

4251 N. Federal Highway

Boca Raton

353-3278

www.zodiamondseast.com

Kientzy & Co. Fine Jewelers 

1053 E. Atlantic Ave.

Delray Beach

272-4545

www.kientzy.com

Jewelry Artisans Inc. 

Plaza Del Mar

247 S. Ocean Blvd.

Manalapan

586-8687

www.jewelryartisans
palmbeach.com

With 40 years of experience at Disney World, the Ocean Reef Club
and the Atlantis Country Club, Jim Simon has settled in at
St. Andrews Club. Photo by Kurtis Boggs

By Steve Pike

Jim Simon and the St. Andrews Club are a perfect match. Each is classy, understated and comes with a fine history. The club, with its 18-hole, par-54 golf course, was founded in 1971 and has become one of the area’s most popular winter destinations for not only golf, but also games such as bridge, backgammon, tennis and croquet.

“One of our members calls this ‘Camp St. Andrews,’ ” said Simon, the club’s head professional. His 40 years of experience includes Disney World, Ocean Reef Club in Key Largo, Atlantis Country Club and, since 2000, St. Andrews Club.

Simon’s golf story began ingloriously in 1968. En route to Palm Beach Gardens to caddy for golf professional Jim Jamieson (Simon and Jamieson were each from Moline, Ill.) at PGA Tour Qualifying School, Simon’s car broke down in Orlando. 

“Jim went to Palm Beach Gardens but I couldn’t do that,” Simon said from behind his desk inside the St. Andrews pro shop he and his wife, Pat, own and operate. “I was broke and needed a job.”

Simon found a job 40 miles from Orlando and light years away from golf. He started working as a tour guide at the Kennedy Space Center.

“It was during the launches to the moon, so that was fun and exciting,” Simon said.

For the next three years, Simon played golf “for fun,” and in 1971 heard about this new place in Orlando called Disney World. He was hired as the equivalent of an assistant professional and later would help his fellow Disney golf professionals get into the PGA Apprentice program — the first step to becoming a full-fledged PGA professional.

“It was fun — a great opportunity to learn the Disney system,” Simon said. “I still go back to some of those lessons I learned.”

For example, Simon said, “They do things right; they don’t cut corners. Cleanliness and neatness is their forte. That’s the No. 1 things people comment about. And customer service, making sure their guests are happy.

“They’re there to serve the customers and make it as pleasant as possible. That’s a philosophy I’ve tried to carry through my career.”

St. Andrews Club, nestled just off A1A near Gulf Stream, has approximately 300 members, most of whom are there only during the winter months. The course and other amenities are open year-round, but services, such as the golf pro shop and food and beverage, are only open during the winter season.

“We have a great membership. That’s the key,” Simon said. “And I teach quite a bit during the season. My philosophy is I try to help each individual with their specific needs — try to make them feel like they have better opportunity to hit fewer bad shots. That gets them to enjoy the game and feel as though they’ve improved, even if it’s just a few shots here and there.

“That’s why golf is such a great game. It can bring so many different abilities together and be in competition with the handicap system. I think that’s what makes golf fun.”          

Psychotherapist Elaine Donaghue (right) of Ocean Ridge
and Sherry Weinschenk at the Center for Healing and
Expressive Arts in Delray Beach.   Photo by Kurtis Boggs 

By Paula Detwiller

Can participating in an art-related exercise be as cathartic as a session on the psychotherapist’s couch? 

Elaine Donaghue of Ocean Ridge believes it can. A local psychotherapist since 1993, Donaghue recently expanded her practice to include a new technique called expressive arts therapy, which has roots in both art and psychology. 

“Expressive arts therapy can bring out things we’re not consciously aware of, such as repressed memories of abuse or neglect,” Donaghue says. “It can be more effective for some patients than talk therapy.”

After becoming certified at the Expressive Arts Florida Institute in Sarasota, Donaghue and her longtime friend and colleague Sherry Weinschenk decided to bring this therapeutic technique to southeast Florida. They opened the Center for Healing and Expressive Arts in Delray Beach’s Atlantic Plaza last May. Both are licensed clinical social workers. Weinschenk, of Lake Worth, is a social work instructor at Florida Atlantic University in Boca Raton. 

So how does expressive arts therapy differ from traditional art therapy?

“Art therapy in the traditional sense is all about the product,” Donaghue says. “The patient draws a picture and the therapist interprets it. But expressive arts is more about the experience. It’s the experience of art — whether through visual art, drama, music, movement, writing or guided meditation — that taps into the unconscious and allows suppressed information to surface.”

In this way, expressive arts therapy is another tool in the Freudian psychoanalysis toolkit alongside hypnosis, dream interpretation, and childhood-memory mining.  

“The process of artistic expression may bring up a past injury that’s been repressed, and because it’s been brought up, you realize, OK, this is still going on for me,” Donaghue says. “And it may be impacting your life in ways you don’t realize. The patient then has the opportunity to take that into a traditional therapy session and work on it.”

Not everyone is thrilled to try it. When the women in Donaghue and Weinschenk’s group therapy class were told it was “expressive arts night,” one of them, a client from Jupiter, protested.

“I said, ‘I don’t have a creative bone in my body. If I’d known we were going to do this, I wouldn’t have come tonight,’ ” the Jupiter client told me. 

But midway through the arts exercise, which involved selecting an object from a basket and depicting the feelings it evoked, she said she became aware of inner feelings that guided her to an important realization. Later, in the group discussion period, she cried tears of relief.

“I don’t know when I would have gotten to that point in our regular therapy,” she said. “I tend to be a private person, not showing my feelings. It was a positive experience.”

Weinschenk likens expressive arts therapy to physical exercise. “You’re never that crazy about going to the gym, but afterwards you’re happy you went,” she says.

The Center for Healing and Expressive Arts recently contracted with HomeSafe, a West Palm Beach-based nonprofit, to help victims of domestic violence “process” their history through the use of expressive arts therapy. The center also offers a variety of art classes apart from therapy of any kind, for those who wish to experience art for art’s sake. 

To learn more, contact Center for Healing and Expressive Arts 777 E. Atlantic Ave., Suite B-4, Delray Beach, FL 33483; 279-2727;
www.healingandexpressivearts.com

Paula Detwiller is a freelance writer and lifelong fitness junkie. Find her at www.pdwrites.com.

Retired pastor Dr. Ronald Siegenthaler of Delray Beach

led the nondenominational service in the Briny Breezes

auditorium on Jan. 22.  Photo by Jerry Lower

By Tim Pallesen 

Regis Philbin will be keynote speaker for the 10th Annual Prayer Breakfast to benefit the Young Men’s Christian Association of South Palm Beach County.

“I am delighted by this year’s legendary guest and know it will be a breakfast to remember,” event organizer Yvonne Boice said.

