Hilliard

"Mr. Myakka" was a consultant at a new exhibit at the Smithsonian.

By Charlie Patton, The Times-Union

HILLIARD - As he watched the two-minute promotional DVD in his living room, Frank Watts got a little emotional.

"This brings goose bumps to me," Watts said.

Soil has that effect on Watts, a 64-year-old pedologist who has spent his life digging around in what he refuses to call dirt.

"I don't like the word 'dirt,' " he said.

It's soil.

Soil, as the two-minute promotional clip documents, is the subject of a new exhibition at the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History.

Watts was in Washington for the July opening of Dig It! The Secrets of Soil, feeling just a little like a proud parent. Part of the exhibit consists of 54 monoliths, cross-sections of soil from each state and territory.

The Florida monolith was a slice of Myakka sand Watts helped take out of the ground in St. Johns County about a decade ago. It originally went to Washington for a 1999 centennial celebration of the U.S. Soil Survey. It remained in storage in Washington until the opening of Dig It.

Dig It will continue at the Smithsonian until January 2010, then become a traveling exhibit.

Myakka fine sand was chosen to represent Florida because it is the state's most common soil, covering about 1.5 million acres. In 1989, the Legislature designated Myakka as the state's official soil.

Watts, who retired in 2003 after a long career with the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Natural Resources Conservation Service, formerly called the Soil Conservation Service, helped lead the effort to recognize Myakka as the state soil. As a result, friends took to calling Watts "Mr. Myakka."

But Watts admits that Myakka isn't his favorite Florida soil. It isn't fertile and it isn't a great soil to build on, he said.

He's much happier on a plot of moderately wet Blanton soil, underneath a stand of oak trees near Hilliard in Nassau County where he and his wife have lived since 1983.

Myakka and Blanton are two of the 174 soils documented in a new book, Soils of Florida, co-written by Watts and Mary E. Collins, a University of Florida professor of environmental pedology. The book, published by the Soil Science Society of America, is a handsome trade paperback with color illustrations of each soil.

Between the book and the Smithsonian exhibit, Watts hopes people learn a little more about the ground we all stand on. And maybe a few of us will learn to share his enthusiasm.

"I live and die soils," he said with a smile.

charlie.patton@jacksonville.com, (904) 359-4413
Photo by Bob Self/The Times-Union

Nassau County runners turned out in force for the 31st annual Gate River Run in Jacksonville on March 8. Here's how your neighbors finished.

