Month: May 2025

Diana Nyad’s Historical Marker: How Fort Lauderdale Struggled To Find The Right Words To Honor A Fraud

Fort Lauderdale City officials approved five versions of the Diana Nyad Florida State Historical Marker text. Nyad’s admirers worked to include her exaggerations and lies while others sought to remove them.

 

Above: Diana Nyad models false equivalence. She posed for this photo in 2017 at her marker’s proposed location, across the Las Olas Beach entrance from the Wade-Ins marker. That marker commemorates the 1961 protests against Fort Lauderdale’s segregated beaches. Image via Dr. Lynette Long’s “Proposed Marker Location Request,” 21 Jun 2017.

In 2018, Fort Lauderdale’s Parks, Recreation and Beaches Board voted on a resolution to place a Diana Nyad Historical Marker at Las Olas Beach. Chairperson Debby Eisinger and all but one other board member voted against the resolution. The marker died, or so I thought.

When the Nyad biopic opened five years later, Nyad’s supporters began a crusade to resurrect the marker. Eisinger led the battle. Though she no longer sat on the Parks, Recreation and Beaches Board, the former mayor of Cooper City, Florida, she retained (and retains) clout at Fort Lauderdale City Hall. She wanted the City Commission to vote on the marker last April 2, so they voted on and approved it last April 2. She demanded that they place the marker at the entrance to Las Olas Beach, so they agreed to place it at the entrance to Las Olas Beach.

Eisinger gave three reasons for that placement. Two of them are lies from Nyad’s core repertoire. According to Eisinger, Las Olas
Continue reading →