Outreach
Books to Schools Program for Title I Schools
The Henry Plant Museum comes to you! Museum volunteers use the award winning book Maggie & Max at the Museum and Through the Keyhole: A Young Person's Guide to the Henry B. Plant Museum to share the history of the Museum and its significance with 3rd-4th and 7th-8th grade students in Hillsborough County's Title I schools. Students are introduced to Henry Plant and the Tampa Bay Hotel during a 45-minute book presentation. Using hands-on props, students learn about Mr. Plant's contributions to Florida's development through railroads and steamships, and talk about the historical significance of his Tampa Bay Hotel. Volunteers engage students with a follow-up discussion and provide each student with their own copy of the interactive book.
If you would like to schedule a Books to Schools visit for your school, please contact Curator of Education Heather Trubee Brown at This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it or 258.7304.
Books to Schools 2010
Grady Elementary Poetry Café April 23, 2010
The following poems are selections written by 3rd and 4th graders at Grady Elementary School in Tampa. They are based on vintage photographs of the Tampa Bay Hotel and its guests during the years of operation, 1891-1931. Some of this work has been edited for space, clarification, spelling and grammar.
In the old days we had a hotel.
It was very beautiful in its old spell.
The tree were blowing whoosh! whoosh!
It was very big.
Then one day it said to me,
“I am very lonesome don’t you see?
I need some friends, so what can you do?”
I said, “I know what, I’ll make a school
and you’ll be the structure that will rule.”
Then it said, “That will be swell.”
And to this day that’s what we see in the place of the old hotel.
Anonymous
The Veranda
The veranda was around since 1891.
It has a lot of chairs
I can sit to watch the sun set
In the shape of the veranda.
I can run around the waves
Of the shades and watch
The wind blowing at me
on the veranda.
The veranda is the most relaxing
Place I could ever be.
Marcella
From old times to new times
From rocking chairs to massaging chairs.
From telephones to blackberry.
From Beethoven to Lady Gaga.
From 1891 to 2010.
From a hotel to a university.
Lorenzo
Eight American men
Stand and sit proudly
Some are Spanish-American War correspondents
And some are different, I guess.
Three men sit with crossed legs, but four are standing.
This picture was taken in 1898 at the Tampa Bay Hotel grounds.
All around they are surround by trees.
I see eight men standing right now near a school in 2010.
Timothy
Busy, busy, busy,
The large hotel is busy.
The veranda creaks as people walk along it.
You are so excited seeing the decorations.
Glass vases and chairs everywhere.
The biggest statue is standing.
People reading the paper,
Old friends laughing.
Amaya
Bricks rough in the city
Crazy palm trees growing
Tall almost up to the sky
Road a cool place
but dusty
Emily
Lots of people in a lobby
Babbling there heads off by one statue near
And one statue there.
Next to the door outside
People running crazy
Up and down the stairs
Mantel holding everything in place
This is a wild place.
Alexis
Catfish, trout, grouper: the women are wearing hot dresses in cold freezing water.
Pamela