Overall Rank Name, Age, Hometown Chip Time

130 Matthew Altman, 25, Fernandina Beach 57:02:00
160 Toby Lentz, 31, Fernandina 58:40:00
209 Michael Biagini, 33, Fernandina 1:00:39
233 Shane Still, 41, Yulee 1:01:18
236 Bill Murto, 42, Fernandina 1:01:49
249 Ken Marker, 30, Fernandina 1:01:52
297 Brian McGuire, 36, Fernandina 1:03:19
324 Brian Gordon, 26, Yulee 1:03:47
444 Michael Nichols, 44, Fernandina 1:06:21
452 Brett Opalinski, 36, Fernandina 1:06:24
505 Gary Haslip, 45, Fernandina 1:07:15
508 Dillon Harrison, 32, Callahan 1:07:18
511 Vic Lloyd, 45, Yulee 1:07:22
552 Matthew Mandeville, 44, Callahan 1:07:40
592 Vann Simmons, 41, Amelia Island 1:07:59
655 Joshua Sherrill, 27, Fernandina 1:08:57
671 Patrick Kelley, 34, Fernandina 1:05:39
681 Chris Twiggs, 37, Fernandina 1:09:14
737 Luke Walls, 19, Callahan 1:09:43
777 Tarla Millar, 34*, Amelia Island 1:10:00
801 Del Conner, 55, Hilliard 1:10:00
826 Marc Demeter, 35, Fernandina , 1:10:34
1028 Joey Shiver, 14, Yulee 1:11:39
1039 Todd Hopkins, 45, Fernandina 1:12:25
1062 Roger Burnsed, 39, Sanderson 1:12:12
1066 Deborah Dunham, 40*, Fernandina 1:12:42
1110 Conner Stevenson, 14, Callahan 1:12:01
1182 Marc Anderson, 46, Fernandina 1:12:54
1194 Chad Irwin, 28, Fernandina 1:11:53
1210 Shelly Davies, 34*, Fernandina 1:14:10
1271 Larry Stokes, 27, Bryceville 1:12:59
1364 Jennifer Gallese, 32*, Fernandina 1:14:36
1386 Sorcha French, 32*, Fernandina 1:15:28
1478 Ashley Stanley, 29*, Yulee 1:15:58
1510 Jeff Wright, 47, Amelia Island 1:15:59
1511 Jamie McCarthy, 28*, Fernandina 1:16:28
1539 Lawrence Stake, 31, Callahan 1:15:07
1548 Dorie Chauncey, 29*, Fernandina 1:16:43
1554 Alicia Parker, 47*, Fernandina 1:15:19
1557 Rusty Burke, 30, Yulee 1:14:37
1574 Mark Belton, 47, Callahan 1:16:03
1592 James Leblanc, 39, Fernandina 1:12:30
1599 Jeffrey Miller, 49, Fernandina 1:16:47
1665 Jeffrey Gallese, 44, Fernandina 1:16:51
1685 Diana Twiggs, 36*, Fernandina 1:17:37
1796 Cole Stevenson, 17, Callahan 1:17:05
1811 Michael Pitts, 33*, Fernandina 1:15:07
1818 Lisa Haviland, 46*, Fernandina 1:18:23
1825 James Strozinsky, 47, Fernandina 1:18:50
1881 Carolyn Peeples, 33*, Yulee 1:19:04
1899 David Stanley, 21, Fernandina 1:18:54
1943 John Pennypacker, 42, Fernandina 1:18:28
1978 John Fournier, 43, Fernandina 1:18:55
2015 Kim Philo, 43*, Fernandina 1:19:52
2016 Robin Lentz, 28*, Fernandina 1:16:33
2084 Everett Crum, 73, Hilliard 1:20:01
2142 David Schreck, 43, Bryceville 1:20:12
2166 Stacy Simmons, 42*, Amelia Island 1:20:36
2208 Quinn Garber, 29, Fernandina 1:17:00
2218 Clara Podrasky, 34*, Fernandina 1:17:45
2255 Andy Mui, 31, Yulee 1:19:52
2262 Bill Barnes, 61, Yulee 1:21:07
2319 Alexandra Maddox, 36*, Fernandina 1:21:44
2366 Russell Turner, 57, Fernandina 1:21:47
2390 Joseph Waas, 47, Fernandina 1:21:12
2432 Dave Hewett, 38, Fernandina 1:18:09
2476 Cleve Cheshire, 23, Hilliard 1:19:27
2495 Bjorn Anderson, 28, Fernandina 1:20:55
2544 Martin Haley, 47, Yulee 1:19:18
2565 Mitchell Haley, 18, Yulee 1:19:23
2631 Devin Stevenson, 12, Callahan 1:21:04
2709 Jessica Angus, 22*, Fernandina 1:20:33
2780 Tommy Frame, 29, Yulee 1:20:10
2817 Austin Nicklas, 14, Fernandina 1:20:25
2824 Dawn Cutajar, 42*, Fernandina 1:23:00
2837 Joshua Gore, 18, Callahan 1:24:17
2927 Thomas Gallacher, 46, Yulee 1:23:35
2985 Kevin Dalton, 37, Fernandina 1:23:12
3078 Keith George, 40, Callahan 1:19:10
3116 Pegge Ealum, 38*, Fernandina 1:24:59
3139 Carl Spillers, 30, Fernandina 1:23:45
3163 Alex Hallmark, 17, Yulee 1:24:19
3183 Robert Podrasky, 39, Fernandina 1:22:54
3190 Bethany Glassbrenner, 27*, Fernandina 1:24:02
3199 Jo Baker, 48*, Yulee 1:26:09
3209 Gary Sanders, 51, Fernandina 1:25:07
3348 Steve Cash, 52, Yulee 1:25:25
3351 Sheri Hutes, 43*, Yulee 1:25:24
3352 Gary Pate, 44, Callahan 1:25:53
3354 Melissa Marker, 31*, Fernandina 1:25:25
3360 Anderson Foote III, 48, Fernandina 1:25:24
3361 Michael Sirmans, 51, Callahan 1:24:28
3471 Bruce Morrison, 61, Fernandina 1:26:26
3603 Steve Hart, 42, Yulee 1:25:28
3652 Alan Young, 47, Amelia Island 1:26:18
3657 Andrew Weston, 44, Fernandina 1:27:28
3735 Laura Rouse, 24*, Fernandina 1:26:46
3737 Casey Klein, 23*, Fernandina 1:26:46
3750 Michael Carroll, 54, Callahan 1:27:18
3779 James Warren, 36, Fernandina 1:25:53
3780 Inga Warren, 35*, Fernandina 1:26:29
3832 Sonny Mann, 65, Fernandina 1:29:23
3928 Kristi Garber, 37*, Fernandina 1:27:19
3962 Jeremy Hamrick, 15, Callahan 1:25:38
3984 Johnny Halman Jr, 51, Callahan 1:24:22
4064 Larry Tipton, 54, Hilliard 1:28:39
4129 Taylor Clark, 37, Fernandina 1:28:26

My Nassau Sun staff

The family reading workshop for middle-school students and their parents at 6 p.m. Thursday, March 6, in the Hillard Middle-Senior High School cafetorium will be held as originally scheduled.

School officials announced earlier today that the event would have to be cancelled, but later found out the seminar would proceed after all.

The workshop, "Mysteries in the Middle," for its middle-school students and their parents and guardians, will be at 6 p.m. Thursday in the school cafetorium.