The Key West Mystique
Key West Island News
Key West Island News connects Key West residents and friends of the island, fosters our One Human Family culture and advances understanding of shared goals for our island community
Linda Grist Cunningham | Columns and news analysis
Key West Island News editor Linda Grist Cunningham has written more than 4,000 columns — in print and on the web — since 1968. She hates writing and is compelled to do it anyway.
Key West hurricane recovery | Part 3 | The worst is yet to come
Four kinds of people ride out a hurricane: Those with no where to go or no one to take them. Those whose clueless bravado having weathered a tropical storm or two leads them to believe hurricanes are just a bit more windy. Those who missed the evacuation window and...
Key West hurricane evacuation | Part 2 | What to do if you leave the island
When a mandatory hurricane evacuation order is issued in Key West and the Florida Keys, how do you know when to go and what to do? We’ll help you decide.
Key West hurricane prep | Part 1: Let’s get started
June is hurricane prep time in Key West. With so much hurricane prep info floating around, here’s what you REALLY need to know.
5 things locals know about Key West in June
Key West in June is hump month. It's the 30 days following the "saying farewell" months of April and May when visitors and snowbirds leave. In June, the weather is perfect and our island catches its breath. Key West in June is the break we get before summer sets in...
4 ways to strengthen the Key West tree canopy without home rule control
Historically, the Key West tree canopy boasted little in the way of showy shade trees. We are an inhospitable, oolite limestone island in the middle of salt water. What green things we had were more scraggly than soaring, the results of birds and other creatures using...
Key West trees | Welcome to the Cunningham Urban Hammock
Myrtles of the river, stoppers and the Jamaica caper flank the pool with mango overhead (2022) The mango remained, as did the Florida thatch palm, in 2012 In 2013, the urban hammock was just establishing itself The next people to own our house are in for an...
Dear Connor is a collection of columns Linda writes for her grandson, Connor. Though he may never read them, they help her make sense of the world.
Dear Connor: Nine promises that we will be OK
Being OK doesn't mean the next several years will be moonbeams and unicorns. The next decade will be harsh, unsteady, inexplicable and frightening. We will, as a country, walk with that awesome shadow of the valley of death. History tells us that we must face our worst selves before we can create our best.
Dear Connor | The day the young ones took charge
History will remember the march as the coming-to-power of Xers and Millennials. Though there were aging baby boomers aplenty in the crowd and at the microphones, the marches around the world saw these elders step aside to open the way for younger women.
Hurricane Irma | In September 2017, Linda Grist Cunningham created and launched a Facebook Page that aggregated news coverage during Hurricane Irma. She was off-island at the time visiting her mother in Virginia. Her husband remained in Key West. Over the three weeks that she and her partner journalists John Teets maintained around-the-clock coverage, they reached almost a million people around the world. These are the columns she wrote each day. Hurricane Season is always June 1 – Nov. 30.
Hurricane Irma | How did news coverage get so confused?
By Sept, 5, 2017, five days before Hurricane Irma battered Key West and the Florida Keys, I was swearing -- or at least muttering unpleasant comments under my breath. I was, as some will remember, visiting my mother in the Shenandoah Valley and...
Hurricane Irma | Are you ready for the anniversary?
Sunday. Aug. 20, 2017 -- exactly one year ago -- was a perfect island beach day. High temps in the upper 80s, low humidity -- at least for us -- great breezes and sunny skies. No storms on the horizon; all quiet off the shores of Africa from...
