The Summer is FINALLY here!! Looking for a way to beat the heat? Then come cool yourslef down at the beach and enjoy the smooth sounds of  national recording artists and regional performers one Sunday each month. Each of the concerts will be held on the following dates:

• June 12th
• July 10th
• August 14th

The concerts will be held at the Seawalk Pavilion on Sunday evenings from 5pm - 9pm. For more information visit www.jaxbeachjazz.com

Born in St. Augustine, FL, Diana Patterson is the first of four daughters born to Robert "Jack" Mier and Pearl Pringle Mier. Earlier Mier families were Catholic and through the records of the church, the family's ancestry was traced to the 1400's to the southern tip of Spain. Moving from St. Augustine in the early 1800's, Diana's great grandparents came to Palm Valley, then a small settlement nestled between the Atlantic Ocean and the Intra-Coastal Waterway north of St. Augustine. They built the first "Mier" house just a few hundred feet from where her grandparents later built the "big house" where Diana was brought after her birth.

JACKSONVILLE BEACH, Fla. -- Gliding a kayak softly through morning fog may not be a typical 50th birthday party.

Long-time Jacksonville Beach resident Kurtis Loftus could think of no better way to celebrate half a century of living.

"It was amazing," Loftus said. "The intracoastal at six in the morning with the fog as it lifted, with the sunrise over the marsh.  It was beautiful."

A surfer and outdoor enthusiast almost his whole life, Loftus created the Island BEAST, a clever acronym for the Beaches Eco Adventure Survival Test. Fourteen friends joined him bright and early Friday morning.

"That's maybe the combination of me thinking about the island and all the things I've done living out here," Loftus said, "And then going, 'Can I pull this off on a 50th birthday?'"

They did pull it off. The friends covered 72 miles with 10 sports in 12 hours, and felt the years lift.