Tropic Moon Media
In 2013, Charles Kropke and Eleanor Goldstein combined their interests to create the company, Tropic Moon Media. Charles has spent more than twenty years creating special tours throughout South Florida. Eleanor has been an educator and publisher of databases used by tens of thousands of institutions worldwide. They share an interest in adventure, ecology, and history that became the foundation of Tropic Moon Media. They have produced books and documentaries about Miami Beach and the Florida Everglades.
The singular most important documentary ever made of the plight, the successes and the prospects for solutions to vexing problems on the Everglades’ restoration.
The Unseen Everglades
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Miami Beach
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From River Boat Captain to Governor, Florida’s 19th Governor, Napoleon Bonaparte Broward
Born on April 19, 1857, to Napoleon Bonaparte Broward, Sr. and Mary Dorcas Parsons Broward in rural Duval County, Florida. His parents were American, but he had French heritage from his paternal line. He spent his childhood on a series for family farms along the St....
Francis Philip Fleming; Florida’s 15th Governor served in the Confederate Army as a Lieutenant
Francis Philip Fleming was born on September 28, 1841, and was the oldest of Lewis Fleming and his second wife Margaret Seton Fleming three children. He had two brothers, Charles Seton and Frederick A. He also had two half-siblings from his father’s first marriage to...
Florida’s 20th Governor, Albert W. Gilchrist a quiet man
Born on January 15, 1858, in Greenwood, South Carolina, looked to have a life in the military. He attended the Carolina Military Institute and went on to attend the United States Military Academy at West Point. He would have graduated from West Point in 1882, except...
Florida’s 18th Governor, began draining the Everglades
William Sherman Jennings was born in Walnut Hill, Illinois. After attending public schools near Marion County, he attended Southern Illinois University and graduated in 1883. He then went on to study law at Union College of Law in Chicago. The school is now known as...
Florida’s 16th Governor began his career in politics as a County Solicitor
Originally from Birmingham, Alabama, he moved with his parents Thomas and Elizabeth Starns Mitchell in 1846, at the age of fifteen to Jacksonville, Florida, and then shortly thereafter to Tampa, Florida. He had six brothers and two sisters. Mitchell’s early education...
Florida’s 14th Governor was a general under Robert E. Lee
Born in Richmond, Massachusetts on March 15, 1831, Edward Aylesworth Perry was the fourth child of Asa and Philura Perry. He was a descendant of Arthur Perry, one of the earliest settlers of New England. After briefly attending Yale University, in 1853, he moved to...
Coffee Table and Historical Books
South Beach
Recently, the Miami Beach Design Preservation League (MDPL) selected “SOUTH BEACH: Stories of a Renaissance” as its feature book for MDPL Reads, a community reading program. The “coffee table” souvenir book was also featured during Art Deco Weekend, an annual event organized by MDPL that brings hundreds of thousands of visitors to Ocean Drive, Collins Avenue, Lincoln Road and the other storied streets of South Beach.
“The book is a treasure trove of stories, photos and original artwork that brings South Beach to life,” says Goldstein, noting it took more than two years of interviews and research to create the book. “We have featured the people who transformed the empty, mosquito infested island of the early 1900s into the most recognized international resort in the world.” Read more
South Beach
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Miami Beach
Noted author and adventurer, Charles J. Kropke traces the Illustrious 100 year history of Miami Beach (1815-2015). The book celebrates the Miami Beach Centennial, tracing the illustrious history of this storied island from the mid-1800s to present. It will highlight the lives of early pioneers and the visionary civic and business leaders who turned an uninhabited sandy island into today’s international visitor destination – and the many booms and busts along the way.
“Miami Beach has welcomed many waves of people through the decades,” Kropke says. In the 1910s and ’20s, tens of thousands of winter visitors from the northern states came each year, and hotels, restaurants and other businesses sprung up to cater to their needs. Read more
Miami Beach
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