The Centennial Historian: Susan Gillis

Paying Tribute to Our Local History!

The City of Fort Lauderdale retained historian and published author Susan Gillis as the historical research consultant for the Centennial celebration.

Susan Gillis is a museum curator and local historian with thirty years of experience in the museum profession. A native Floridian, she graduated from the College of William and Mary with a B.A. in History and Anthropology and the University of Denver, with an M.A. in Anthropology.

She served for fifteen years as curator at the Fort Lauderdale Historical Society and is the author of five books on local history: Fort Lauderdale in Vintage Postcards (2004); Fort Lauderdale: The Venice of America (2004); Broward County: The Photography of Gene Hyde (2005); Historic Photos of Fort Lauderdale (2007); Boomtime Boca: Boca Raton in the 1920s (2007) and is co-author of Images of America: Fort Lauderdale (1999).

She joined the staff of the Boca Raton Historical Society in 2002 and acts as an instructor and freelance consultant to local historical and cultural agencies.

Gillis has more than 30 years experience as an expert on local lore, working as a curator, archivist and consultant at various local cultural facilities, including the Fort Lauderdale Historical Society, Stranahan House and Bonnet House.

Gillis worked with the City’s Centennial Celebration Committee to preserve, recreate and promote Fort Lauderdale’s history through research, as well as spearheading several educational initiatives throughout 2011.

Among the many projects created to pay tribute to the past century are a series of traveling Centennial exhibits, walking tours, state heritage markers and speaker presentations.

Ms. Gillis was an excellent resource to help tell the story of the City’s beginnings as a trading post, to its present-day status as one of America’s most popular tourist destinations. She was uniquely qualified and provided a diverse, comprehensive and accurate historic account of the past century.