Table of Contents:
LESS ANCIENT
PONCE AND HIS FOUNTAIN.
NEW INVADERS
THE COLONIES ARE REVOLTING.
BRAND NEW STATE.
METAL PATHS INTO THE WILDERNESS.
THE BOOM AFTER THE BOMB
FLORIDA TODAY
FLORIDA DESTINATIONS
TASTE FLORIDA.
I love Florida. And not just for beaches and sunsets. The state offers so many other things that many people do not realize.
It is a beach destination with more than 300 days of sunshine and over 1300 miles of coastline.
But, did you know it is the first state to receive Europeans?
It is the first and only state providing round trip excursions to the moon.
It is the flattest of The United States. The highest natural elevation is only 345 feet above sea level.
The state has several manmade mountains, including Space, Thunder, and Splash.
There are over 1300 golf courses and too many tennis courts to count.
Florida is home to 34 Hall of Fames, including fishing, swimming, golf, water-skiing, and others.
While most people can name at least three of Florida’s “Amusement Parks,” did you know there are more than 60?
And what about museums? There are over 330 museums across the state covering early Florida history, science, space, nature, marine life, and more.
Florida is also home to the most comprehensive collection of Louis Comfort Tiffany pieces in the world.
Ancient Florida history.
We need to go back approximately 12,000 years during Florida’s first land boom for the first inhabitants.
Evidence points to America’s first explorers being migrating tribes from Asia crossing the Bering land bridge circa 18,000 B.C.
Over the next thousands of years, they migrate south through Central and South America, and east.
What About the Dinosaurs?
During the Jurassic and other periods, 66+ million years ago, Florida was still an underwater reef.
Much of the state sits on a bedrock of limestone from seashells, coral, and fish skeletons. The sand and clay on top of the limestone began as part of the Appalachian mountains. Many ice ages, erosion, and wind deposit the mud, earth, and quartz sand on top. But not until after the dinosaurs disappear.
The limestone is responsible for the numerous underground springs and sinkholes in the state’s central area.
Many parts of the “peninsula” will return under the sea during numerous global warming periods. When the first Paleo-Indians arrive from Alabama and Georgia circa 10,000 B.C., the planet is in a cooling period. Many geologists believe the gulf coast of Florida was 60 miles further into the Gulf at that time.
The climate was colder, and they have found signs of hardwood forests, woolly mammoths, and saber-toothed tigers from this period.
Less Ancient Florida.
Very few remains (the history) of the early natives remain pre-1000 A.D.
By 1400, tribes from Alabama and Georgia are living and farming the northern areas of Florida. In the northwest are the Apalachee and Pensacola tribes. The Tocobaga begins in the west-central. They will later end up in the Tampa area. In the northeast are the Timucuans.
By this time, estimates range between 100 and 350 thousand natives in Florida.
The Gulf Coast
Calusa (Calos)
The Calusa, living along the Caloosahatchee River (Ft Meyers), are probably some of the oldest.
Their community structure began with nobility at the top, then commoners, and slaves from other tribes. Native Americans are the first slaves in America.
There is evidence of a canal system and signs of fundamental organized religion.
Tocobaga
This tribe was living along the rivers feeding Tampa Bay, probably from circa 900 A.D. The waterways are the primary source of navigation for the locals. Evidence of this tribe grows scarce circa 1500.
Potano
Another tribe with artifacts dating to ancient times, they were in the area around today’s Gainsville. They seem to be an offshoot of the Timucua.
East Coast Natives.
Like their northern and western neighbors, there is not extensive information on these tribes before the 1600s. Due to the abundance of salt and fresh water food, they grow very little. Evidence of earlier inhabitants appears in some areas.
Ais
They are probably the largest tribe on the east coast. The Ais camps stretch along the river, which will later be the Indian River.
Jeagas
The Jeaga and the Jobe (Ho-bay) tribes were south of the Indian River in today’s Palm Beach County. Numerous artifacts indicate they were fighters. They are also trading with other tribes, as some items are not native to the area.