Philbin, 80, is a popular talk and game show host who rose to fame in 1985 with Live! With Regis and Kathy Lee.
The YMCA’s newest trustee, Marv Russell, got Philbin as speaker. “Without his help, we would not have been able to secure our spectacular speaker,” YMCA executive director Dick Pollack said.
Tickets are $75 for the 8:30 a.m. breakfast at the Boca Raton Resort & Club. Call (561) 237-0944 or see www.ymcaspbc.org for details.
The annual breakfast is the largest fundraiser for the YMCA, averaging 500 attendees each year. Past inspirational speakers have included football coaches and Tim Tebow’s parents.
“As we celebrate our 10th anniversary, we can take pride in having developed a significant event that unites the community and attracts stellar nationally recognized speakers,” Boice said.

Sabrina Ginsberg with her grandmother Susan Marks. Photo provided

Sabrina Ginsberg’s flash mob dazzled her rabbi as an act of kindness for her mitzvah project.
The 12-year-old Boynton Beach girl recruited 60 friends to perform a surprise dance to honor her grandmother at a community Hanukkah celebration. Rabbi Anthony Fratello of Temple Shaarei Shalom had encouraged Sabrina to find a mitzvah project that spoke to her.
“I did a flash mob because my grandmother has Parkinson’s disease and loves to dance,” Sabrina said.
The mitzvah project raised $2,100 for the South Florida Parkinson’s Association.
“This is utterly unique in my rabbinic experience,” Rabbi Fratello said afterward.

Many temples teach teens that the Jewish ritual can be an important social action in becoming a responsible adult.
Sabrina’s friends donated to her cause when they gathered Dec. 17 at the Ross Jewish Community Center to rehearse their flash mob dance. Sabrina and her grandmother, Susan Marks, demonstrated the dance steps.
The 60 dancers then surprised the crowd of 1,000 the next day at the JCC’s annual community Hanukkah celebration at the Canyon Town Center Amphitheater in Boynton Beach.
As a nice interfaith twist, Sabrina’s idea attracted 10 students and teachers from St. Mark Catholic School to dance in the flash mob.
“What better way to come together than a random act of kindness?” St. Mark teacher Elizabeth Eubanks asked.

Worship at Briny Breezes Community Church — the south county’s only seasonal church — starts in November when the snowbirds arrive and ends when they leave after Easter.
“We’re for people who might not go to a regular church service but would go here because it’s convenient,” long-time member Betty Foland explained.
Mostly retirees live in the 485 trailer homes that compose this oceanfront hamlet.
“The church is here for the spiritual needs of the people,” Foland said. “Some come in wheelchairs and walkers.”
A rotation of part-time pastors take turns delivering the sermon.
One is the Rev. Ray Brower, who has preached the first and third Sundays in Briny Breezes since he retired as pastor of Boca Raton Community Church in 1992.
“I get them all pumped up on my Sunday and then say I’ll see you in two weeks,” laughed Brower, who also makes house calls and hospital visits.
Mike Bingham, manager for religious radio station WRMB in Boynton Beach, delivers the Easter sermon each year.
All are welcome at the 10:30 a.m. nondenominational service in the Briny Breezes auditorium.
“We discourage our pastors from talking denomination or doctrine,” Foland said. “We just want them to talk about Jesus.”
Brower said pastors are careful to do that. “Everyone can come and feel free to worship,” he said. “Nothing is going to offend them.”

Tim Pallesen writes about people of faith, their congregations, causes and community events. Email him at tcpallesen@aol.com.

Rich Anderson, director of the Peggy Adams Animal
Rescue League, found out that his pooches Rex and
Roxie are a mix of Chihuahua annd Yorkie.  Photo provided

By Arden Moore

Each February, more than 185 different breeds vie for Best in Show honors at the prestigious Westminster Show sponsored by the American Kennel Club at Madison Square Garden in New York City.  I suspect many of you will be rooting for your favorite breed (my vote goes to the yet-to-win Pembroke Welsh corgi) as you tune into this two-day televised event.

Last year, a Scottish deerhound named Hickory reigned as top dog. In the days that followed, searches for Scottish deerhound spiked on Google and other search engines.

But any time is a good time to champion the cause for the true all-American breed — the marvelous mutt, the canine cocktail. 

A friend of mine playfully refers to dogs of mysterious lineage as “who’s-your-daddy-who’s-your-momma” dogs. Thanks to advance in veterinary medicine and the completion of the canine genome project, we now can identify most dogs’ family trees using easy-to-use DNA identification kits.

Not sure if your lovable mutt is a melody of bichon frise and miniature poodle or a beautiful blend of shih tzu and Norwich terrier? You can find out for certain — and benefit the Peggy Adams Animal Rescue League in the process.

Here’s how: For $65, you can purchase a Wisdom Panel Insights Mixed Breed Identification DNA test kit from this limited-access humane society that has been in Palm Beach County since 1925. A portion of the proceeds will be donated to this shelter that depends on donations — not tax dollars — to keep its doors open and to keep expanding services.

This DNA kit makes for ideal gifts for that hard-to-buy-pet lover in your life or can be given for a favorite dog’s birthday or for other special holiday. 

Rich Anderson, executive director at Peggy Adams, knew his dog, Hank, is a golden retriever and suspected that Rex and Roxi are siblings with Chihuahua and Yorkshire terrier heritage. Just to make sure, he did the cheek swabs on Rex and Roxi, followed the directions provided in the DNA kit, mailed in the samples and received the results a few weeks later from the Mars Veterinary lab.

“The DNA test did confirm that they are Yorkie-Chihuahuas and it was good to know their breeds,” says Anderson.

Shelter assistant director Heidi Nielsen performed the DNA test on her beloved mutt, Ollie, an 80-pound dog who struck out four times in homes before being adopted by her four years ago.

“Until I had his DNA tested, I always referred to Ollie as my marvelous mutt when people would ask me what kind of dog he was,” says Nielsen. “Now I can say that one of his parents was German shepherd; another parent was cocker spaniel with wired-haired griffon. I never would have guessed those breeds, but knowing it now makes perfect sense when I consider his coat, his stature and his activity level.”

Peggy Adams is the first in Palm Beach County — and only among 65 shelters across the country — to offer pet owners a scientific way to identify the various breeds in their dogs.

Knowing your dog’s breeds provides many benefits. You can work more closely with your veterinarian to be on the lookout for early signs of certain inherited disorders. For example, Cavalier King Charles spaniels and great Danes are at genetic risks for developing heart disease. Alaskan malamutes and beagles are prone to glaucoma. Australian shepherds and Italian greyhounds have greater propensity for epilepsy.

Knowing your dog’s breed pool can also help you target his training plan and select a nutrition plan that fulfills the dietary needs of his specific breeds. 

If you know your dog’s family tree, you can still help out the shelter by donating money to cover the cost of these DNA kits to be used on dogs awaiting adoption at the shelter.

“By donating to cover the cost of these DNA kits, we can use them on the dogs here at our shelter so we can have a better idea of their breeds, and that can help us them adopted more quickly,” says Anderson.

Here’s your chance to take the mystery out of mutts, but retain their marvelous personalities. 

Peggy Adams Animal Rescue League’s DNA test kit
Purchase a Wisdom Panel Insights Mixed Breed Identification DNA test kit for $65. A portion of the proceeds will be donated to the shelter located at 3200 N Military Trail in West Palm Beach. For more information, call 686-3663.

