So much information on this snapshot—enough to make any historian’s heart beat faster! We have not only the names of the picnickers and the place they were meeting, but also the exact date.
If I’m not mistaken, this is an area called Ross Park in the Florida town of Holly Hill. Not much looks like Florida to me, except for the tall stem of a palm tree in the background.
And do the clothes say “Florida” to you? Grace and Jack, on the left, wear colorful outfits that I associate with the warm, touristy areas like Florida and California. Grace, with her pink dress, white cardigan, and bluish white hair, reminds me a lot of my grandmother.
Edith Chapman, on the other hand, definitely looks like an outsider. There is no trace of color in her clothes, and nothing about them speaks to the styles of 1969. She wears a hat, although hats were no longer required of the well-dressed woman, and it doesn’t even protect her from the sun. Her black coat is long and heavy looking, and she has kept her sensible shoes. I imagine she is an out of state visitor not used to Florida styles, and maybe not to picnics either.
It almost looks like Edith is wearing gloves too! Super interesting pic.
Interesting, too, that they are relatively bundled up for September 26 in Florida. Let’s pretend that Edith just arrived and her friends whisked her out to a picnic before she had got to change her clothes.