Mayaimi
They live west of the Jeagas, near Lake Okeechobee, which they fish. They also grow some items to supplement their diet. The remains of several mounds are in this area.
Tequestas
Today’s Fort Lauderdale and Miami were the fishing and hunting grounds of the Tequestas. In part, due to their isolation, a peaceful group will change with the Europeans’ encroachment.
Keys Indians
These are probably splinter groups from the Tequesta and Jeagas, as opposed to separate tribes. Some believe they may be splinter groups from the Arawak and Caribe Indians from the Caribbean. Other splinter groups include the Saturiwa, Boca Ratones, and others. The fish and salvage the ships going aground while trying to pass through the Keys. Pirates would take over the wrecking business when the number of vessels in the area increases.
For the most part, the natives of Florida co-exist in peace. That will begin to change circa 1513.
Ponce de Leon.
What starts all the talk about a fountain of youth? It does not appear in any of the writings or journals of Ponce de Leon.
Who is Ponce? He came from Spain with Christopher Columbus on the second voyage. But not as an explorer; he was a “gentleman Volunteer.”
These are children of the aristocracy who would “volunteer” as soldiers in return for a command. Ponce makes a name for himself, slaughtering the local native Taíno people on San Juan. They make him the first governor of Puerto Rico circa 1509.
When Christopher Columbus’s oldest son Diego knocks him out of that position, Ponce takes the advice of King Ferdinand II. He becomes an explorer. In 1513, he set off with three ships.
He lands somewhere along the eastern coast of Florida on April 2. He names it La Florida.
They sail south, mapping the coast, and discovering Biscayne Bay a few days later. This trip will take him as far as today’s Port Charlotte, or maybe Fort Meyers. From here, they sail west to the Tortugas.
But there is evidence that he is not the first European on the mainland.
Who’s On First?
Slavers were visiting the Americas as early as 1502 on their return to Europe with indigenous people as slaves. They would stop along the east coast of Florida for fresh water. They would also collect a few locals to become slaves back in Spain.
Whereas the locals were suspicious of Ponce on his first trip, they were downright hostile by his second. They were screaming at him in broken Spanish. An indication they had other Spanish visitors before him.
The poor treatment of the locals by the Spanish increases, and for some reason, relations between the two groups decrease.
Why Can’t We Be Friends?
Some try for coexistence, but they are few and do not speak Spanish.
There are stories about the Spanish finding Europeans, usually from shipwrecks, living with the local natives. Circa 1539, Hernando de Soto discovers Juan Ortiz living with the Tocobagan’s near Tampa. Chief Ucita’s daughter takes a shine to him and pleads for his life. This love story is almost 70 years before Pocahontas lays eyes on John Smith.
Another account is Hernando de Escalante Fontaneda, a shipwreck survivor circa 1549, at the age of 13. He writes about his 17 years living with the locals in what appears to be southern Florida and the Keys.
The Spanish and later French and English explorers come ashore, killing anyone who questions them. Why are the locals so wary? It is incredible how many innocent shipwreck victims and missionaries do survive.
Florida, We Are Here.
The French arrive circa 1562, looking for wealth, and a safe colony for the Protestants (Huguenots.)
Not finding suitable ground for a fort, they move north along the coast, establishing Charlesfort in today’s South Carolina. Charlesfort is on Parris Island, near Hilton Head. It has nothing to do with Charleston. It fails within a year and the French return to France.
They try again a year later and establish Fort Caroline, near present-day Jacksonville.
The next year (1565), the Spanish capture the fort killing many of the French.
The Spanish alienate the local Saturiwa Indians, who team with the French to attack the fort three years later.
The Spanish rebuild but desert the fort the next year. Today, nothing of the fortifications remain, and the exact location is unknown.