Walk for the Animals    

Lace up your sneakers, leash your dog and mark your calendar to participate in the 11th annual Walk for the Animals on March 10. This one-mile fun walk will be held Downtown at the Gardens in Palm Beach Gardens to benefit the Peggy Adams Rescue League.  You can register on the shelter’s website, www.hspb.org.

Arden Moore, founder of FourLeggedLife.com, is an animal behavior consultant, editor, author, professional speaker and certified pet first aid instructor. She happily shares her home with two dogs, two cats and one overworked vacuum cleaner. Tune in to her Oh Behave! show on PetLifeRadio.com and learn more by visiting www.fourleggedlife.com.

Aaron Medow puts in his kayak with the other Tuesday/Thursday Paddlers at 

Harvey E. Oyer Jr.  Park in Boynton Beach to paddle along the Intracoastal
Waterway. Photo by Tim Stepien

By Deborah S. Hartz-Seeley

Whether you are in search of great blues (herons), roseate spoonbills, alligators, manatees, mangroves or mega mansions, your kayak is a great way to see them.

South Florida is veined with canals, lakes and waterways that are perfect for paddling. In fact, our area is part of the Florida Circumnavigational Saltwater Paddling Trail.

It begins at Big Lagoon State Park near Pensacola, heads south along the west coast of the state, covers the Keys and then makes its way up the east coast to Fort Clinch State Park near the Georgia border. 

A natural wonder, the trail passes through every coastal Florida habitat from barrier island dunes to salt marshes and mangroves.  

The 1,515-mile trail is made up of 26 segments. Palm Beach County is included in segment 18 (Pompano Beach to Lake Worth) and segment 19 (Lake Worth to Jonathan Dickinson State Park).

For local paddlers, segments of this trail, as well as other paddling adventures, are easy to access from the many marinas and parks in our area. 

My husband, David Seeley, has been kayaking throughout South Florida for over 15 years. He goes with an informal group that meets every Tuesday and Thursday to paddle our waterways.

With his assistance, we’ve put together this guide to local put-ins and the paddles they offer (listed in order south to north). These are easily accessible, offer a variety of amenities and, best of all, they are the starting points for many pleasant paddles. 

Just for fun, we’ve included latitude and longitude coordinates so you can find these put-ins with your GPS or on navigational charts. 

Of course, these trips are good for canoes and paddle boards as well as kayaks. So throw your boat on your car, pack your paddle, and we’ll see you on the water.

Pioneer Park

217 NE Fifth Ave.
Deerfield Beach
954-480-4433

N 26 19.279’ 

W 80 05.811’

Website

Although it’s a little bit of a ride into Broward County, the potential paddles make travel to this spot worthwhile. You can head south, paddle under Federal Highway and end up in the Intracoastal Waterway.

But first, take a detour through the canals of Royal Palm Yacht & Country Club. You’ll be impressed by the money spent on backyards.

Also, check out Deerfield Island Park where Al Capone wanted to build a house but was blocked by Boca Raton residents who didn’t want him as a neighbor. The island is home to squirrels, raccoons, gopher tortoises, armadillos and birds.

If you need a restroom, there are facilities in Deerfield Island Park and a dock. 

Head north from the put-in under Dixie Highway, and you’ll have to make a decision. You can continue north on the Boca Rio Canal or take the western fork into the Hillsboro River that passes under I-95.

The river, which is the dividing line between Palm Beach and Broward counties, is navigable for only about a half mile before it comes to a dam. And because it passes behind an industrial park, it’s not that scenic.

We prefer the canal that lets you view backyards and park-like areas. 

Silver Palm Park

600 E. Palmetto Park Road

Boca Raton

561-393-7810

N 26 20.977’

W 80 04.574’

 Website

Tucked into downtown Boca Raton, this hidden gem lets you head south to Lake Boca Raton, where you can pass by the tower of the Boca Raton Resort and Club. If you want to brave the boat traffic and ocean, make your way through Boca Inlet.

Head north from the ramp and you’ll paddle into Lake Wyman, which is really just a widening in the Intracoastal Waterway. Along the eastern bank you’ll see nature at work at Gumbo Limbo Nature Center. On the west, James A. Rutherford Park has trails through the mangroves. These used to be open to the public but now they are only accessible through tours from Gumbo Limbo Nature Center.  There is talk of refurbishing the paddling trails, but the work hasn’t started yet.

Head farther north to arrive at another widening of the Intracoastal dubbed Lake Rogers. On its eastern bank you’ll find Spanish River Park.

None of these parks have facilities for you to exit your boat, but they do attract wildlife you can enjoy from the water. 

Mangrove Park 

1211 S. Federal Highway

 Delray Beach

561-243-7250

N 26 26.576’

W 80 3.962’

Website

The ramp at this park was steep enough to be difficult to use. The city closed it in October to do construction that would make it more accessible. The ramp reopened in late January. Here, like at Knowles Park, you access a narrow part of the Intracoastal Waterway where boat traffic can make paddling unpleasant.

Knowles Park

1001 S. Federal Highway

Delray Beach

561-243-7250

N 26 22.067’

W 80 4.497’ 

Website

This park just north of Mangrove Park provides access to the Intracoastal in Delray Beach at a spot where the waterway is narrow. Boat traffic can cause turbulence, making paddling from here difficult.

Ocean Inlet Park

6990 N. Ocean Blvd.

Ocean Ridge

561-966-6600

N26 32.652’

W 80 02.719’

Website

This park is set on the east side of the Intracoastal just south of the Boynton Inlet. Instead of a ramp, you launch your boat from a beach.

Head south to the Two Georges (www.twogeorgesrestaurant.com/boynton/) or Banana Boat (www.bananaboatboynton.com) restaurants. Each has a dock where you can get out of your boat to enjoy a meal or snack.

Go north and you are at the south end of Lake Worth Lagoon. Here you can navigate around Hypoluxo Island. Just be careful. It’s shallow at the north end of the island where the waterway rejoins the lake/Intracoastal.

The Old Key Lime House (www.oldkeylimehouse.com/) on East Ocean Avenue provides floating docks in case you want to exit your boat to eat on your way back down the Intracoastal to your car.  

 Harvey E. Oyer Jr. Park 

(formerly Boat Club Park)

2010 N. Federal Highway

Boynton Beach

561-742-6243

561-369-3904 (weekends)

N 26 32.741’

W 80 3.160’

Website

Located about opposite Ocean Inlet Park, this park offers ramps, floating docks and a small beach that give you access to the same paddles  mentioned above. But we prefer this park because you enter the water opposite the Boynton Inlet so there’s less boat traffic. 

Although there is a weekend fee for trailers/boat launching, we are told it doesn’t apply to kayaks. 

Intracoastal Park

2240 N. Federal Highway

Boynton Beach

561-742-6650

N 26 32.909’

W 80 3.194’

Website

Located just north of Harvey E. Oyer Jr. Park, you can enjoy the same paddles as above. Here you’ll put in from a beach instead of ramps.

