The deadly Category 4 Hurricane Ian that hit Fort Myers Beach September 28, 2022 made history hovering several hours destroying homes, businesses as well taking lives. Hurricane Ian will be long remembered by Floridians and many seasonal Visitors for years to come. If you practice the half full, positive thought mentality ~ there is always a silver lining to all stories. This story “It’s A Wrap” also has a silver lining.
During Hurricane Ian, Fort Myers Beach was chewed up and spit out leaving a disaster everywhere you looked, nothing was spared. This unique historic beach community was paralyzed for many days and today still has many leftover remnants of the hurricane.
Prayers, Money and Volunteers came in from all over the world to support and help rebuild Fort Myers Beach, a place so many loved and called home.
Knowing God always has a plan. Still today, many still struggle to understand why this happened. The powerful wind and rising high waters knocked out power lines as well as jeopardizing the clean water. Damaged occurred everywhere you looked in Fort Myers Beach. With this devastation, promises still stand today with heavily damaged steeples giving many Hope.
And now for the silver lining to the story. Many of you might remember “Roxie”, the 1967 Bambi Airstream that housed the Fort Myers Beach Chambers information kiosk once upon a time. Roxie was located at Times Square on Fort Myers Beach and caught the attention of many bystanders that loved her vintage look.
Moving forward, Roxie was sold from the Chambers to a local businessman. This little trailer came in my site when I took on a part time job and I knew if she ever went up for sale, mark it sold to me! It was a fun day when I received a call that Roxie was up for grabs!
We stored Roxie at our friends house on the island that April of 2022 and knew we would be back in the fall to give Roxie more attention when time allowed. We tied her up to a few trees keeping her secure from theft not knowing Hurricane Ian that came in that fall would change everything.
Learning the devastation of the storm we did not know the whereabouts of Roxie for several days. We wondered if she too might have floated down the street with other buildings and vehicles.
A few days later we received word that Roxie held her ground and was still nested next to the tree that had been chained to. Jumping for joy, we were elated she made it through the hurricane.
Arriving a couple weeks after the hurricane, we began the clean up. Roxie not only nested close to trees that protected her but was surrounded by piles of debris.
Water exceeded well over 10 feet filling Roxie up with ocean water. Once she filled up with the water it gave her enough weight to stay in place and wait the storm out.
The sun came out, the water seeped out and it was time to clean her up! Leftover greasy mud from the ocean waters spread across floor leaving a big wet mess.
A few weeks after to storm while cleaning Roxie up we had several stop by our work site, many were amazed as we were that she was still standing pretty catching peoples attention. Two Pastors at separate times stopping sharing a prayer and celebrating the blessing. Our hearts were filled with joy.
Bit by bit we threw out the water logged contents inside and created a clean slate with a new resources that would put her back to work. Our budget was frugal and getting supplies in Fort Myers was limited from the hurricane. We scoured the second hand stores, curbs, recycling as much as we could to get her cleaned up.
A little elbow grease 😉, time and love was put back into Roxie to make her shine once again.
We lucked out finding two matching dressers to cover the wheel wells making storage room for materials. It was amazing what we found on the curb. A little paint and she quickly came back to life.
In Roxie’s past life she served as the Information Kiosk with the Fort Myers Beach Chambers on Times Square as I mentioned earlier. Thoughts of sharing Roxie filled our minds as we continued to cleaned up the mess inside. Each of us coming to the same conclusion, she needed to be shared back with the community. In this time of need with so much loss and devastation, maybe she could put a few smiles back on peoples faces.
Reaching out to my friend Jackie Liszak the Executive Director at the FMB Chamber, we offered to put Roxie on loan to help fill the gap of the lost FMB Info Kiosk at Time Square. We all became winners, they were excited to put Roxie back on the beach and we were happy to share her with others.
Roxie was off and running sharing her story with the locals and tourists. Volunteers were excited to be back handing out business brochures and answering FMB questions.
Roxie often caught the eyes of many bystanders. A few weeks ago it caught the eye of a local Fort Myers artist, Dana Enders. Dana took the time to share her talent and paint Roxie.
I reached out to Dana as I wanted to know more about her artistic story. Dana and the Fort Myers Art Association meet every Wednesday and do Plein Art Painting class around Fort Myers.
Lucky me, I caught them at the Shrimp Boats on Fort Myers Beach painting their hearts out. Wow ~ if you want to be inspired, this is the group to hang out with. Within a couple hours these artists were producing beautiful paintings. How honored I felt that Dana took the time to paint Roxie.
CBS Saturday Morning was another one that took the time to make Roxie feel special on the beach working in her new role as the FMB Information Kiosk.
Many think Roxie was hand painted with her artistic look but instead it was a wrap made especially for the 1967 Bambi trailer year promoting Fort Myers Beach.
The wrap today is still in pretty good shape giving ideas of so many things for tourists to take in while visiting Fort Myers Beach.
We hope if your on Fort Myers Beach you will take the time to go check her out. Roxie is located at Times Square standing tall and mighty with all she has been through but still bringing smiles to many.
Our hearts are full of gratitude for keeping Roxie alive today. The Fort Myers Chambers, our friends Max and Deb Runciman for allowing us to store her, Moss Marina for helping with transporting and keeping her safe, and all the volunteers continuing to promote Roxie and the Fort Myers Beach. We certainly couldn’t have had our silver lining story without YOU.
So “It’s a wrap” sharing this story of Roxie. I leave you with a favorite song we can all sing along with. Roger Miller’s ~ Trailers for Sale