The City Ponce de Leon Did Not Discover
On August 28, 1565, (the feast day of St. Augustine,) Spanish conquistador Pedro Menéndez de Avilés, spots land. His ships, carrying settlers, troops, and supplies from Spain, eventually land 11 days later. They begin a settlement here that he names “San Agustín.”
On the site of a previous Timucua village, it is easy to defend and has fresh water.
Over time, it becomes the oldest continuously occupied European settlement in the continental United States. San Juan, Puerto Rico (1521), is the oldest European settlement in a United States territory.
Santa Domingo (1496) is the oldest European settlement in the new world.
St Augustine will serve as the capital of Spanish Florida for more than 200 years.
Pirates of the Caribbean on Tour
Spanish ships, returning with the new world’s bounty, occasionally stop in St Augustine for fresh water. Along with these low hanging fruits, come the pirates looking to relieve them of their treasures.
Although many pirate attacks are on ships at sea, they also attack settlements, and St Augustine is no exception. The English privateer Sir Francis Drake attacks in 1586, looting the settlements treasury and burning them to the ground.
Attacks by pirates and the British will continue for almost 200 years along the Atlantic and Gulf coasts.
What About the Brits?
The British came to the new world via a northern route arriving in “new” England circa 1526. They begin setting up settlements moving south along the coast. There were no Spanish or French to oppose them, just those pesky natives who were here before anyone. They kill or enslave them.
They do have problems with the Spanish further south, however, when it comes to their slaves. The Spanish are harboring slaves who run away from the British plantations.
King Charles II of England issues the charter of 1663 for his new Province of Carolina. It claims lands southward to 29 degrees north latitude, today’s Daytona Beach. The Spanish settlement at St. Augustine is now in British territory. Now, they have problems with the Spanish.
Attacks From the North
Governor Moore, of the British colony of South Carolina, leads attacks (circa 1702) to gain more land for England. Failing to capture St Augustine, he attacks the Spanish-Indian towns in middle Florida.
He attacks Fort San Luis, west of present-day Tallahassee. The small group of Spaniards and local Apalachee Indians are no match for the attacking English and Creek tribes. They plunder, then destroy the town before doing the same to nearby Ayavalla. They take the local natives to be slaves in place of the African runaways Florida is harboring.
Into this British void comes a new tribe of natives, a mishmash of several tribes. They call them the Seminoles. They will eventually push south as far as the Alachua region (Gainesville).
More Trouble to the North
Circa 1732, King George II grants a twenty-one year Charter for the land between the Savannah and Altamaha rivers. They call the new colony Georgia, after King George.
It offers the settlers English liberties and religious freedom except for Catholics. It is a refuge for persecuted protestants and a place to send prisoners from England’s overcrowded jails.
James Oglethorpe is the first governor. He chooses a spot on the bluffs overlooking the Savannah River for the first city.
The protestants arrive a year later and establish the town of Ebenezer, near Savanah. John Wesley, the founder of Methodism, comes as a missionary, with a large group of Scottish highlanders.
Georgia is different from the previous twelve colonies. Parliament finances it in the beginning. Also, it is the only colony that prohibits slavery and importing alcohol.
They fortify Savannah due to attacks by the Spanish and Native Americans. By 1739, England and Spain are at war again.
The colonists are not happy with the restrictions and demand reform. By 1744 they can import alcohol to improve trade. The religious immigrants are against slavery, but money wins out, and in 1749, Georgia allows slavery. Three years later, the King takes back control of the colony.
New Owners
1756 and Great Britain is at war again with France and Spain (the Seven Years’ War.) In the colonies, they call it the French and Indian war.
Many native tribes from the north were in the keys escaping the advancing English. Although escaping to Cuba was a good idea on paper, the Cuban (European) diseases wipe out most natives.
By the end of the 1700s, the Florida native people almost entirely disappear. Disease, fighting with the white man, and other tribes are the reason.
England is victorious, and circa 1763 takes everything east of the Mississippi River, except New Orleans. This deal includes all of Spanish and French Florida. They give up Cuba and the Philippines. A majority of Spanish leave Florida for Cuba and Mexico, uneasy with the new government.
