HERNANDO COUNTY, Fla. — Mable Sims is a staple in Hernando County. 

She has so much memorabilia that was passed down from her family members and some she's collected over her 75 years of life. 

“I’ve been here for God knows,” she told Spectrum Bay News 9's Katya Guillaume.

The Hernando County native can talk your ear off about her experiences growing up as a Black woman in a county she said is still struggling with diversity

“This is my mother and that is me,” she said, growing through her old photographs.

Not every story is a happy one. 

“All the way back to Martin Luther King, all the killings. Yes, all of those things,” she said.

Mable has lived through the kinds of stories many only read about in history books. Some memories are hard to talk about, even more than 70 years later.

“I get goosebumps right now,” she said as she describes the most painful of them all: the loss of her childhood home

“That’s the old house, the old house. And guess what, they burned it down. It’s not there. That was where I was raised," she explaind, fighting back tears.

Although some of the memories bring tears, Mable also hopes her stories can bring understanding.

With her daughter Lisa, they hope to continue telling these stories across Tampa Bay.

“I had stated to her one day we need to open up a museum because she has enough stuff to put in a museum," Lisa said.

Mable is already sharing Hernando County’s Black history with tourists and students by dressing up as Aunt Lizzy, a beloved South Carolina slave who eventually moved to this area and worked for the owners of Chinsegut Hill. She became a sought-after midwife and farm owner who died a free woman.

“Born in slavery, it was in 1848,” Mable said about Aunt Lizzy's history.

Sharing lessons of the past, she hopes to see changes in the future.

The family is working on finding the right location for a museum, but they tell Spectrum Bay News 9 that it will not be in Hernando County.