Sportsman’s Park

330 E. Ocean Ave. 

Lantana

561-540-5000

N 26 35.037’

W 80 02.835’

Website

This put-in has limited parking, but it does provide access to the Atlantic Ocean through the Boynton Inlet as well as the south end of Lake Worth Lagoon on the Intracoastal Waterway. 

The Ocean Avenue Bridge over the Intracoastal Waterway is scheduled to be closed for work. Car traffic will be prohibited beginning March 19, but use of the ramps in this park should not be affected during the closure, which may last two years.

Bryant Park
and South Bryant Park

30 S. Golfview Road
Lake Worth

561-533-7363

N 26 36.852'

W 80 2.868'

Website 

These are different parts of the same park with boat ramps in the middle. From here you have easy access to Lake Worth Lagoon and the north end of Hypoluxo Island. 

Currie Park

North Flagler Drive and 23rd Street

West Palm Beach

804-4900

N 26 44.179’

W 80 2.967’

Website

Use this park if you want to cut across Lake Worth Lagoon to Palm Beach Island. Go south to look at Mar-a-Lago from the water. But be warned, on your way south you’ll experience lots of big water studded with only a few islands.

We prefer to go north along the coast of Palm Beach so we can explore the magnificent homes from sea level. But keep going and you’ll come to Peanut Island, accessible only by boat.

It’s an 80-acre tropical park with swimming beaches and a 1.25-mile brick walking path around the perimeter that provides access to wildlife habitats. 

The island also is home to a historic Coast Guard station and boathouse that was built in 1930. And there’s a command post and bunker for use by President John F. Kennedy in case of national emergency.  

Phil Foster Park

900 E. Blue Heron Blvd.

Riviera Beach 

966-6600

N 26 47.004’

W 80 2.487’

Website

Although it’s a little bit of a drive, this park is worth the trip to put your boat into the north end of Lake Worth Lagoon. From here you can head north to Peanut Island (see above). And you can visit Little Munyon Island and Munyon Island, which are part of John D. MacArthur Beach State Park. 

According to the park website, Munyon Island has a colorful history. The Seminoles called it Nuctsachoo (Pelican Island) and it was said to be one of the largest wading bird rookeries in South Florida. 

The first inhabitant in 1884 lived in a tent and made his living by selling green sea turtles caught in Lake Worth.

Next came the Pitts family, who bought the island in 1892. They built a two-story house and raised 28 kinds of fruit on their land. In 1901, the Pitts sold the island to Dr. James Munyon. He took two years to construct the Hotel Hygeia, named after the Greek goddess of health.

The five-story, 21-room, eight-bath hotel catered to wealthy Northerners who came to recuperate and drink Dr. Munyon’s Paw-Paw Elixir. It was fermented papaya juice bottled on the island.

Arthur R. Marshall Loxahatchee National Wildlife Refuge

10216 Lee Road

Boynton Beach

734-8303

N 26 29.853’

W 80 13.309'

Website

To get here, you need to head west. Yes, all the way to the Everglades. But it’s worth the trip. Set on the north side of the Everglades, this 145,800-acre park offers a 5.5-mile kayak/canoe trail hewn from the sea of grass.

Go in the spring and summer when it’s hot and you’ll see plenty of alligators. We’ve floated over and around them up close and personal. You may see snail kites, frogs, turtles, birds, butterflies and deer.

At some times of year, the paddling path may be overgrown with water hyacinths or the water may be low in the dry season. Call ahead to check trail conditions.

There is a $5 entrance fee to the park.      

The Tuesday/Thursday Paddlers take off into the Intracoastal Waterway.

Photo by Tim Stepien

For information on places to paddle, click here

Tuesday/Thursday Paddlers

If you are an experienced paddler who’d like to get on the water with a group, you may want to contact the Tuesday/Thursday Paddlers. This association notifies you of the paddle location by email, gathers at the designated put-in at 10 a.m. and paddles for about three hours twice a week. And they've now added Saturday paddles

Time on the water is usually followed by lunch in a restaurant. The group has been meeting for over 15 years. For more information, email your phone number to  seeleydavid@bellsouth.net, with “paddling group” in the subject line. 

Palm Beach Pack and Paddle Club

This group hikes, bikes and paddles, but about 60 percent of its weekly events are paddles.

There are monthly meetings with speakers on the second Monday of the month at 7 p.m. (a social time starts at 6:30 p.m.) at the Okeeheelee Nature Center in Okeeheelee Park, 7715 Forest Hill Blvd., west of West Palm Beach. 

Membership is $25 for individuals; $30 for families (no children under 18). 

Visit website or call Geoff Wilson at 963-9755. 

Florida Circumnavigational 

Saltwater Paddling Trail

Visit website

Kayak Rentals

Available at Adventure Times Kayak Shop, 521 Northlake Blvd., North Palm Beach;
881-7218; website

Tours in Boca Raton

Join a naturalist from Gumbo Limbo Nature Center for a guided tour along the boardwalk at Rutherford Park. The walk is followed by a canoe paddle through the mangrove trails and back along the shoreline of the Intracoastal. Paddling experience is necessary. 

Cost is $22 per person; $15 for members of Gumbo Limbo Nature Center.  Pre-payment and reservations required by calling 338-1542.

Tours in the Everglades

Loxahatchee Canoeing offers guided moonlight tours from 7 to 9 p.m. through Arthur R. Marshall Loxahatchee National Wildlife Refuge, Boynton Beach. Cost is $10 per person (includes boat rental) plus $5 admission to the park. Reservations required; call 733-0192 or visit website

The refuge also offers volunteer-guided tours (bring your own boat) every other Saturday from 8-10:15 a.m. The tour is free after paying $5 admission to the park. Reservations required; call 734-8303.

By Steve Plunkett

Travelers along State Road A1A will be able to glimpse the ocean at four “view corridors” after sea grapes bordering the highway are trimmed this month.

The city approved a low bid of $400,000 from Florida Native Nurseries Inc. of Plant City. The contractor will remove sea grape and other exotic vegetation within 20 feet of A1A. 

Workers will then trim a 40-foot-deep strip of sea grape down to 4 feet above the road elevation and remove other exotics. 

Three corridors, opposite Spanish River Park’s tunnels to the Atlantic, will be 400 feet wide. The fourth corridor, 200 feet wide, is north of Spanish River Boulevard.

Assistant City Manager Mike Woika said work will begin the first or second week of February. The contractor’s heavy equipment must be off the beach by March 1, the start of sea turtle nesting season. Florida Native Nurseries will replace exotics it removes with native plants over seven or eight months, he said.

The state Department of Environmental Protection and Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission at first objected to Boca Raton’s plans, citing possible adverse effects to turtle nesting, but relented after the city pushed for approval.

Mayor Susan Whelchel and Deputy Mayor Susan Haynie groused that Delray Beach was allowed to trim all its coastal sea grapes.

“Now it’s gone to the next level because of results from Delray Beach’s projects,” city senior financial analyst Jennifer Bistyga told them at a City Council meeting last   March.                             Ú

By Steve Plunkett

The former Wildflower nightclub site on the Intracoastal Waterway will become home to a family-style restaurant if the city’s Marine Advisory Board has its way.