The British create two colonies. East Florida, with its capital in St. Augustine, stretches from the Atlantic to the Apalachicola River. West Florida, governing from Pensacola, includes the panhandle and parts of southern Louisiana, Mississippi, and Alabama.
New British settlers began arriving by boatloads due to the generous land giveaways. Ranching cattle predominantly, and plantation agriculture take off.
At the beginning of the 1700s, Cuba, who was trading with the keys, sends boats. They extract the Key Indians escaping the invading British.
Mediterranian Imports.
Circa 1767, Dr. Andrew Turnbull, forms a company to import settlers from Minorca and other Mediterranean islands. The idea is to work plantations of fig, olive, indigo, and other warm-climate agriculture.
More than fifteen hundred colonists from Italy, Greece, Turkey (Smyrna) came with new land promises. They would get passage, food, clothing, and housing for three years in return for working for the company. After three years, they would also get a small parcel of land. He calls the new settlement New Smyrna, and it is south of St Augustine.
The colony succeeds but only for a short time. Living and working conditions are terrible, and more than half of the colonists die.
After nine years, they plead their case to the government in St Augustine. The governor releases them from their contracts and offers small lots in St Augustine.
The remaining Minorncans, the name for all colonists regardless of their country, moved to St Augustine.
1776
In the twenty years of British rule, much of Florida’s residents are loyalists. They are still in the “honeymoon” phase and do not dislike the English King like those in the north. Florida remains British through the revolution.
The Florida colonies are essential to England. They are a buffer between the colonies revolting and the British colonies in the Caribbean. They are also a landing place for British supplies and troops.
George Washington is aware of Florida’s strategic significance. He will authorize five separate attacks on East Florida between 1776 and 1780.
By 1781, Spain can recapture West Florida from the spread-out British. When the American Revolution ends two years later, England will give East Florida to Spain in exchange for Gibraltar.
Some of the Spanish who fled return to Florida. And some of the British go back to England or move to the British Bahamas.
Spain is not able to police its borders. The escaped slaves and Seminoles continue to move into the mostly unoccupied areas.
English and Scotch settlers from Georgia and the Carolinas (no longer British colonies) also begin to migrate. They mix with the British remaining in Florida. These are the beginning of the Florida Crackers.
The Florida Republics
The British do not come across much pushback from the Spanish as they continue to drift south into Florida.
By 1810, the English in West Florida rebel and establish the Free and Independent Republic of West Florida. They raise their Bonnie Blue Flag over the garrison in Baton Rouge.
Their reign is short as a few months later, President Madison claims this region as part of the Louisiana Purchase.
Two years later, the U.S. annexes the Mobile District to the Mississippi Territory. Spain continues to dispute the area, but the United States gradually occupies the space.
This act did not stop tensions along the Florida border. The Seminoles were raiding Georgia settlements, and the Spanish were still providing sanctuary to runaway slaves. The United States Army began leading strikes into Spanish territory, leading up to the 1817 campaign by Andrew Jackson, the First Seminole War.
Spain tires of defending its colony that is not producing a profit. Ceding Florida to the United States for five million dollars, it became a U.S. territory in 1821.
The Florida Territory
Many free blacks, Indian slaves, and Spanish flee to Havana to avoid coming under U.S. control.
Large groups of Black Seminoles and fugitive slaves along the east coast escape to Andros Island in the Bahamas.
The Seminoles continue to assist runaway slaves and clash with the new settlers.
Circa 1832, the government offers the Seminoles land west of the Mississippi River to leave Florida voluntarily. Over the next three years, many Seminoles move west. Then the U.S. Army arrives to deal with the ones who do not go.
And we have the Second Seminole War beginning when Seminoles ambush Army troops marching to reinforce Fort King (Ocala).
The war will continue for seven years with the Seminoles using guerilla tactics against the regimented Army.
