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Folk Singer Bobby Hicks Dies At 54

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By KAREN HAYMON LONG / Tampa Tribune

Published: December 19, 2007

TAMPA - He billed himself as the radical Cracker. Others called him everything from a gentle soul to a hot-tempered troubadour.

But those who knew him agree, folksinger Bobby Hicks loved Florida like family.

Hicks, who died Wednesday at age 54 of lung cancer, was a fifth-generation Floridian who never forsook Tampa, even though he hated to see it sprawl into condo complexes, shopping centers and crowded roads.

He poured his love of the state into his folk songs.

"I'm the Spanish moss hanging from the live oak tree," goes his most famous song, "I'm Florida, Need I Say More."

I'm what's left of the panther and the old manatee

I'm an eagle in flight, I'm the ocean's roar

I'm Florida, need I say more."

Florida folk music fans consider him the best of the best for his singing and guitar playing and for his outspoken lyrics. He lambasted developers, phosphate mining companies, water polluters and snowbirds.

Sometimes, people said he went too far. Like the time he mused that if old men were going to kill their wives and then themselves anyway, he wished they'd do it in a condo. At least that would get rid of the awful eyesores.

Radio fans remember him as co-host of the Florida Folk Show on WMNF, 88.5 FM, along with Peter Gallagher. He also sang at weekly folk nights at Ka' Tiki beach bar on Sunset Beach in Treasure Island.

Randy Wynne, the station's program director, remembers his buddy as "a very radical environmentalist. He believed that the old Florida was the Florida that needed to be preserved and celebrated," he said Wednesday. "He was always on a campaign against developers and people who would spoil his beautiful state."

He could be gruff at times and some who didn't know him well were scared of him, Wynne said. "But he really was a gentle soul."

He rode a Harley, sure, but he once cut off his trademark long hair and donated it to an organization that makes wigs for children with cancer.

His son, Dawson Hicks, 24, says his dad loved people.

"My dad's ideal family time was going on a picnic or going fishing in the bay," he said.

Hicks, who also is survived by his wife, Gini, was born on Sept. 4, 1953 in Tampa General Hospital. He graduated from H.B. Plant High School and served in the U.S. Army from 1970 to '73. He worked 20 years in the electronic alarm business, but mostly he devoted his life to his environmental views and his music.

Dawson Hicks said he was very proud of his father, who just wanted to be remembered "as someone who cared about Florida and cared about the people who cared about Florida - people in the folk community who tried to give something back to Florida through their music, their stories and their crafts."

There will be no public memorial for Hicks, according to his son. But a folk music benefit to pay Hicks' medical bills is planned for 2 to 6 p.m. Jan. 12 at the Film Paradiso Beach Theatre, 315 Corey Ave., St. Pete Beach.

Dawson Hicks will be a guest on WMNF's Florida Folk Show from 9 to 10 a.m. Thursday.

Karen Long can be reached at (813) 259-7618 or klong@tampatrib.com.

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