Chairman Gene Folden told City Council members at a January workshop: “We support a restaurant unique in design so as not to compete with other restaurants in the area, multifunctional, family-oriented, with open-air dining, accessible to the water and accessible by watercraft.”

The advisory board also wants Boca Raton to acquire the property just north of the Wildflower site, as well as the vacant lot at its southwest corner.

Folden challenged a list of objections to having a restaurant on the site, on the northwest side of the Palmetto Park bridge, particularly that people don’t want a restaurant there.

“Not everyone can live on the water or the Intracoastal,” Folden said. “Not everyone owns a boat to enjoy the water.”

Folden said Boca Raton is the only major city in Palm Beach County or Broward County without waterfront dining accessible by boat. He also said currents would not affect boats docking if the city were successful in buying the parcel just north of the site. Homes on the other side of the Intracoastal all have docks despite concerns about currents, he added.

Folden also said the city should explore buying vacant land along Palmetto Park Road and East Palm Avenue to provide additional parking for boat trailers and cars using the boat docks at Silver Palm Park just south of the Wildflower site.

Mayor Susan Whelchel embraced Folden’s recommendations.

“People I talk to absolutely want a restaurant there for the reasons Mr. Folden presented,” she said.

Whelchel said city staff was preparing a request for proposals to get a restaurant on the Wildflower site.

“I think everyone understands it would be fabulous if we were able to really create an outstanding ambiance and activity on the water,”’ she said.

Council member Anthony Majhess worried about saddling taxpayers with an extra expense.

“I would hate to get into the position where it’s a taxpayer-subsidized restaurant,” Majhess said. Ú   Ú

Mitt Romney Fundraiser

Home of Miami Dolphins owner Stephen Ross, Palm Beach

Boca Raton residents Karen Asher, Bobby Campbell, Maureen Egan
(wife of the late Ambassador to Ireland Richard Egan) and Senada Adzem
were among those attending the $2,500-per-person fundraiser Jan. 12.

Photos Provided

Highland Beach Art Show Opening

Highland Beach Library

Exhibiting artists Hanne Neiderhausen (not pictured)
and Art Siegel (right) drew a big crowd during an opening
reception on Jan. 13 at the Highland Beach Library. Caryl
Roberts, Pat Maguire and Siegel were among the attendees.

We’re keeping it Coastal this holiday season. 

That’s right — Coastal. For our fourth holiday gift guide, we’re looking at objects inspired by our lives along the shore. 

What better time to reflect on life in paradise? 

With the sand and the surf, who needs snow? And Santa? 

He’d be happiest in the pair of swim trunks we found in Delray Beach, and might even want a morsel or two from the alligator snack trays sold in Boynton Beach. Then, he would don the Maui Jim sunglasses he bought in downtown Boca Raton and head out to the beach. 

Santa also would be happy knowing we visited locally owned businesses to find these gifts — no muss, no fuss, no lines at the mall. Some items were created locally; some were made elsewhere in the United States. 

That’s what it’s all about. 

After all, the holidays begin at home. 

And what better time to keep that Coastal Star shining bright than at the holidays.

— Scott Simmons

Designed by Scott Simmons

Written by Scott Simmons, with Mary Thurwachter

Photography by Tim Stepien and Scott Simmons

Old World holiday ornaments 

How much: $6-$19 

Where: Etc. Gift Shop, Seagate Hotel and Spa, 1000 E. Atlantic Ave., Delray Beach.  Phone: 655-4800. 

Ornaments at a hotel? Who’d have thought? 

But we were hooked the moment we laid eyes on these delicate, blown-glass fish, pelicans, oranges and other tropical themed creatures and objects. These are perfect for expanding your own collection of holiday decor or as a quick, last-minute hostess gift, and at these prices, you can buy several.  

Decorated starfish 

How much: $12-$35 

Where: BeachComber Arts, 212 S. Federal Highway, Boynton Beach. Phone: 315-5717. 

Shell artist Debbie Brookes lends her touch to these decorated starfish in a variety of hues of blues and greens and lavender to suit our coastal moods.  

Feeling more traditional? She also has starfish in reds and whites, plus a line of shell-encrusted chandeliers, sconces and furniture that will remind you of why you live in Florida.  

Mariposa

small alligator sauce dish 

How much: $42 

Where: Boynton Beach Postal and Gift Center. 562 E. Woolbright Road, Boynton Beach.  Phone: 738-6002. 

These metal trays are sure to be a hit with the Florida Gators fan on your list. They’re listed as a small sauce dish, but the 8-inch or so dish also is perfect for nuts and such on game day. 

The dish is green, too, in the environmental sense.  

Mariposa products, made in Mexico, are created from recycled metal.   

Lilly Pulitzer neckties 

How much: $72 

Where: C. Orrico, 1218 E. Atlantic Ave., Delray Beach.  Phone: 278-5353. 

Nobody makes casual look stylish or formal look effortless quite like Lilly. These ties are perfect with a rumpled shirt and jeans or with that über-swank Hugo Boss suit, and that’s why these Pulitzers take the prize.  

Bermuda Styles Hybrid shorts/trunks 

How much: $68 

Where: The Trouser Shop, 439 E. Atlantic Ave., Delray Beach.  Phone: 278-5626 

Bruce Gimmy (left) guarantees you’ll walk out of his shop smiling, so why not treat someone to a pair of these tropical shorts? Their lightweight construction is designed so they can be worn on land or in water. And that tropical motif will be a hit wherever your recipient wears them.  

By Margie Plunkett

and Tim Pallesen

Delray Beach coastal residents rallied in December in protest of planned luxury beach-side sober houses, filling commission chambers at two meetings and spurring city leaders to scour law in search of changes that will protect  single-family residential neighborhoods.

The controversy is a familiar one in Boca Raton, which, following an outcry from residents, passed ordinances in 2002 restricting sober houses to areas of the city zoned for hospitals or motels. The city was sued by the owners of the sober houses and in 2007 a federal judge struck down the ordinances, saying they were discriminatory.

In Delray Beach last month, neighbors protested laws that allow houses in residential neighborhoods to be rented in such a way that dozens of unrelated people can reside there during the course of a year.

Residents argued that the safety and security of their neighborhoods were compromised by allowing sober houses, which they claimed is a big business contrary to residential use.

“We’re asking for support for preserving single-family neighborhoods,” said Mary Renaud, president of the Beach Property Owners’ Association.

The outcry in Delray Beach was sparked when word leaked out that Caron Foundation, a  Pennsylvania-based drug and alcohol addiction treatment center, had purchased a house at 740 N. Ocean Blvd. for $1.6 million and had been approved to house up to seven people while they went through treatment. 

Andrew Rothermel, a spokesman for Caron, a nonprofit treatment agency with a center in Boca Raton, declined to comment on whether Caron had purchased the house at 740 N. Ocean Blvd. 

Rothermel said: “We’ve been good neighbors in Delray for 20 years,” noting Caron owns a 46-unit apartment building off Lowson Boulevard for patients who need more support. 