The U.S. Army arrest Osceola, a Seminole war leader while negotiating under a white truce flag in late 1837. He will die of malaria in jail, making him a martyr for the natives. Within five years, the remaining Seminoles surrender. The Army forcibly exiles them to Creek lands in the west. Some escape and go into the Everglades.
East Meets West
Florida’s first railroad began in Tallahassee and ran 25 miles south to Port Leon, near the Gulf of Mexico. Circa 1834, mules began pulling cartloads of cotton to the port for loading onto ocean-going ships.
Over the next several years, several small regional railroads would pop up over northern Florida.
Circa 1836, David Levy Yulee joins the Florida Territory’s Legislative Council. He owns a sugar cane plantation near Fernandina, just north of Jacksonville. He begins to secure federal and state land grants to fund a railroad connecting the Atlantic Ocean to the Gulf. Citing the danger of ships passing through the Florida Keys and saving three days passage convinces the government. The fact that he stands to make a fortune does not come up.
By 1858, construction, using slave and Irish immigrant labor, begins at Fernandina’s deepwater port on the Atlantic side. The Gulf terminus is Cedar Key, with deeper water than Tampa Bay, and closer to New Orleans port. The first train arrives in Cedar Key in 1861, a few weeks before Florida secedes from the Union.
Just months later, Union ships destroy the ports of Cedar Key and Fernandina, cutting an important Confederate supply route.
The 27th state.
On March 3, 1845, Florida became the 27th state, a few months before Texas.
A majority of the population of the new state lives in north-central Florida. Of this, close to half are African American slaves working the substantial cotton and sugar plantations.
Circa1850, before transferring federal land to the state, the federal government tries to convince the remaining Seminoles to move. The Army reactivates Fort Harvie, naming it Fort Meyers.
The Everglade Seminoles, sensing hostilities, attack Fort Meyers starting The Third Seminole War. By 1858, most of the Seminole men are dead, and the government moves the surviving women and children.
Civil Unrest 1861
With the smallest population of the Southern states, Florida is the third state to secede from the Union after the election of Abraham Lincoln.
Growing dissatisfaction with the Confederate leaders leads to desertion by Confederate soldiers.
Several Florida counties become havens for deserters. These deserters join as bands and attack Confederate patrols, plantations, provide intelligence to the Union army and disrupt supply routes.
The state’s remote location and meager industry lower its strategic importance. The battles in Florida are more small skirmishes for parcels of land rather than significant military actions.
The Battle of Fort Meyers is the “southernmost Civil War land battle in Florida.
A few months later, in 1865, the war is over.
Restoration
After signing amendments to the U.S. Constitution to abolish slavery and grant citizenship to former slaves, Florida’s representatives rejoin the Congress.
During the Reconstruction era following the Civil War, moderate Republicans took charge for a short time. As soon as Federal Troops leave the state, Democrats engage in voter suppression and intimidation. They regain control of the state legislature.
Part of their success is due to the Ku Klux Klan, a white supremacist hate group. Their goal is to overthrow Republican state governments in the south. They use voter intimidation and violence to achieve this.
Their primary targets are African Americans, Jews, immigrants, homosexuals, and Catholics.
Over the next four years, the white-dominated state legislature imposes poll taxes and other barriers. This move is to block black and poor-white voter registration and voting. These two groups were a threat to white Democratic power due to their numbers. Blocking them, the Democrats establish a one-party state, similar to others across the south.
By 1900, more than 200,000 African Americans in Florida made up around 44 percent of the total population. They cannot vote, sit on juries, or run for local, state, or federal office positions. Local governments will not recruit them for law enforcement or other government positions.
Jim Crow
By the end of Reconstruction, Florida has Jim Crow laws establishing segregation by race in public facilities and transportation. Railroad cars, waiting rooms, water fountains, and certainly restrooms were separate.
And without political representation, the facilities for African Americans would rarely receive maintenance or repair.
