Williams said it was a “pleasant mill stream, the collected waters of several fine springs.” He said it wound along for about a mile before pitching “20 to 30 feet into an immense chasm” — creating the forever famous Tallahassee “cascade.”

Years before, Apalachee Indians drew water from the stream to irrigate their cornfields. In the years ahead, Gov. William DuVal splashed through the stream in his horse-drawn buggy each morning on his way to the Capitol. The stream was known as the St. Augustine Branch, and it had beauty, charm and utility.

In the 189 years since Williams first described the stream, Tallahassee has grown and changed. Forests were leveled, corn fields were paved, tall buildings and homes rose in every direction. But for 189 years, that stream persisted — albeit bunkered, fenced and relegated to unglamorous status as a drainage ditch.

Until now.

Construction has begun on the remodeling of Franklin Boulevard, which runs on either side of the stream. The street is being reduced from four lanes to two lanes, and the stream is being enclosed in a box culvert, an underground drainage channel to Cascades Park, now under construction on the site of the long-gone cascade.

By August, the former stream will be buried six feet under the road — which may be cause for a wince among some, such as Jonathan Lammers, a former state historic preservation planner who wrote the most extensive history of the cascades.

“It’s rather ironic Tallahassee is, on one hand, spending large sums of money to recreate the cascades (park),” Lammers said, “while at the same time spending more money to cover up the only part of the cascades waterway that wasn’t destroyed in the first place.”

Ben Fusaro shares that irony. Four years ago, when the city-county agency Blueprint 2000 was contemplating plans for Cascades Park, the retired Florida State University math professor presented his plan for Franklin Boulevard renovations: Build a pair of underground culverts on either side of the stream, while saving and landscaping the stream in an open, natural state.

“It would have been a nice natural feature that adds a lot to any downtown … ,” Fusaro said. “The default position should be to go with what is already there and not change anything.”

Yet, sometimes we over-romanticize the past. For all its bucolic charm at Tallahassee’s founding, the St. Augustine Branch long ago lost its innocence.

Fifty years after our founding, the stream was an often fetid public nuisance. Mary Cathrin May, Tallahassee’s pre-eminent late-19th century historian, has written: “Water often overflowed its banks during periods of heavy rain and created a large mosquito-infested swamp that provided ‘a place for the generation of miasma.’ ”

In the 1870s, Tallahassee citizens regularly demanded the city council drain the area “to relieve it from its present unhealthy and unsightly condition.” City records in the 1880s and 1890s are filled with receipts for hiring contractors to clean the stream and its banks, which regularly collected debris and trash. In 1902, the city council reported the St. Augustine Branch was being used as an “outlet for sewage” and was seeking ways “to prevent the dumping of garbage alongside the ditch.”

In modern times, the St. Augustine Branch has been a treacherous flood zone. During heavy rainstorms, cars are unable to cross Franklin Boulevard, and drivers who attempt to drive its length are often trapped in their cars. In 1974, two 13-year-old boys were sucked into the ditch during a heavy rainstorm and drowned, which led to the ditch being lined with a fence.

It is an effort to tame that flooding that led to construction of the underground box culvert. Engineers say the culvert should eliminate severe flooding along Franklin Boulevard in all but the most monumental storms.

None of that is to say the flooding might not have been tamed without covering the stream — though at what price in these hard economic times. Fusaro’s idea was rejected because of the need to buy additional right of way for then four-lane Franklin Boulevard. The box culvert project was on hold a couple of years because of declining tax revenues for Blueprint 2000, which moved ahead with the project only thanks to federal hurricane relief money.

Nor is it to argue that an open stream, a recreation of the St. Augustine Branch that Williams also once called “a beautiful brook,” would not have been an attractive feature for our city.

But it is to say, progress and safety often trump romance and history.

Sean McGlynn, a water quality specialist, has lived in the neighborhood adjoining the St. Augustine Branch for 30 years. He was one of the champions of retaining the open stream and is still wistful about the loss.

“We’re all kind of sad to lose the little creek and all its features,” McGlynn said. “There were a lot of creatures (raccoons, bats, crawfish, turtles and “even a mangy red fox”) living down there.”

But McGlynn is glad the flooding will be tamed. He is glad the four-lane raceway of Franklin Boulevard will now be a two-laned, landscaped greenway with sidewalks into Cascades Park.

He said the changes will improve traffic safety and unite the neighborhood.

“It’s been a moat (dividing the neighborhood) with dragons (cars) running up and down the street,” he said. “We would have been happy with just the sidewalks; if they had got rid of the road altogether that would have been the best thing.

“But in general, it’s an improvement for everyone. And hopefully, nobody else will ever drown there again.”

— Contact Senior Writer Gerald Ensley at (850) 599-2310 or gensley@tallahassee.com.

Best bets
• “Adventures of a Wimpy Kid”: Stage production inspired by the books by Jeff Kinney. Through the experiences of the title character (Matthew Seidenfeld, right, with Quin Mewbornecq as the editor of the school newspaper), learn about acne, taking tests, parents, best friends, worst enemies and everything that goes with being a kid in a show that comes complete with musical numbers and hilarious situations. 7:30 p.m. Fri., 2 and 7:30 p.m. Sat. $18 adults, $17 students and seniors, $14 children 12-under. Young Actors Theatre, 609 Glenview Drive. 386-6602.

