Based on true stories from South-Central Florida when it was still a wild frontier State—before orange groves, Disney World, and tourism--Crackers in Paradise is an epic tale about seven generations of a Cracker Florida family from 1843 to 1990. It seeks to dispel many myths and misunderstandings about Florida Crackers—original white settlers to rural Florida.

 

Crackers begins with the story of Reverend Tom Branch and his wife Louisa struggling to survive in the wild scrublands of Central Florida with their five beautiful daughters. After Tom’s untimely death, Louisa defends her family against cattle rustlers and a jealous brother-in-law by relying on her grit and sharp shooting skills as well as on Cotton, a Black Seminole Indian who is a fixture on their farm and in their lives.​

 

Crackers focuses largely on the women in Louisa’s family as they move from frontier to city life in the small, but ambitious booming town of Wauchula. Louisa’s new home is in the heart of the thriving citrus, cattle, and agricultural industries of Central Florida, but is a far cry from the wild, peaceful, native Florida landscapes she grew up in and loved. Now, she and her family either adapt to or fail in this small-town’s social world and ever-changing political and business dramas.