For more than sixty years, Democrats control a majority of the state’s seats in Congress. They base the number of positions on the total population, including the African Americans and women who cannot vote.
Until the early 1900s, most Floridians are still living within 50 miles of the Georgia border. To the south are cattle ranches and wilderness.
After the war, another railroad buys up the bankrupt Florida Railroad between Cedar Key and Fernandina. Soon Cedar Key is the essential port north of Key West.
During an 1883 visit to St Augustine, Henry Flagler finds it to be very inviting. However getting there, and decent accommodations are problems.
Two years later, he retires from Standard Oil’s day to day running. He begins buying up regional railroads reaching south from Jacksonville. His first job is to move them all to a standard rail gauge.
He begins constructing the 540 room Ponce De Leon and 300 room Alcazar Hotels in St Augustine.
By January of 1888, his updated railroad and hotels in St Augustine are up and running.
By 1889, the rails run as far as Daytona, and he adds the 600 room Ormand Hotel to his collection.
When you Run Out of Railroads
There are no railroads or track south of Daytona. So in 1892, he asks the state for a charter to build his railroad as far as Biscayne Bay.
With track reaching Palm Beach by 1894, he builds the Royal Poinciana Hotel overlooking the bay. It will grow to 2000 rooms, making it the most massive wooden structure in the world. As the island is desolate at that time, the hotel property runs to the Atlantic Ocean. Guests keep at him to build a hotel closer to where the ocean waves are breaking. 1901 heralds the opening of the Breakers Hotel on the ocean. The wooden structure burns to the ground two years later.
A new wooden structure opens within a year.
Flagler builds himself the small Whitehall cottage nearby as a winter retreat. The 60,000 square foot home immediately attracts the super-rich of the east coast to the area. They all race to build their ostentatious cottages.
The South End of Florida.
Flagler is content in Palm Beach and sees no reason to continue south to Biscayne Bay.
Two landowners on Biscayne Bay beg to differ. Julia Tuttle is sitting on more than 600 acres north of the Miami River. She wants the settlement of fewer than 50 people to become a destination.
Her neighbor across the river, William Brickell, an aide to President Abraham Lincoln, owns from the river to Coconut Grove. He and his family operate a trading post and post office from their home. The only way to reach Miami is by ship.
Tuttle contacts Flagler repeatedly to build his railroad south, offering land for tracks, stations, and hotels. He does not see any reason to.
Then the hard freeze of 1894 shocks Palm Beach, the citrus farms, and Flagler. He sends his men to check out Biscayne Bay, which Tuttle says never freezes. They return, confirming her story.
In April of 1896, the newly named Florida East Coast Railway Company reaches the unincorporated town of Miami. Within three months, the city grows enough to write letters of incorporation.
A year later, Flagler opens the Royal Palm Hotel on the north bank of the Miami River. It features 450 rooms and the city’s first electric lights, elevators, and a swimming pool.
Flagler’s Folley.
1905 and the United States announces the construction of the Panama Canal. The closest U.S. deepwater port to the canal is Key West. The port is already a major coaling station for ship traffic between the east coast and South America. The town supports almost 20,000 inhabitants and is only accessible by water.
Stretching 128 miles from the Florida mainland’s southern tip, it jumps across 44 islands before reaching Key West. Construction takes seven years, with three significant hurricanes slowing progress.
Another reason for the slow progress is there is a need for several engineering innovations. These only show up after construction begins.
At the peak of construction, around four thousand men are working.
January of 1912, Henry Flagler rides into Key West in his private train car. By this time, Key West is no longer a major coaling port. Flagler moves three freight car ferries to Key West and begins transportation between Key West and Havana, Cuba. The ports are only 90 miles apart.
A year later, Flagler dies at the age of 87. The overseas railroad continues until a category five hurricane in 1935 destroys significant parts of the line.
A Plant is Growing in Tampa.
Another Henry, also a northern transplant living in Jacksonville circa 1854, sees the potential of Florida.