• “Around the World”: The Florida State Flying High Circus 65th anniversary show. 8 p.m. Fri., 2 p.m. Sat. $22, $17 and $14 (add $2 if purchased day of the show). Haskin Circus Complex, FSU. Visit www.circus.fsu.edu.

•“Smokey Joe’s Cafe”: FAMU’s Essential Theatre presents a rollicking production of the Leiber and Stoller musical revue “Smokey Joe’s Cafe” this weekend in the Charles Winter Wood Theatre in Tucker Hall. The production showcases such much-loved numbers as “Stand By Me,” “Jailhouse Rock,” “There Goes My Baby,” “On Broadway” and other hits (pictured are Vlad Durson, Martinez “MJ” Johnson, Brian Wiggins, Ryan Mack and Brandon Heyward performing “Keep on Rolling”). 8 p.m. Fri., 2 and 8 p.m. Sat., 3 p.m. Sun. $15 adults, $12 seniors, $10 non-FAMU students and children, free with valid FAMU student ID. Charles Winter Wood Theatre, Tucker Hall. 561-2425.

Saturday events
•Downtown MarketPlace: Fresh produce, fine arts and crafts, food vendors, more. 9 a.m.-2 p.m. Howard Rubin plays from 10:30 a.m.-1:30 p.m. Free admission. Ponce de Leon Park, downtown Tallahassee. 224-3252.

•Free Planetarium Show: A look at the April sky over Tallahassee. 10-11 a.m. Free. Challenger Learning Center, Kleman Plaza. 241-3610.

•Open House: Fundraiser for Big Brothers Big Sisters of the Big Bend, with bounce house, Easter egg hunt, raffles, more. 10 a.m.-2 p.m. Free admission. Furrin Auto, 504 W. Tennessee St. 222-6864.

Sunday and Easter events
• Annual Easter Egg Hunt: Sponsored by Charlotte Leven. 4-6 p.m. Free. Pearlie Mae Butler Park, 2718 Cypress Lake St. 241-2010.

• City of Tallahassee 53rd Annual Easter Egg Hunt: Open to ages 10-under. Bring baskets for your children, cameras for photo opportunities with the Easter Bunny. Parents allowed in hunting areas for children 4-under only. 1-3 p.m. Free. Myers Park. 891-3855.

An experienced public relations professional and business marketer, Couch is one of the 25 Women You Need to Know, the annual celebration sponsored by the Tallahassee Democrat in conjunction with Women’s History month.

Her expertise in communications and a desire to stay involved in community work has been a benefit to numerous organizations.

“That’s just who I am. I love to be out there,” said Couch, who is chair of the Cultivate Cascades Project of the Knight Creative Communities Institute. “What is great is I have been able to stay in that communications and marketing industry.”

“Everybody is blessed with different talents and abilities,” she added. “You might as well capitalize on those, especially if you can help people.”

Cultivate Cascades is a comprehensive effort to gauge the public’s interest in the kinds of activities that could be presented at the 24-acre downtown area park due to open this fall. The committee members received 1,600 responses to their local survey in December and that will form the basis for helping plan events in the park.

An adjunct communications professor at Florida State University, Couch was the 2010-11 president of the Junior League of Tallahassee and serves on the board of the Foundation for Leon County Schools. While employed at tourism marketer Visit Florida, she received its first President’s Award, and is the recipient of more than 15 state public-relations honors.

She was nominated to be one of the 25 Women You Need to Know by Carla Gaskin Mautz, a longtime friend and fellow Junior League board member.

While Couch was Junior League president, Mautz said she was instrumental in establishing a community impact area, which helped the organization focus on ways it could assist local nonprofits in addressing the complex problems facing children and families.

“Betsy is an inspiration to women in our community. She has an amazing ability to balance her family commitments (she has two children under the age of 5) while still finding time to give back to our community,” Mautz said.

The challenge, says the co-owner of Tri-Eagle Sales, is to not become overextended.

“I try to not spread myself too thin. It’s an honor that I’m asked to be involved in so many things, but I try to limit my involvement to no more than two boards at any one time,” she said.

Busch-Transou, one of the Tallahassee Democrat’s 25 Women You Need to Know for 2012, currently is focusing her efforts on Florida State University, where she is vice chair of the Board of Trustees, and Tallahassee Memorial HealthCare, where she’s on the Board of Directors.

Busch-Transou’s resume is bulging with previous local organizations where she has played a key role, from United Way of the Big Bend to Whole Child Leon, the Greater Tallahassee Chamber of Commerce and Leon County Schools Foundation.

Since she and her husband, Trip Transou, moved their family to Tallahassee from St. Louis 16 years ago, she has tried to re-create the model she learned growing up in the world of Anheuser-Busch Brewing Co. The family’s business and St. Louis’ cultural life are tightly connected, she said, pointing to the St. Louis Zoo, a major draw the A-B company helps underwrite so that it is free to the public.

Among other things, Tri-Eagle has made it possible for singer Tim McGraw and other national performers to take the stage at Tallahassee’s Celebrate America Fourth of July festivities.

“We’ve had an opportunity to be involved, and we’re grateful for it,” Busch-Transou said. “I grew up with that philosophy in my family.”

What she would like to see happen is to not have different, well-intentioned volunteers tackling the same issues and, in essence, tripping over one another.

“Sometimes there are multiple people working on the same thing. I’d like to see us pool together for the same objective and not spread ourselves too thin as volunteers. In the end, I think we all want the same thing, to keep making this a special place to live.”