00:00Mary was the executive director of the Deering Estate Foundation when the Seafood Festival came about.
00:06So I'm going to let you talk a little bit about the history, Mary.
00:10Actually, I came on board in 2007, which was actually the third annual.
00:18But what we did was we completely retooled the event into a island themed all day celebration that was family
00:32friendly, brought in the whole island vibe to showcase the absolute beauty of the Deering Estate, leveraging its resources.
00:41Back then, the Deering Estate was relatively unknown, hidden behind the rock walls.
00:48People that lived just within blocks had no idea what was behind the walls.
00:54So we needed to bring people in and we wanted to bring this asset, this incredible asset that the county
01:02has to the people.
01:04And the best way to do that was to create an incredibly fun and exciting seafood festival, the first in
01:13Miami-Dade County, by the way, that was truly an island celebration, bringing arts, seafood, all day entertainment, kids activities,
01:24natural and environmental touring, historic preservation with the historic homes.
01:30It just blended everything all together.
01:33We created this cute little logo with a shrimp playing the drums and a lobster in the pot and a
01:42crab that was dancing all over.
01:45And I worked with Sheila Stieglitz, who was our public relations and marketing specialist at the time, and the new
01:52director of the Deering Estate, Bill Irvin.
01:55And we brought just an incredible group together of volunteers, retooled it, and presented it as the Deering Seafood Festival.
02:06That, as Mary stated, it started as a friend-raiser just to get people to come to the estate.
02:12But now it's become a beloved community and beloved South Florida festival.
02:17And what I think that it does is it highlights all of the different types of seafood in all of
02:25the different ways that it can be prepared.
02:29But in addition to that, I think that it brings people to the estate and allows us, there's also so
02:38many components to it.
02:39There's a discovery cove where children can go and learn about dissection.
02:44They can go and learn about all the different seafood.
02:48They can take part in different experiments.
02:54They can learn about all the flora and the fauna and all the different creatures that are on the estate.
03:02And it's just a wonderful way that it's not just a park.
03:07And we have a mission to protect the land and to ensure that it stays here in perpetuity for generations
03:17to come.
03:19In my vision, is that I always want it to be a celebration of culture.
03:26And through our food vendors and so forth, it's not just island culture, it's also the Latino culture.
03:35And I just want it to be a celebration that brings everybody together with music and with food and with
03:43activities for the children and fun.
03:45Because it's all about saving this place for your children and your children's children, right?
03:55So that they can come and visit and they can come to the Seafood Festival.
04:00And I'm hoping that we can continue to offer it and have it just be one of the highlights of
04:08South Miami.
04:09You know, I would just like to see it sustained and, you know, be available to the community.
04:18You know, I have to say, too, that we don't just draw community members.
04:22We, you know, we have people that actually travel down here to attend from other parts of the country, international
04:30visitors.
04:30Yes, we do.
04:31Our surveys that we take have indicated every year still we'll get first-time visitors.
04:37Every year we have a bunch of people that have got it marked on their calendar.
04:40They come every year.
04:41And then we also have all of, you know, from a tourism point of view, it brings people down to
04:48South Miami-Dade and draws people down this way.
04:53And, you know, a lot of people get stuck up in North downtown, you know, the beaches and all that
04:59stuff.
05:00And when they discover that we have assets like this further south, it draws our tourism further south.
05:07So the Tourism Development Council has also been a very big partner in growing this event and supporting us.
05:14And, you know, a lot of people got involved in the companyçu that many years, we see the
05:23Yeah, you know.
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