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Deconstructing the Chickee

By Mischa Vieira

You've seen them before, perhaps in a travel magazine or a glitzy Hollywood film. They're the palm-thatched huts lining tropical shorelines where one can imagine a romantic escapade or a relaxing retreat perfect for spending hours lost in a good book.

Across South Florida they're known as chickee huts, and they're the latest in ancient traditions and practices, like yoga, that are coming en vogue once again.

Recently, members of the Miccosukee Native American Tribe constructed one of the largest chickee (pronounced chick-ee) huts in the state outside of a reservation at the Winyah Hotel & Suites at the Centennial Harbour Marina in Fort Myers. The 1,200-square-foot hut is made of cabbage palm fronds and a thick cypress log frame. It took nine days to build under the guidance of three men whose only modern piece of technology was a worn chainsaw.

"It was stunning to watch it come together," Winyah general manager Jack Copeland said. "It's a dying art."

The chickee is a dying art. Up until the late 1970s the chickee hut was still used for traditional housing on reservations like Big Cypress and Florida State Reservation. The convenience of running water and electricity won out, though, and today the chickee is mainly viewed as a piece of history in Native American culture, like the washboard is in prominent American culture.

Although thousands of years old and first documented on the Lee Island Coast by Spanish Conquistadors in the 1500s, the chickee actually saw its rise in the early to mid 1800s. During that time Seminole and Miccosukee Native Americans were hunted by the U.S. government as part of the Indian Relocation Acts, and the ability of the chickee to be quickly dismantled before an attack proved useful.

Home Sweet Home
Quite simply, "chickee" means "house" in the languages of the Seminole and Miccosukee Native Americans (the closest relatives of the Calusa Indians). The open-air styling of the chickee weren't designed for looks, but to accommodate for the warm, humid weather.

"There would be at least two types of chickees," said Brent Weisman, Associate Professor of Anthropology at the University of South Florida whose specializes in Seminole studies. "One without a raised wooden platform floor (only dirt floor) for cooking, with the cook fire in the middle, and a sleeping chickee with a raised wooden split-log floor. In both types, tools and possessions were stored in the rafters or hanging in bags or pouches."

While a chickee could be dismantled and moved relatively easily, the process of building a new hut by hand is quite complicated. First, the cypress trees needed to be cut down. Some of these trees are as much as four feet in diameter, so after they were felled, the construction crew might have waited for a thunderstorm to flood the area, that way they could easily haul the logs to the building site. Cutting the cabbage palm fronds was another involved task. An average chickee hut takes several hundred fronds, and they can't dry out before they're strapped to the frame.

Today, modern technology speeds up the process, and commercial chickee hut builders can pull together a hut in two to three days, rather than almost two weeks. The craftsmanship is still solid, though, and most chickees can withstand heavy Florida rains and even hurricanes. Their lifespan is 15 to 30 years, with roof maintenance every five years. The chickee at the Winyah Hotel should remain standing for 25 to 30 years, Copeland predicts.

The New Old World
In the short months since the Winyah's chickee was constructed, the hut has decidedly become a popular relaxing venue where locals and visitors alike gather at the end of the day to watch the sunset. Several weddings have also been booked at the Winyah, thanks to the chickee. Copeland says the enthusiasm for the chickee comes from the cultural aspect of the structure.

"That this was made by hand, and is an original piece of work by the Miccosukee gets people pretty excited," Copeland said. "It was a great experience to have this done."

WaterFrontFortMyers.com-Pet Friendly-located on the Carolina Ave. canal with boat dock available and solar heated pool (Time Square area of Estero Island) and only 150 yards to the beautiful white sands of Estero Island in the Gulf of Mexico. Be in the Gulf of Mexico within 1 minute from our boat docks. WaterfrontFortMyers.com provides free bikes available upon request, free fishing on our docks, free wireless internet access, and laundry facility. We are located on the Carolina Ave. canal street facing Hooters Restaurant, and 300 yards away from the Beached Whale restaurant in theTime Square area of Fort Myers Beach . Our location is quiet and peaceful.

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· Please do not rearrange the furniture, take any items outside that are part of the interior décor, move any furnishings or kitchen items to another unit.

· You will be charged if we have to rearrange the furniture after your stay. The unit descriptions were correct at the time of printing, but subsequent owner renovations may have resulted in changes. Although every effort has been made for accuracy, WaterfrontFortMyers is not responsible for errors, for property changes made by the owners, or for any conditions beyond our control upon arrival.

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· Augustine unit has 2 parking spots allocated located on the furthest most left side on the parking lot (facing from Carolina Ave. towards the complex. These cars are to be parked back to back to each other.

· Reagan, Aquinas, and Schaeffer units all are allocated 1 parking spot

· No guest cars are ever allowed on our parking lot and will be towed at owner's expense

· $100 fine will be assessed against any guest who violated the parking agreement for guest cars parked in our parking lot.

· R.V.'s, Boats, motor homes, travel trailers, trucks, motorcycles, trailers, etc., are not permitted without prior approval and will be subject to towing. We do not have room in our parking lot for any of these items.

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Please call for details or to reserve your dates. We are pet friendly, family friendly property. Free bikes provided upon request, two boat docks for fishing right at the property, pool, two boat docks

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