Terry at home doing what he loves – relaxing in his
element with a good glass of wine.
house,” he said while sitting at a very impressive
dining table with inlaid slate from one of his own
mines in Africa. “This is my base of operations, it won’t
be going up for sale.”
Terry has raised two daughters on the island, Stacy
and Susan. Stacy currently works on the east coast
of Florida and Susan lives in Tallahassee with Terry’s
three grandchildren. He was proud to report the
youngest grandchild, Katie, will be graduating from
high school soon and will be attending George
Mason University to play Division One volleyball.
While his name elicits fond and wild memories for
many on the island, he feigns a look of innocence
when he speaks of those times years ago when he
and a group of friends tried to buy the Boca Grande
Causeway, and when he was part of a group called
“The Dirty Dozen.”
“We were always blamed for everything that
happened out here, but it was never us,” he said,
perhaps not as emphatically as he could.
One of his personal passions is theater, and every
two years or so he works in an acting role in a Royal
Palm Players production. Having been in performances
such as “Rumors” by Neil Simon, “When You
Coming Back, Red Rider,” “Tuesdays with Morrie” and
“Deadwood Dick,” he has made a lot of
memories up on the stage. “The first play I ever did was “The Wild Guys”
with my friends Steve Seidensticker, Dennis
Domres and Jim Grace,” he said. “Before that the
RPP director at that time, Tina Johnson, kept
asking me if I would do theater and I kept saying
no. Finally one day, after seeing that play in British
Colombia, I told her if she ever brought that play
to Boca Grande I would be in it. She called me
the next year.”
Terry was also one member of the group who
started the “Dam” streets parties. He, Braxton &
Betty Bowen, Chris & Brenda Lee Combrink and
now Mike & Cindy Rosier pay to have the Boca
Bande play, to decorate the end of Damficare
Street and set up large tables laden with food
that usually includes a whole lot of delicious
alligator meat from Braxton and tripletail from
neighbor Tommy Locke. They change the date of
the party every year and if you know the right
people you might get invited to one. To say they
are legendary is an understatement.
“We want all the island people to come,” he
said. “We never publish the date, it’s all word of
mouth. If you know about it, you were meant to
be there.”
70GASPARILLA ISLAND May/June 2018