The History of Northeast Florida

In the late 1800s Northeast Florida was a major winter destination for visitors from the northern states.  Henry Flagler’s railroad was pushing southward and with it came hotels and tourists.  The folks from “up north” wanted to experience Florida ’s warm climate and exotic environs.  All of these people needed to be entertained.  Of course, they wanted to see those strange prehistoric creatures that they had heard about – alligators.  Local entrepreneurs were happy to oblige by establishing amusement parks and alligator attractions.  For good measure, ostrich shows – featuring a species not native to Florida – were added to the mix.  After all, exotic animals are exotic animals. It all began on Anastasia Island , just outside of St. Augustine , in the 1890s.  A tram had recently been installed to ferry people from the City of St. Augustine to the beaches of Anastasia Island .  A St . Augustine resident set up a small exhibit at the...

On the night of December 19, 1827, the waters off Key Largo, Florida, fractured with the sounds of wood splintering, heavy artillery firing, and the screams of hundreds of captive people. The Spanish brig Guerrero, a heavily armed vessel carrying 561 enslaved West Africans, crashed at full speed into Carysfort Reef. The impact was a catastrophic groan of oak tearing open against a jagged thicket of razor sharp coral. Below decks, the captives were plunged into absolute blackness, broken only by flashes of lightning through the deck as the foul bilge water began to rise rapidly around their shackled ankles. Pursued through a blinding storm by a British Royal Navy anti-slavery schooner, the outlaw vessel tore its hull open, snapped its masts, and began to sink. The wreck of the Guerrero was not an isolated maritime accident, but a geopolitical clash, an act of piracy, and a human tragedy. It remains one of the most significant, yet overlooked, events in the twilight years of the transatl...

               For Jonathan Dickinson, a prosperous Quaker merchant, a journey meant to secure his family’s future in Pennsylvania in the late summer of 1696 instead became a descent into a harrowing fight for survival. When his ship, the Reformation , ran aground on the shores of modern day Jupiter Island , Florida , it set off a chain of events that would yield one of the most vivid, terrifying, and historically significant tales of captivity in early American history. Jonathan Dickinson was not an adventurer by trade.  He was a man of commerce and faith. Born in Jamaica to a prominent English family, he had built a comfortable life managing plantations and trading goods. By 1696, however, the political and spiritual situation in Jamaica prompted him to relocate his family to Philadelphia , the rapidly growing heart of William Penn’s Quaker experiment. On August 23, 1696, Dickinson boarded a three mast vessel, the Reform...

Most residents of and visitors to Fernandina Beach are aware of David Yulee and The Florida Railroad.   Yulee holds a special esteem in the town and most people know his story.   A statue of David Yulee stands outside the historic railroad depot in downtown.   However, like most visionaries, Yulee was an idea man, visionary, and entrepreneur. He chartered the railroad and raised capital but subcontracted most of the actual planning and construction to experts. David Yulee, a prominent figure in Florida 's history, was born in St. Thomas , U.S. Virgin Islands , in 1810. In the early 1830s, he relocated to Florida and eventually established himself as an ambitious entrepreneur. Yulee secured a seat in the U.S. Senate in 1845, just a few months after Florida became a state. His passion for transportation led him to propose a plan for a railroad connecting Fernandina Beach , on Amelia Island , to Cedar Key on the Gulf Coast . Yulee, driven by the desire to improve...