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 traffic | Unless we ditch some vehicles, the island’s gonna sink
It doesn’t take an official study to know there’s nothing good about Key West traffic. There are days when I’m sure we are one car away from the entire island sinking into the Atlantic. And, you know what? Our alternatives-to-cars solutions have not improved things.
Key West newcomers: 4 ways to engage their attention (and checkbooks)
Look, I get it. It's hard to share "our" island with new folks when we're gritting our teeth in the traffic jam at the Cow Key Bridge or sprinting through the Green Parrot intersection before the light changes. Why can't these Key West newcomers -- visitors, second...
Key West sidewalks and cruise ships: This time, the island wins
Two years ago, Key West locked itself down, isolated for almost three months by a roadblock at the mainland border, and began a reasonably neighborly conversation about what the island might look like “after Covid.” Here’s what happened with Key West sidewalks and cruise ships.
Key West vacation: What I learned on my 10-day island escape
If you’re working with a 2019 “here’s what to do in Key West” list, you ought to toss it, because you’re going to find Key West vacation planning has changed since our Covid-19 lock down ended June 1, 2020. Without an updated list, you might find yourself mightily disappointed.
Key West weird: How a weekend gave us our joy back
I danced in the grocery aisle Monday morning. (That's an image you won't want to keep handy.) There's more to that snippet of Key West weird later, but, first let's back up a few days. Our tiny, two-by-four island with its long tail stretching 150 miles up the Keys...
Key West Covid-19: Two years in and we’re “done”
Key West Covid has joined Key West Crud as something we live with. We’ll deal with Covid consequences as they arise, but we’ve moved past, way past, the memes and hunkering down of 2020.
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.
Dismantling the 14th Amendment: Keeping it upbeat in Key West when the world isn’t
I love my Key West Bubble, but national dissonance is dribbling through today. I am unsettled at the prospect of living through the dismantling of the 14th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. The 14th Amendment, ratified by the states in 1868, can be boiled down to this: Oops, when we wrote the Constitution and the Bill of Rights (the first 10 amendments), we were thinking only of straight white men with money. Perhaps we need to fix that?
Dear Connor | As the American democracy unravels, can there be hope for your future?
American history is filled with "times like these." Three times we have been here. I believe we will be OK. Though my rage boils over too often, I believe in Americans-in-the-middle. I believe there are extremists on the right and the left -- and I believe they do not, do not, represent who we are as a people. They get the attention and the headlines today; spoiled children clamoring for their own ice cream cone, unwilling to share and willing to fight to the death to keep what they believe is theirs and theirs alone. Getting through this transition will not be for the faint of heart. But get through we will.
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: 9-23-17: Closing up shop. Saying Godspeed. Going home to the Cat 5s
When we launched Key West Hurricane Irma, our online news coverage, we weren’t sure when “quit” would happen. We were confident we'd know. Today is the anniversary of knowing. It was time to wish our house guests farewell and Godspeed.
Hurricane Irma | One year ago, we awaited the storm
Why did so many decide to stay on the island, defying the mandatory Hurricane Irma evacuation orders and flirting with destruction? The answers are as complicated as the Keys. Re-reading my 2017 columns reminded me just how powerful we were as an online community. To each of you who followed along, who shared your stories and your tears, I say "thank you." It was a tough time. It's been a tough year.