Jim Morrison’s Florida: Melbourne, Tallahassee and Coconut Grove

In 1962 Florida State University made a promotional film, and among the clean-cut students in it was Jim Morrison. Three years later he was in Los Angeles starting the Doors.

Melbourne and Tallahassee

Morrison was born in Melbourne on December 8, 1943, to a Navy family that moved often. He transferred to Florida State in 1962, then left for the film school at UCLA, where he met Ray Manzarek. They formed the Doors in 1965.

Dinner Key, 1969

His best-known Florida night came on March 1, 1969, at a Doors concert at the Dinner Key Auditorium in Coconut Grove. Morrison was charged over what happened on stage, and on September 20, 1970, a Miami jury convicted him of indecent exposure and profanity. He died in Paris in July 1971, before the case was resolved.

On December 9, 2010, Florida’s Board of Executive Clemency granted him a posthumous pardon.