As the president of an express company, Henry Plant’s knowledge of trains and steamboats is substantial. Like Flagler, he begins buying up defunct railroads south and west from Jacksonville.
Legend says when he cannot buy into the railroad running to Cedar Key, he connects his railroads to Tampa. He vows to wipe Cedar Key off the map. As Tampa Bay was able to handle more traffic, this is probably just a story.
Plant’s railroad arrives in Tampa circa 1884. The city will not receive its charter for three more years.
By1886, The Plant Steamship Company obtains the U.S. mail contract for Key West and Havana. It begins running trips from Tampa to Key West and Havana. Later it will add other gulf ports.
A Palace
His crowning achievement, the Tampa Bay Hotel, opens for the winter season. The enormous hotel, looking like a Moorish palace, costs over $3,000,000 and sits on 150 acres adjacent to downtown Tampa. It was the first in Florida to have electric lights, an elevator, and a telephone in each room. The hotel now houses a university and the Henry B. Plant Museum.
A few years later, he builds the large, Victorian-style hotel Belleview-Biltmore near Clearwater, Florida. The grande hotel, initially with a railroad spur, will operate until 2009.
Unfortunately, only a small portion of the west wing remains today as a boutique hotel.
By 1892, he owns fourteen railway companies and more than 2,000 miles of track. He also has several steamship lines and buys or builds numerous hotels.
He organizes all these companies into the Plant Investment Company.
In Addition
Later, he buys additional railroads in Georgia for moving Florida oranges to northern markets.
The Florida routes reach from Daytona to Tampa, and from Fort Meyers to the middle of Georgia.
In 1899, he died of a heart attack at his mansion on New York’s Fifth Avenue. It is now the home of Cartier Jewelers.
The 1900s
The construction of the first north-south paved highway takes place between 1915 and 1927. The Dixie Highway stretches from the Canadian border to Miami.
By 1926, U.S. 41 is open from Michigan, south along the west coast of Florida as far as Naples. They build State Route 94. connecting Miami to Naples and Tampa via U.S. 41. Although they are separate route numbers until 1949, they call it the Tampa Miami Trail (Tamiami.)
On the east coast, U.S. 1 stretches from Fort Kent, Maine to Miami, Florida. The Overseas Highway, extending US1 from Miami to Key West opens in 1938, using Flagler’s remaining bridges.
Thanks to several visionaries, Florida has a transportation grid.
A World War
The U.S.A. comes home from WWI as victors in 1918. Over the next ten years, the American economy grows 42%. Mass production and mass consumption spread across the land.
In 1920, the Nineteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution became law allowing white women to vote.
But not everything is sunny in Florida.
After World War I, Florida sees a rise in racial violence against blacks in the state. Florida is not the only place, but it leads the nation in lynchings per capita from 1900–1930.
Black veterans returning from a war where people have been treating them more like equals. All of a sudden, there are two classes. There is competition for jobs with so many service members looking all at once. And things are changing for everyone. Socially and economically, there is change, and most people do not adapt quickly. And there is lingering resentment resulting from the Reconstruction period, which is not to distant in the past.
The modern Klan flares up again after the World War, first in Georgia, but spreads to Florida quickly. Estimates are there are three million members nationwide by 1925. As the Depression deepens, the Klan begins to fade, except in Florida, where they expand their list of targets.
To escape lynchings, segregation, and civil rights suppression, more than 40,000 African Americans leave Florida to find better lives in northern cities between 1910–1940.
Florida Swamp Land
Land speculators snatch up large parcels of land and advertise them to Northerners in the cold. Many of them are honorable, but some sell property with drainage issues.
New towns, including Miami and Palm Beach, multiply as men like Carl Fisher and George Merrick hawk their virtues.
From a population of around 968,000 people in 1920, by 1925, the population had grown to over 1,200,000. Everything is sunshine until 1926.
