Happy February First and welcome to Greater Jacksonville, Florida!
The city of Jacksonville proper is one of the few cities in the United States where the city limits and the county line are the same.
This makes it the largest city in the state by both population and area.
The Greater Jacksonville Metropolitan Area, about 1.3 million people, surrounds smaller cities and towns that have come to be considered “Jacksonville proper.”
“Greater Jacksonville,” however, takes in even more territory in northeast Florida than most Jacksonvillagers™ care to realize.
Since the First Coast extends all the way to Palm Coast, it’s more accurate to acknowledge, for instance, that Gainesville, Green Cove Springs and Palatka really are part of Greater Jacksonville.
Get a map, and let me prove it.
Draw a line from “Jacksonville” to Gainesville. Then draw another east toward the Atlantic through Palatka and Bunnell to Palm Coast. The First Coast makes the third leg of the triangle you just drew.
Say hello to “Greater Jacksonville.”
The fact that Palatka is not an official part of the Greater Jacksonville Metropolitan Area should especially bother Jacksonville proper.
“Palatka” is European for pilo-taikita, “a place where cattle cross a river.”
Look up wacca pilatka and cow ford.
Wacca Pilatka (Jacksonville) and Pilo-Taikita (Palatka) even reported to the same Timucuan chief. (Source: fourth-grade Florida history, Florida public schools.)
Your Greater Jacksonville Examiner calls on the Jacksonville Chamber of Commerce to issue a proclamation granting Palatka sister-city status. This Examiner volunteers to act as Lord Mayor if it will help expedite the aforementioned.
In short, Your Greater Jacksonville Examiner examines the unique and unusual in northeast Florida.
Welcome to her neighborhood.
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©2012 All rights reserved.
OFFICIAL BIO:K Truitt is a second-generation, native Floridian born in Jacksonville. Truitt worked in public higher education for 25 years, most recently in Texas, is a successful grant writer, knows newspaper publishing, printing and graphic design and wants to work in the public sector. Contact: kt.4examiner@yahoo.com
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