ABOVE: South Palm Beach created a graphic explaining how Penny the Sea Turtle became the town’s official mascot. Graphic provided; BELOW: The statue former resident Penny Davidson created. Maria Biggane/The Coastal Star
By Brian Biggane
Everybody loves a mascot.
In their early years, the Miami Dolphins had Dolfan Denny, a man dressed in a garish orange-and-aqua outfit who ran around the Orange Bowl riling up the fans. (He was replaced by cheerleaders.)
The University of Florida has Albert, a person dressed in what has to be a very warm alligator costume. And the University of Miami has the Ibis, which for some reason twists its orange beak in opposite directions every time it sees a TV camera.
Now the town of South Palm Beach, a sleepy hamlet five-eighths of a mile long just north of the Lantana public beach, has a mascot of its own with Penny the Sea Turtle. It’s a tribute of sorts to former artist-in-residence Penny Davidson, who constructed a life-size bronze turtle climbing over a rock in 2006 to commemorate the town’s 50th anniversary.
The mascot idea came from administrative assistant Emma Trotto, who attended a statewide meeting of municipal employees in Clearwater Beach in April aimed at improving communications with residents.
“We were in a brainstorming session,” Trotto said at the June Town Council meeting, “and a town north of us (DeBary) brought forward that they had made a mascot of a dinosaur for their town and anything that came from this dinosaur was getting the utmost respect and attention from the residents.
“Anything that Danny the Dinosaur would say, the residents were like, fine. If it came from any other staff member, not so much. So, it was a great way to bridge that gap and make government communications a little more exciting.”
Deciding on the identity of the mascot was easy. The life-sized loggerhead turtle Davidson spent three years to create has easily become the town’s most recognizable feature.
“People know the turtle,” Vice Mayor Fran Attardi said during a brief discussion leading up to the council’s approval of the move by a 5-0 vote. “You say, ‘the town with the turtle,’ and people know exactly where you’re at.”
The move also underscores the town’s appreciation for Davidson, who not only sculpted the bronze turtle but also designed three glass mosaics that serve to hide unsightly electric boxes in front of the Sausalito, Southgate and Mayfair West condominiums.
Born in New Jersey, Davidson spent more than 30 years in Des Moines, Iowa, after marrying in 1949. She spent those years as a teacher of at-risk children before she and her husband, Sol, bought a houseboat in 1982 and spent five months cruising the Mississippi before finding their way to Delray Beach.
Eight years later, in 1990, they moved to the Horizon West condo in South Palm Beach, where they would remain until Sol died in 2013.
“We didn’t like South Palm Beach,” Penny once said. “We loved South Palm Beach.”
And the town loved her back.
“She was a warm spirit that made everyone feel welcome,” Town Clerk Yude Davenport said. “She was the kind of person who never hesitated to lend a helping hand, volunteer her time or support a community event.”
Davidson had demonstrated an artistic flair when she created a raw wool needlepoint named Flowering Shrub for the Judy Chicago Birth Project in the early 1980s. The piece is now part of the permanent collection at the Albuquerque Museum.
In South Palm Beach, Davidson became more active artistically, participating in the early Lake Worth Street Painting festivals and holding classes and workshops in the town.
“She had a very creative attitude toward life itself,” longtime resident and former Council member Elva Culbertson said. “She was very fun-loving, very social. One thing most people don’t know is she also started the town book club.”
Culbertson said after Davidson’s husband died, her two sons convinced her to move around the corner from South Palm Beach to the Carlisle, an assisted living facility. Culbertson said Carlisle officials wouldn’t allow her to do her artwork there, so she left her equipment at Town Hall and did it there.
“She couldn’t walk to Town Hall anymore because she was older, so one of us had to pick her up because she was still working on a mosaic,” Culbertson said.
At least one of her works in the town features a penny as her signature; Culbertson said it could be several.
Davidson ultimately moved back to Iowa to be nearer her children in her final years. She died in 2020.
The South Palm Beach Town Council passed a resolution honoring her work in 2017 and the current council expressed its appreciation and enthusiasm for what the new town mascot could mean going forward.
“It’s a fantastic way to go, and it’s kind of preserving our town history and kind of glorifying it,” Council member Adrian Burcet said.
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