“We have every intention of maintaining the character of the neighborhood and being good neighbors.”

Within a week of the initial Dec. 13 commission meeting where the BPOA and other neighbors first protested, the Planning and Zoning board recommended commissioners lower the number of times a home in a single-family residential neighborhood can be rented to twice a year. That was stricter than both the three-times-a-year policy commissioners had asked the board to consider at its Dec. 19 meeting and current law, which allows for six rentals a year.

Planning and Zoning Chairman Cary Glickstein acknowledged: “We’re not going to accomplish everything tonight. This is a step. We want to draw a line in the sand and build from that.” 

BPOA members plus others grew noticeably perturbed at the Dec. 13 meeting when told that an ocean-side sober house had already been approved — but that the name and location were protected by law and would not be revealed. 

Treatment centers have successfully argued in federal court that cities cannot discriminate against people with alcohol or drug addictions. In addition, they have maintained that they do not have to disclose locations of sober houses because the addresses of people in treatment are part of their medical records, and thus, confidential.

During the commission meeting, former Commissioner Gary Eliopoulos said that in July 2009 he and other city lawmakers had changed regulations, addressing the number of rentals as well as limiting the number of unrelated adults living in a house to three.

Eliopoulos said there are instances in which the law has been interpreted to mean that each bed or room in a house can be rented six times a year.

“I’m urging this commission to go back and look at that ordinance,” he said. “If we got it wrong, I would urge you to get outside counsel and get it right. There’s no reason we have to tolerate this.”

Delray Beach Mayor Woodie McDuffie later sent a letter to local state lawmakers, urging the state to step in to license and regulate the substance-abuse treatment industry.

“We need your help on this issue more than anything else I have confronted since taking office,” McDuffie wrote. 

“Our Village by the Sea receives rave reviews for the beach, Atlantic Avenue, our events and how well it is run, but we have another name that is not so complimentary: The Drug Rehab Capital of the United States.”

Heidi Sargeant said she is a next-door neighbor, has three children and is vehemently opposed to transient housing.  She said it has the potential to be unsafe, adding, “Where are we going to put the eight cars?”

The house will have a chef and a masseuse, she said, adding, “Where are these people parking? I’m concerned about the value of our homes. Do you want that next to you? I don’t think so.”

The possibility of a lawsuit blanketed discussion at both government meetings, noting  previous Boca Raton litigation that has guided Delray Beach policy over concerns of potential suits from neighbors or sober-home operators. 

Residents urged officials not to be swayed by the threat of a lawsuit. 

“There are going to be lawsuits no matter what,” said resident and lawyer Scott Richman, explaining that the board’s actions shouldn’t be formulated merely to avoid a suit. “First thing: You need to protect the citizens.”

Warned Caron’s Rothermel: Other cities have lost lawsuits when they opposed similar requests for sober houses in residential neighborhoods. 

“They suffered in court and spent a tremendous amount of money fighting it.”              

By Steve Plunkett

County officials have put an accountant’s touch on the local match needed for grants to convert Lake Wyman spoil islands into thriving mangrove canoe trails and a manatee stopover.

“Sharpening the pencil, we can move $36,000 from local share into county share. That leaves county at $455,457 and local at $383,177,” Rob Robbins, deputy director of the county’s Environmental Resources Management Department, emailed County Commissioner Steven Abrams.

Abrams forwarded the information to City Council members and the Greater Boca Raton Beach and Park District in December.

“City advisory boards and many of our constituents agree that this is a worthwhile project that will enhance water quality, wildlife habitat, recreation and public access to an important waterway in our city,’’ Abrams wrote, asking that the city and the beach-park district take “formal steps’’ to participate. “I hope we can work together to move it forward.’’

The original proposal called for $419,000 in matching money from the county and $419,000 from the city or the beach-park district or both. The county secured $2.1 million for the project from the Florida Inland Navigation District, the taxing body that maintains the Intracoastal Waterway and owns the largest spoil island, provided it obtains matching funds. 

“The clock is ticking,’’ Abrams wrote.

Abrams said residents want Lake Wyman Park and neighboring Rutherford Park on the west side of the Intracoastal cleaned up. 

The project would remove 11 acres of Australian pine and Brazilian pepper from FIND’s island and two smaller spoil islands created as the Intracoastal Waterway was dredged in the 1930s. About 72,000 cubic yards of spoil material would be excavated to create mangrove and seagrass habitat and maritime hammock. 

The excavated earth would be spread over Lake Wyman Park to elevate ball fields and reduce flooding.

FIND’s island would be scooped out to create a 3.3-acre basin where manatees could munch on seagrass. Day boaters would have a dock with six slips.  Upland areas would have picnic tables and a crushed-rock road for emergency and maintenance vehicles.

About 1 mile of canoe trails would be restored to increase tidal flushing around mangroves and make the trails passable at low tide. The boardwalk would be extended to reach the picnic areas, two beach areas and an observation platform near the shore opposite Gumbo Limbo Nature Center.

“I think this is a very special place and we need to have special places for all the tourists that are coming in,’’ resident Lenore Wachtel said Dec. 12, imploring City Council members at a workshop to find the matching money.

City Manager Leif Ahnell said he would report back at a future council meeting.       Ú

The Debbie-Rand Memorial Service League Board of Trustees includes
front row, from left: Debbie Leising, Diana Rivellino, Marci Nowak. Back
row: Mildred Schwartz, Barbara Gideon, Eileen Carlins, Diana Bubb, Marty
Lambert, Lois McGinn, Deyse Norwitz and Dave Reynolds. Photo provided

For more on Gloria Lawson Drummond who founded the Boca Raton Regional Hospital click here.

By Linda Haase

In 1962, 18 resolute women banded together, fiercely determined to raise money to build a hospital in Boca Raton. The action was spurred by the tragic deaths of Debra and Randall Drummond, two children who were poisoned and died as they reached the nearest hospital about 15 miles away in Boynton Beach. The women — along with the children’s mother, Gloria Drummond, who founded the group — raised the seed money for the “Miracle on Meadows Road,” now known as Boca Raton Regional Hospital.

Today, the Debbie-Rand Memorial Service League has more than 1,000 members and has raised more than $28.8 million for the hospital, which opened in 1967. Using everything from bake sales to establishing a thrift shop (which has more than 90 volunteers and nets about $350,00 a year), they have funded many projects, including a pavilion at the hospital. 

But the league, named in memory of the Drummond children, has also given its heart and soul: 2 million volunteer hours have been donated over the years. The men, women and teen volunteers help out in 60 areas of the not-for-profit hospital campus, including serving as hospital ambassadors to patients, employees and visitors; assisting patients and staff on a nursing unit; raising money for equipment and services; serving on event planning committees; organizing children’s tours; helping with the pet therapy program and delivering flowers. 

Members of the league will be honored during 50th annual Boca Raton Regional Hospital Ball,  “A Golden Gala — Celebrating 50 Years,” on Jan. 21 at the Boca Raton Resort & Club.

