Florida politics around the turn of the 20th century was wild and wooly. Most candidates and voters were grateful to get through elections and legislative sessions with no gunplay. Frequent shouting matches, fistfights and the occasional horse whipping were a given.

May Mann Jennings, who for a good part of her life was unable to vote, much less hold public office, was among the most skilled politicians of the times. Clay County has long laid claim to this woman and her family.

May Mann's political training began early when, in 1882 at age 9, her mother died and her father became Sen. Austin Mann from Hernando County in the Crystal River area. She and her older sister were dispatched to St. Joseph Academy in St. Augustine for a stiff academic curriculum and traditional southern finishing school training in refined deportment.

Vacations were spent in Tallahassee when the Legislature was in session. Natural curiosity inspired her to explore and learn the ins and outs of the capital city. Her father introduced her to his peers and her accomplished curtsey and nun-instilled demeanor made her an immediate success. But she sought out the regular people and charmed them as well. She listened and remembered everything.

Austin Mann's political enemies conspired in the late 1880s to gerrymander him out of office. He ran in newly formed Citrus County but was defeated when his opponent charged that he was an aristocrat because he slept in a nightshirt. It was, of course, a vicious lie.

Mann relocated to Brooksville and in 1890 was soon back in the fray running for a seat in the House of Representatives. May Mann, recently graduated as valedictorian of her class, proved an able campaigner. She was equally comfortable pouring tea and punch in fancy drawing rooms or out in the woods rubbing elbows with working people where the candidates climbed on the nearest available stump and commenced speechifying.

Austin Mann was elected and May met her future husband, then Judge William Sherman Jennings, a young up-and-comer in the Democratic Party.

Their courtship continued when they both traveled to the capital, where May assumed responsibility for her father's appointments, correspondence and hostess duties. Sometimes, she was the only woman in the capital corridors and offices full of suspender-snapping, back-slapping politicos and their fawning hangers-on.

On May 12, 1891, May Mann and William Sherman Jennings married and were escorted down the aisle by the entire membership of the Legislature. Jennings' ascent in the Democratic Party was one of the most rapid in history and many credit May's intimate knowledge of state politics and politicians and her vast network of

women friends from her tireless efforts for the Florida Federation of Woman's Clubs.

On Nov. 6, 1900, the voters of Florida elected Jennings governor of the state. After serving one term, Jennings, May and 12-year-old son Sherman Bryan settled in Jacksonville. The family also spent time at their farm property near Middleburg in Clay County. May reveled in again having a hen house and riding horses as in her earliest days.

May Mann Jennings was a natural at negotiating the minefield of politics in turn-of-the-century Florida. She did it with intellect and charm, in corsets, bustles and immaculate white gloves. never mussing a hair of her signature Gibson Girl hair style.

She never resorted to a gun or horsewhip.

Acknowledgements: Clay County Photographic Archives.

Clay County resident Mary Jo McTammany writes a regular column for Clay County Line.