From Jacksonville.com: If Jimmy Buffett Memorial Highway begins in Key West, where does it end?
Florida HB 91 led to something that was quite rare in 2024: Republicans and Democrats happily and unanimously agreeing on something.
The bill passed the Florida House by a 119-0 vote, and then the Senate by a 40-0 vote. And when Gov. Ron DeSantis approved it June 27, a famed American roadway — State Road A1A — was designated as the “Jimmy Buffett Memorial Highway.”
It was a fitting tribute for the singer-songwriter who died in 2023. Fifty years ago this month, in December 1974, Buffett released his fifth studio album and named it “A1A.” And now that road is named after him.
Partly because of Buffett and his music, everyone knows where the southern end of A1A is. Key West, the Margaritaville Mecca for Parrotheads.
But what about the other end of A1A?
If you went to Key West — or for that matter, pretty much anywhere else along A1A — and asked people that question, how many would know the answer?
“Probably nobody,” Paul Schwend said. “People assume it’s Fernandina.”
When the designation became official, quite a few stories said that A1A stretches “from Key West to Fernandina Beach.” And it does, albeit with a few breaks. But it doesn’t end in Fernandina.
That’s the northernmost point. But it’s where A1A takes a 90-degree turn away from the ocean and heads west, then south, then west again, through a booming stretch of Nassau County, underneath I-95, past gas stations with tourist information, past the nearly 14,000 acres of Four Creeks State Forest, past rural churches, subdivisions and homes (quite a few of the latter with “Trump” flags these days), past local businesses ranging from the massive new Hagan Ace Hardware to the Small Town Rags Boutique and Gift Shop, and into Callahan (pop. 1,185).
There’s a busy intersection in the middle of town.
As a smorgasbord of signs tell you, this is the crossroads of U.S. 1, 23 and 301 and S.R. 200 and … A1A.
This is where a road known as Atlantic Boulevard when it opened in 1927, later renamed State Road 1, then renamed again in 1946 to avoid confusion with U.S. 1, officially ends. About 20 miles from downtown Jacksonville, 18 miles south of the Georgia line and 25 miles from the ocean.
There is nothing that officially says this is one end of the Jimmy Buffett Memorial Highway.
Schwend is on a mission to change that.
End of the ‘avenue that’s known as A1A’
His office is just a few hundred feet south of the intersection, just past the fire station, the Town Hall and the water tower that says “Callahan” on one side and “Home of the Warriors” on the other.
So he was excited when state leaders wanted to rename the highway that ends a few hundred feet from his office after Jimmy Buffett.
“When you hear that name, you have an image,” he said. “It’s happy, relaxed. It’s Jimmy Buffett.”
When I suggested that maybe people don’t picture Callahan, he laughed and said: “We’re happy.” And, he added, a lot of people there love Buffett music.
He noted that when his wife, Brenda, looked at her Spotify 2024 Wrapped — a summary of someone’s listening from the past year — it had Buffett as her No. 2 artist, behind only Taylor Swift. His list leaned much more toward Southern Rock, but he’s also a big Buffett fan.
It was pouring on this day. So we drove the short distance to the end of A1A. When we got in his car, something from “Son of a Son of A Sailor” was playing. And while the lack of sunshine might not have seemed much like Buffett weather, it’s worth noting that on the album “A1A,” when Buffett specifically mentions the highway now named after him, it’s in the song “Trying to Reason with Hurricane Season.”
So he was excited when state leaders wanted to rename the highway that ends a few hundred feet from his office after Jimmy Buffett.
“When you hear that name, you have an image,” he said. “It’s happy, relaxed. It’s Jimmy Buffett.”
When I suggested that maybe people don’t picture Callahan, he laughed and said: “We’re happy.” And, he added, a lot of people there love Buffett music.
He noted that when his wife, Brenda, looked at her Spotify 2024 Wrapped — a summary of someone’s listening from the past year — it had Buffett as her No. 2 artist, behind only Taylor Swift. His list leaned much more toward Southern Rock, but he’s also a big Buffett fan.
It was pouring on this day. So we drove the short distance to the end of A1A. When we got in his car, something from “Son of a Son of A Sailor” was playing. And while the lack of sunshine might not have seemed much like Buffett weather, it’s worth noting that on the album “A1A,” when Buffett specifically mentions the highway now named after him, it’s in the song “Trying to Reason with Hurricane Season.”