“It’s been quite the journey,” says League President Debbie Leising, who began volunteering for the league in 1977. “What we do here is so important, so incredible. The volunteers are so dedicated and passionate. There are no words to express what the volunteers do on any given day.”

And Leising adds, others have said that the hospital couldn’t operate without the league’s help.

As the steadfast group mourns the Dec. 10 death of founder Gloria Drummond, it takes solace in the work it will continue to accomplish on her behalf.

The tireless group, which Leising calls the “backbone” of the hospital, hopes to provide a chapel on campus. “It will be a place for respite and a place for people to pray for their loved ones,”  she explains. The group also hopes to have a presence in the gift shop in the Christine E. Lynn Women’s Health and Wellness Institute when it opens. 

However, this year’s annual ball will be bittersweet for league members, who planned to honor Drummond there. 

But it will be “a last hurrah to show her and the community how proud we are,” says Leising. 

“Gloria Drummond’s passion to see something good come out of devastating personal tragedy is one of the most compelling stories our community has ever witnessed. Not only was she the driving force behind the creation of our hospital, she also established and nurtured the development of one of the largest and most effective volunteer service and fundraising organizations in health care today.” 

And one that will be around for years to come, predicts Leising. 

50th annual Boca Raton Regional Hospital Ball

“A Golden Gala — Celebrating 50 Years”

Chairmen: Honorary Chairs Orrine and Warren S. Orlando and Patricia Thomas

Honorees: The late Gloria Drummond, a founder of Boca Raton Regional Hospital; Dick Schmidt, chairman of the Board of Trustees and life-long supporter of the hospital; members of the Debbie-Rand Memorial Service League; and physician honorees who were selected by their peers as exemplifying the best in quality, compassionate care: Stephen Babic, M.D.; Nicolas Breuer, M.D.; Stephen Grabelsky, M.D.; Michael Lewis, M.D.; Stewart Newman, M.D.; Mark Rubenstein, M.D.; Alan Saitowitz, M.D.; Mark Saltzman, M.D.; David Scott, M.D.; and Jose Yeguez, M.D.

When: 7 p.m.-midnight, Jan. 21

Where: Boca Raton Resort & Club

Tickets: $400

For information: Call Sandra Longo, 955-3249 or slongo@brrh.com

Peter Leonard and Jacqui Wyatt

By Ron Hayes

The talk of the town is “The Talk of The Town.”
But don’t expect it to be all happy talk.
On July 17, 2010, Jacqui Wyatt and Peter Leonard welcomed listeners of radio station WBZT-1230 AM to a new show — from Boca Raton, about Boca Raton, hosted by residents of Boca Raton.
She was the director of marketing for Investments Limited, owner of Royal Palm Place, where the show originates. He was a longtime radio personality, as edgy as she is smooth.
From 1-3 p.m. each Saturday, they would talk to the town about food and wine, entertainment, the arts, sports and all things Bocan.
“The concept was to make the show feel like you were sitting in somebody’s living room,” says Wyatt, “just having a conversation with friends.”
Some of those friends have included saxophonist Will Donato, sculptor Yaacov Heller, model Oleda Baker, photographer David Pearlman and fashion designer Patrizia Rondelli.
Apparently, the conversation is catching.
In its annual “Boca 100” issue last year, Boca Raton magazine placed “The Talk of The Town” in the No. 1 spot.
Locally, the show can be heard from Jupiter west to Lake Okeechobee and down into Broward County, but Wyatt boasts that they also have online listeners in South America, Europe and Guam.
“We’re huge in Guam,” Leonard says. And therein lies the show’s charm.
Watch Wyatt and Leonard live, and you can’t help smiling at the creative tension.
On air, Wyatt is the marketing pro, unfailingly perky and polite.
Leonard arrives at the clubhouse studio high atop Royal Palm Place in a T-shirt adorned with microphones and the slogan “Speak Your Mind.”
He does.
After the strains of “Downtown” have faded, Wyatt kicks them off with predictable pep.
“It’s always gorgeous in Boca!” she gushes. “It’s like a Mediterranean version of Greenwich Village!”
A bit more chit-chat and they segue into the “Adoptable Pet of the Week” segment, steering viewers to orphaned cats and dogs at Tri-County Humane Society.
Rufus, the chihuahua lab mix, has almost completed his heartworm treatment. Shannon, the classic tabby, likes people but not other pets.
Hansel and Gretel, Wyatt assures, “are just precious.”
“He likes long walks on the beach and enjoys poetry,” adds Leonard.
What?!
Wyatt shoots him a look. It will not be the last.
Later, Wyatt drops in a plug for the FroYo frozen yogurt shop in Royal Palm Plaza, and Leonard speaks up again.
“Stop in and tell them you heard about it on this show and they’ll charge you just the same,” he says, without a hint of irony.
Wyatt shoots him a slightly sterner look.
They wrap up the segment with a reminder that cat adoptions are available for just $15 during the holiday season.
“So you mental patients who are still smoking out there, give up two packs of cigarettes and you can have yourself a beautiful cat,” Leonard says. “It’s five Starbucks.”
Wyatt looks like she can see all the smokers out there angrily changing the channel.
“Jacqui doesn’t know what to make of some of the stuff I say,” Leonard confides during a commercial break. “She gets mad at me sometimes.”
He’s Groucho, she’s Margaret Dumont, and that’s what makes the show such fun.
Next up is Skip Sheffield, just back from Las Vegas to host his “Inside Scoop” segment, a roundup of the week’s cultural offerings.
“It’s disorienting going through three time zones,” Sheffield says. “I don’t feel like I’m still all here.”
“Well,” says Leonard, “I’ve felt that since I met you.”
And then, just when you think “The Talk of The Town” is all happy talk with a dash of Tabasco, their guest of the week arrives.
Jim Gavrilos, executive director of Boca Helping Hands, brings a bit of a storm cloud to all that sunny “Boca lifestyle” chat.
Boca Raton also is home to Pearl City, he reminds everyone, and the Sandalfoot neighborhood out by SR 441 is “a second pocket of poverty.”
Leonard stops with the wisecracks. Now he and Wyatt still look concerned.
In 2010, Gavrilos reports, Boca Helping Hands was delivering 2,700 hot meals a month. This year they hit 4,000.
In 2010, they distributed 710 pantry bags. This year, 2,685.
On Thanksgiving, they served 670 meals in one day.
Leonard hands him a check, and Gavrilos starts talking about an anonymous donor who has offered to match gifts. 

     He recalls a client, a family on the pantry bag list, who brought in $6. His voice is steady, but his eyes fill with tears.
“That $6 meant more to me than a $50,000 check from a corporation,” he says.
In the final 10 minutes, the happy talk returns, but the town they’ve been talking is much more than good food and wine.
“Boca’s really a hidden gem,” Wyatt says, “but this show isn’t just about money and affluence.”
And that’s what makes “The Talk of The Town” worth talking about.                           

By Mary Thurwachter,

Managing Editor

Some of us didn’t make it through 2011 to celebrate the New Year, but we continue to celebrate their lives. 

Gloria Drummond, for one, was a shining example of what one person can do to make the world better place. This remarkable woman took a tragedy and turned it into something that could help so many others facing potential tragedies of their own.

