HENRY M. FLAGLER’S Florida East Coast Railroad kept Mrs. Julia Tuttle of Fort Dallas in a fever heat of excitement. She knew it would eventually open up all south Florida to northern commerce and she was keenly aware of the boon it would be to the country once it reached the Biscayne Bay region.
Here she was living in an environment as near perfect as Nature could make it. Every visitor raved about the possibilities of the country, but swore at its inaccessibility. Here was the only truly tropical spot in the whole continental United States and civilization was passing it by.
Flagler had become a railroad man through necessity rather than intention. He made his first visit to Florida in 1883. He was then 53 years old and a multimillionaire Standard Oil magnate ripe for retirement. But the Florida climate intrigued him to such an extent that he built at St. Augustine the magnificent Ponce de Leon Hotel, and followed it quickly by the Alcazar.
The local transportation facilities to Miami and Miami Beach were woefully inadequate for the handling of his building materials and the guests he hoped to attract, so on December 31, 1885, he bought the holdings of the Jacksonville, St. Augustine & Halifax River Railway, which was then only two years old and the most pretentious railroad in east Florida. Its 36 miles of track between South Jacksonville and St. Augustine were narrow gauge and the locomotives were wood burners with bell-shaped stacks. He widened the roadbed from three feet to the standard four feet eight and one half inches, replaced the 30-pound rails with heavier ones and bought modern equipment throughout, completing the job within four years.
The Ponce de Leon opened in 1888 and its opening was made a state occasion by the arrival of the first through all-Pullman vestibule train from New York to Florida, a boon brought about through Flagler’s influence. Previous to this the southern railroads from Quantico, Virginia, had operated on roadbeds of varying width, necessitating the changing of trucks, at a great waste of time and money. These combined events gave the first real impetus to Florida tourist travel. But passengers for St. Augustine had to be ferried across the St. Johns River in order to board Flagler’s railway to their destination—a great inconvenience—so Flagler bridged the river with a steel span within two years, opening the peninsula to through railroad service.
In 1885-86 the St. Augustine Sc Palatka Railway, a narrow- gauge line, had been built from Tocoi Junction to East Palatka. In 1887 Utley J. White extended his little logging road in the vicinity of East Palatka to Ormond and Daytona. During 1888-89 Flagler purchased both these railroads and widened them to standard gauge, thus bringing up to date rail facilities as far south as Daytona and increasing the population of this town ten times by 1890.
Then Flagler pushed his railroad southward through virgin territory with great rapidity. Tapping the rich Indian River citrus country he changed his railroad’s name to the Jacksonville, St. Augustine Sc Indian River Railway Company, and was soon operating to Fort Pierce.
Meanwhile the Empire Builder himself had visited Palm Beach, which immediately took his fancy. He bought land there and planned to build the huge Royal Poinciana Hotel. This was completed in nine months and opened in February, 1894. Within a month the railroad reached West Palm Beach. The next summer he began to build the Palm Beach Inn, which was later renamed the Breakers. In addition he erected a l000-foot pier into the ocean and established a steamship line to Nassau. Palm Beach was essentially a Flagler creation, and to preserve it as a playground for the wealthy, he promptly built West Palm Beach into a complete and thriving town almost overnight.
Meanwhile Mrs. Tuttle had not been idle. When the road was moving south from Saint Augustine she went to see Flagler and interviewed him in person. She sang of the glories of southernmost Florida and promised to give him outright half of her extensive acreage here if only he would build his road this far. Flagler was courteous as always and seemed glad to hear about the Biscayne Bay country, but he refused her offer pointblank.
Mrs. Tuttle’s sole resource of real value was her land. With the refusal of this her hands were tied. She returned to Fort Dallas discouraged, but still hopeful.
When Flagler’s steel rails reached Palm Beach they stopped. The vacation crowd followed the railroad. All the way north from here substantial settlers flowed into the state and made it their home. Most were tillers of the soil, the backbone of the country, and soon their farms and orchards began to pay dividends, both to them, the railroads which transported the produce, and the state and county which realized the taxes. Real prosperity was here for the first time in over three and a half centuries of white occupation.
Then came that terrible winter of 1894-95 when the Great Freeze struck. Not since January 3, 1766, when the ice was an inch thick in Florida as far south as 9° North Latitude, had such a catastrophe occurred. Beautiful citrus orchards were wiped out in a single night. Years of growth were killed within a few hours by the icy grip of the frost. All the delicate plants, trees, and flowers from Palm Beach to the Georgia border were either killed outright or so badly blighted that it would require an indefinite length of time for them to get back to normal again.
The old steamboat Rockledge that had been a pioneer craft on the Indian River, known as Captain E. E. Vail’s Floating Hotel, appeared in Miami harbor. It offered accommodations for 5o guests and became the first hostelry in town. The more well-to-do of those who were building the city made their headquarters on this vessel, which had served in like capacity at Jupiter and West Palm Beach. It never left the neighborhood and eventually sank near Miami Avenue Bridge in the Miami River, where its hull could be seen for some years thereafter.
The original townsite as agreed upon by Mrs. Tuttle and the Brickells included 640 acres north of the river, belonging to the former, and the same acreage south, belonging to the latter. This covered an area a mile wide and two miles long from north to south. Half of the lots were given outright to Flagler as promised. In addition Mrs. Tuttle gave him all the land from what is now Flagler Street to the river, with the exception of 16 acres in Dallas Park.
As the Royal Palm hotel inched skyward the railroad swept south from Palm Beach, was completed on April 15, 1896, and officially opened a week later. By July 28 Fort Dallas had attained such size as a settlement that it was incorporated as the City of Miami. It had 502 voters to start with and had jumped from a two-home site past the village and town stage into a city. There was considerable difference of opinion over the name. Many favored Flagler, but the Indian title finally won out.
The railroad and the genius behind it breathed the very breath of life into the whole Biscayne Bay region. At last it was accessible to the outside world and once here the traveler was assured of every modern comfort in living conditions.
[…] January 12, 2021 by SouthBeachDaily The preservation of Miami Beach’s rich history is evident in the new restoration project of the Flagler Memorial on Monument Island. Monument Island, a designated historic site, sits in the middle of Biscayne Bay surrounded by Star, Palm, Hibiscus, and Venetian islands. Through the decades, harsh marine exposure and vandalism has taken its toll on the 88-year-old monument built to honor South Florida pioneer Henry Flagler. […]