![\"Zora](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/Zora-Neale-Hurston.-Courtesy-of-the-United-States-Library-of-Congress-859x1024.jpg\")
Zora Neale Hurston. Courtesy of the United States Library of Congress<\/p>\nZora Neale Hurston. Courtesy of the United States Library of Congress<\/p>\n
In the 1950s and 1960s, Lincoln Park in Fort Pierce was home to a bustling Black community. Among the cultural icons living there was anthropologist and author Zora Neale Hurston. Best known for her novel Their Eyes Were Watching God, Hurston lived in Fort Pierce from 1957 to 1960, first in a private home and then in the St. Lucie County Welfare Home for Blacks. Recently, both properties were acquired by local nonprofit organization the Zora Neale Hurston Florida Educational Foundation<\/a> (ZNHFEF).<\/p>\n The former Welfare Home for Blacks was gifted to ZNHFEF in 2019 by St. Lucie County after the organization lobbied to preserve the property. \u201cWe found out that this location where Zora last lived and died would be transformed into something that had no voice from the community,\u201d says Marvin Hobson, grant administrator for ZNHFEF. \u201cWe wanted to see [it] memorialized.\u201d Located at 809 North Ninth St., the building is under renovation and slated to open later this year as the Zora Dust Tracks Museum\u2014with plans to feature exhibits about Hurston, offer classes and programs, and host art exhibits. <\/p>\n In 2019, with the help of a separate grant, ZNHFEF bought the private home at 1734 Avenue L where Hurston. The property will become a visitors\u2019 center and host a writers-in-residence program. President of ZNHFEF Marina Santos says it fulfills an important vision in the community. \u201cWe are doing this because of the love of Zora, the love of the community, and the passion we have for preserving a legacy.<\/p>\n In honor of Black History Month, here are three of our favorite Florida-centric titles penned by Hurston.<\/p>\n \u2022 Their Eyes Were Watching God<\/p>\n Hurston\u2019s novel follows a protagonist\u2019s life in the all-Black town of Eatonville.<\/p>\n \u2022 Mules and Men<\/p>\n A collection of Black folklore, stories, songs, and sermons from Central Florida.<\/p>\n \u2022 Seraph on the Suwanee<\/p>\n Written in 1948, Hurston\u2019s final novel explores Florida\u2019s white \u201ccracker\u201d culture. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Zora Neale Hurston. Courtesy of the United States Library of Congress In the 1950s and 1960s, Lincoln Park…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":136681,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[171,173,172],"class_list":["post-136680","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-port-st-lucie","tag-port-st-lucie","tag-port-st-lucie-headlines","tag-port-st-lucie-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/136680","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=136680"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/136680\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/136681"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=136680"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=136680"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=136680"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"Their](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/Their-Eyes-Were-Watching-God-by-Zora-Neale-Hurston-198x300.jpg\")
Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston
\nZora in Florida<\/p>\n