She left behind a hospital, as Boca Raton City Councilwoman Constance Scott said at Mrs. Drummond’s well-attended funeral at St. Paul’s Lutheran Church last month.

As you will read elsewhere in this paper, Mrs. Drummond began raising money for the Boca Raton Regional Hospital after two of her children died after drinking poisoned milk. Her son and daughter might

                                           Mary Thurwachter

have survived if the nearest hospital had been closer than Boynton Beach.

With her husband, Robert, who died in 1989, Mrs. Drummond rallied the community to have the hospital built. She also started the Debbie-Rand Service League and was its first president.

Mrs. Drummond will, as St. Paul’s senior pastor J. R. Jones said at her funeral, keep touching the world with her love. That, he said, was the way to live a meaningful life.

Another man who lived a meaningful life and left us this year was Dr. Seymour Strauss of Highland Beach.  The retired dentist and World War II veteran was a passionate promoter of and fundraiser for the Lyric Chamber Orchestra, a group that will honor him during its opening performance at St. Lucy’s Church on Jan. 27. His wife, Dorothy, a violinist with the Lyric until she was 90, was one of the Lyric’s founding members.

Dr. Strauss, who received a Purple Heart and Bronze Star in Gen. George Patton’s Third Army, also left his mark at the Highland Beach Library, where several of his bronze and stone sculptures remain in the sunlit reading room for all to enjoy.

We all can make a difference in some way. Here at The Coastal Star, we’re pleased to be able to share stories of difference makers all year long. Who knows? Maybe one day we’ll be writing about you!

Plans to replace the 1939 Camino Real Bridge were thwarted
after engineers discovered the structure is protected as a historic
treasure. Photo by Tim Stepien

By Tim Pallesen

Plans to replace the Camino Real Bridge have been canceled after county engineers discovered the bridge is protected as a historic treasure.
State inspections have repeatedly rated the drawbridge built in 1939 as structurally deficient. County engineers were ready to tear it down and build a new $43.8 million bridge.
“A new bridge was the preferred alternative but then this historical issue popped up,” said Omelio Fernandez, the county’s director of roadway production.
County engineers didn’t know that county commissioners in 1997 had established the Camino Real Road and Bridge Historic District, protecting the bridge they wanted to tear down.
“The problem at this point is that we cannot justify replacement because of the bridge’s historical status,” Fernandez said. “We would not be permitted to do it.”
Camino Real from the east side of the bridge to Dixie Highway is eligible to be listed on the National Registry of Historic Places because of the county’s historic designation.
The wide street designed by Addison Mizner in 1925 is significant to understanding Boca Raton’s history.
Unlike most communities with humble beginnings, Boca Raton was born from Mizner’s grand conceptual plan for “the world’s most architecturally beautiful playground.”
“This was a very radical idea in the 1920s,” county preservation officer Chris Carpenter said. “Mizner’s grand vision for Boca Raton was our county’s first planned community.”
Winter guests would arrive at Henry Flagler’s railroad depot and be escorted down Camino Real (the royal highway) to what today is the Boca Raton Resort and Club.
“This is our historical corridor,” Boca Raton Historical Society executive director Mary Csar said. “If you want to know how Boca Raton came to be, you go down this corridor to figure it out.”

The Camino Real Bridge, built in 1939, was the first
permanent bridge built over the Intracoastal
Waterway in that spot. 

Photo by Tim Stepien

Mizner envisioned a grand canal down the center of the 160-foot-wide Camino Real. So hotel guests could get to the ocean, he also designed an elaborate Venetian drawbridge with a tower apartment for the bridgekeeper.
But neither the canal nor the bridge was built before Mizner went bankrupt in 1927.
Boca Raton’s next developer, Clarence Geist, put a temporary swing bridge over the Intracoastal Waterway in 1929.
The permanent drawbridge constructed by the Public Works Administration in 1939 was nothing fancy.
County commissioners voted to replace it with a raised four-lane bridge in 1974, but backed off when Boca Raton argued that the new bridge would create more traffic.

The county hired a consultant in 2006 to investigate the bridge’s condition when it began to repeatedly fail state inspections.

“The existing bridge barrier and railing are substandard and do not comply with current standards for crash testing,” the consultant wrote. “The curb is high and considered dangerous because it has the potential to launch vehicles over the barrier.”
The consultant said a new drawbridge would cost $43.8 million compared to $17.3 million to build a high-level fixed bridge, and that a tunnel would cost $384 million.
Bridge experts say the maximum life span for any bridge is 75 years.
But now, because of the 73-year-old Camino Real Bridge’s historical status, the only way to replace it would be to prove that is unsafe.
“It’s not in such bad shape that we could justify replacing it for safety reasons,” Fernandez said.
The U.S. Coast Guard notified county engineers when it discovered the historical status while routinely reviewing the county’s proposal to build a new bridge, Fernandez said.
The cost to rehabilitate the Camino Real Bridge for its 75th birthday is estimated to be $7.2 million.                             Ú

Delray Beach police are investigating the reported disappearance of more than $1 million held in escrow accounts for Mizner Grande Realty clients, police said.

Mizner Grande owner Ari Albinder said he was called by a client whose escrow money, held by a Boca Raton attorney, had been disbursed without proper authority.

“I was shocked,” Albinder said. “He said the escrow money was disbursed a long time before.” Albinder said he filed a report with Delray Beach police. 

Albinder said Jon Rashotsky, a former agent with his firm, requested the release of the escrow funds. Albinder said he fired Rashotsky in November. Rashotsky could not be reached for comment.

Albinder said his firm is suing Rashotsky for return of the money.

 His firm has hired a private attorney, Thomas Graner of Graner Law Group of Boca Raton, to monitor all the escrow accounts of its clients.

— Angie Francalancia

By Steve Plunkett

The Boca Raton City Council may act as soon as this month to designate the controversial Ocean Strand property public land instead of zoned for residential use.

With little discussion, the city’s Planning and Zoning Board endorsed the change for the 14.9 oceanfront acres on Dec. 8. 

City Planning and Zoning Manager Jim Bell said the new designation would allow structures totaling roughly 51,000 square feet to be built as long as they were park-related.

“I guess you could potentially have some commercial, but it would have to be park-related,” Bell said, mentioning bathrooms, a café or snack shop as possible buildings. “51,000 is rather limiting.”

The Greater Boca Raton Beach and Park District, which owns the property, did not oppose the land-use change.

“At the current time the Greater Boca Raton Beach and Park District will defer to the desires of the City Council,’’ the beach and park district wrote Mayor Susan Whelchel.

The district’s letter noted its deferral should not be seen as validating any claims by a grass-roots group that is suing to ban cabana clubs and other private uses at Ocean Strand. 

Bell said the Planning and Zoning recommendation could be on the City Council’s agenda Jan. 10.

The city and the beach and park district are waiting for the 4th District Court of Appeal to set a date for oral arguments in the grass-roots group’s lawsuit. The appellate judges should hand down a decision a month or two after the hearing, said Arthur Koski, the district’s     attorney.                                 Ú