Prohibition
A few counties in northern Florida were able to enforce it. In central and southern Florida, it was an epic fail. However, it makes many criminals rich.
The Everglades and barrier islands are full of stills. The Bahamas, 60 miles to the east, becomes a funnel for rum runners. With hundreds of miles of shoreline, there is no way to patrol it all.
Hotels need to keep thirsty tourists happy. The Breakers and other hotels build secret dining rooms and lounges where guests can drink discreetly.
Bribes and booze flow freely.
The Bottom Drops Out
Florida’s economy freefalls in 1926 when money and credit run out. Banks stop lending, and the real estate market tanks. A severe hurricane in 1926 and another one two years later batter the state and the economy.
By the time the Great Depression begins in the rest of the nation, Florida is already at the bottom. Or is it?
A 1929 Mediterranean fruit fly infestation destroys 60% of the citrus industry.
By 1931, Florida legalizes parimutuel gambling to try and stimulate the economy.
From 1930 to 1935, college students swarm to Fort Lauderdale, Daytona Beach, and Panama City Beach for their school breaks. Read the section on prohibition again if you wonder why.
The U.S. economy finally starts to rebound in 1934 after the repeal of prohibition. Coincidence? But Florida, first to the depression party, rallies very slowly.
Some good during the 1930s takes place in 1937. They repeal the Florida poll tax allowing poor African-American and whites to vote.
In 1944 the U.S. Supreme Court will back this up by outlawing all-white primary elections.
Another World War
1945 and once again, soldiers are returning from the war, and there is a new sense of hope.
Unfortunately, the Klan raises its ugly head again. Their national leader dies circa 1949, and each state splinters off into separate groups.
The Florida klan proliferates, especially in Orange County, where its ranks include elected officials and lawmen.
By 1951, the NAACP branches are challenging Jim Crow ordinances over the use of public spaces. The Florida legislature passes a no-mask policy. The Klan strikes back with cross burnings and declares war on the NAACP, B’nai B’rith, Catholics, and other religious groups. They also start using sticks of dynamite to intimidate people. The press dubbs the klan “The Florida Terror.”
The 1954 Brown v. Board of Education decision by the U.S. Supreme Court sends them into new tantrums.
While the Klan is fuming, others are chilling.
Willis Carrier’s invention from the 1920s is finally more available and affordable. Air conditioning makes Florida, and all of the south, more inviting. Add the low cost of living, and Florida becomes alluring.
Land speculators are making a fortune on people from the Northeast and the Rust Belt looking for paradise.
The Armed Forces
Post World War II
Circa 1949, the U.S. needs a test site for the country’s nascent missile program. Because of its relative closeness to the equator and support stations in the area, Cape Canaveral wins.
Nearby Naval Air Station Banana River becomes Patrick Air Force Base. It is a command and support base for Cape Canaveral Air Force Station.
By the early 1960s, the U.S. is in the Space Race. On adjacent Merritt Island, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) builds its Launch Operations Center.
Naming it the Kennedy Space Center, it is NASA’s primary launch center of human spaceflight. Launch programs from Complex 39 include Apollo, Skylab, and the Space Shuttle missions.
Tours of the K.S.C. and CCAFS are available.
In 2020, they will rename the Air Force Station the Cape Canaveral Space Force Station. Patrick Air Force Base will become Patrick Space Force Base.
The Cuban Revolution
Today, Florida is the third-largest state by population. Once a destination for retirees, it now attracts people of all ages with its diversity of industries and businesses.
The “Sunshine State” offers more than 1300 miles of shoreline along an ocean, Gulf, and numerous fresh water lakes.
With 300+ days of sunshine, it offers numerous outdoor activities from leisurely beach-walking to the Daytona 500.
There are make-believe Frontier Lands and actual forts once on the frontier.
Visit space centers or battle in Star Wars.
Florida has something for everyone.
Florida Destinations.
PANHANDLE
CENTRAL
GULF COAST
ATLANTIC COAST.