Maria Checa, Miss August, 1994

Maria Checa, Miss August, 1994Its an hour before closing, and the Historical Museum of South Florida is nearly empty, just the way Maria Checa likes it. Slowly, as if treading on hallowed ground, the Bogotá-born Miss August wanders through the exhibits and stops, transfixed, in front of a 19th century photograph of a huge banyan tree. "As a child," relates Maria with a faint Colombian accent, "I would swing from the vines of a tree just like that one and play for hours under its m...