Tag Archives: C. C. Chillingworth

Marketing Palm City Farms, father/developer C. C. Chillingworth

~ A tidbit from our upcoming book, A Pictorial History of Palm City, Florida, by Sandra Thurlow & Jacqui Thurlow-Lippisch

~Charles Curtis Chillingworth, 1868-1936, was born in Liverpool, New York and passed away in West Palm Beach, Florida. Pictured below at 45 years old, second from left, front row.

Alligator Smith aside, it is Charles Curtis Chillingworth “distinguished pioneer, citizen, attorney and developer,” who must be recognized as the “father/founder” of Palm City and Palm City Farms. In the early 1900s western Palm City Farms was sold in ten acre plots with a small bonus lot in what was termed Palm City on the St. Lucie. Today I am going to share a bit about Chillingworth the man, and how his development was marketed.

In my reading, I came to especially like Chillingworth because his autobiography notes his appreciation of nature, including the beauty of Florida’s iconic cabbage palm trees.

“As I remember of it, I left Atlanta one evening about the middle of October, 1891, and reached Jacksonville the following morning. Later that day I took a train on the old Jacksonville, Tampa and Key West Railroad,  now the Atlantic Coast Line, which runs on the west side of the St. Johns River. I changed cars at Enterprise Junction for Titusville. That evening with the sun in the west just before sunset, I saw the first cabbage palmetto trees I ever saw in my life, and they made a great impression on me….”  

So how did he come to develop Palm City Farms?

Chillingworth a young, hard working lawyer,  eventually learned about lands west of the St. Luice River and wanted a part of development himself.

As he put it:

“In 1909 a real estate boom sprung up in South Florida, especially in the purchase of sale of large tracts of land.”

After much back and forth, Chillingworth took title to at least 12,000 acres from the Florida Coast Line Canal & Transportation Company.  He then opened the Palm Beach Land Company in Stuart in 1911, because at that time what became Martin County lie in Palm Beach County, and Stuart had a small downtown area.

Chillingworth’s land office sold Palm City Farms. Historic Society of Martin County.

Chillingworth explains who helped him market the lands giving insight into those times:

“I took with me Miss Reilly, who had been my stenographer in New York during that summer. She was a most faithful and efficient helper and I made her Assistant Secretary of the new Company…” 

Years later after Chillingworth’s death, Miss Reilly, now married as “Patsy Reilly McCord,” wrote a 1964 piece for the Stuart News about how Palm City Farms and Palm City on the St. Lucie were marketed. It is  fascinating to read her account. Then, like now, it was not just the natural resources of the land, but of course also the beauty of the St. Lucie River that “sold” newcomers.

“Patsy Reilly McCord” was C.C. Chillingworth’s’ Assistant Secretary – here photographed in a beautiful Palm City Farms’ grapefruit grove, c. 1915. She helped organize trips for prospective buyers to see the beauty of the area to sell Palm City Farms and Palm City on the St. Lucie.  Martin Digital History.

Patsy (Reilly) McCord wrote::

“The sale of land progressed, and in order to entertain the prospective purchasers, the Palm City Land Company purchased boats and automobiles and mule teams and large comfortable covered wagons for use in displaying the wonders of the rivers, ocean and plantations. The Palm Beach land Company took care of all prospective buyers by entertaining them and paying all expenses of their visit, while here, consisting of boat trips to the inlet, trips out the North and South Forks as well as wagon trips to different points of interest in the county, winding up with a trip to Palm Beach. 

In those days, the waters of the St. Lucie were salty, (the inlet had been opened in 1892 and the St. Lucie Canal was not completed until 1924) and at night the water was so full of phosphorus the millions of fish looked like millions of streaks of lighting darting through the water. It was a wonderful sight in those days to be on the river in the darkness.” 

WOW! It must have been beautiful!

The maps below will help you see the location of Palm City Farms and Palm City. I hope you enjoyed today’s “tidbit.”

Google maps with Palm City Farms subdivision overlay. Todd Thurlow
My mother’s color coding of township/range map of  Palm City Farms – pink. The Hanson Grant is in blue.
Chillingworth offered a lot in Palm City on the St. Lucie to those who bought ten acres further west in Palm City Farms. Note location of St. Lucie River for reference – 1911 plat map.

 

 

Palm City’s Real Founding Father, “Alligator Smith”

One of the earliest photographs of “Palm City,” along the St. Lucie River. Florida Photographic Concern, 1912-1913. Thurlow Collection.

In my previous blog post announcing my mother’s and my upcoming book,  A Pictorial History of Palm City, I told the story of Palm City’s very interesting early homesteader, Alligator Smith. Today I will share another tidbit – how Palm City’s creation is connected to Smith, and how his 1891 “state of intoxication and drowning” in the St. Luice River inadvertently led to C.C. Chillingworth becoming the known founding father of Palm City Farms in 1911.

In 1891 C.C. Chillingworth was a young lawyer at Robbins and Graham soon to be working in Juno, the county seat of Dade County.

Chillingworth’s second case was civil in the United States Land Office. In those days thousands of acres of land were open for homestead-entry but one had to reside on the land for two years. It was Chillingworth’s  job to prove that William M. Smith, locally known along the St. Luice as “Alligator Smith,” had “not abandoned” his 160 acre homestead, on the west side of the river.  By law, a six month abandonment caused the homestead to revert back to the federal government.

An antique post card reads,” A Florida Native.” ca 1910.

Obituary of Alligator Smith, Tropical Sun 1891.

Jewelry made from alligator teeth, c. 1880s, Thurlow Collection.

Chillingworth’s autobiography written in his later years states:

“We were engaged about a week in taking testimony at Pottsdam, now known as Stuart and I had been unable to prove that Smith had been spending any time on the homestead during six months. Smith was drunk and fell overboard from a boat in the St. Lucie River on July 4, 1891. However when I began to check on the testimony and prepare a brief for the Register of the U.S. Land Office at Gainesville, Florida, I discovered that Smith had died just one day less than six months after he made entry.”

Smith seemed to have lost his homestead by one day!

The case was appealed to the General Land Office in Wahington D.C. and  to the Secretary of the Interior, but in the end Chillingworth prevailed. According to my mother, the Bureau of Land Management documented that a Mr. George Mulligan ended up with Alligator Smith’s former homestead. How, we will never know!

These “coveted and valuable lands” located on the west side of the South Fork of the St. Lucie River are connected to today’s Palm City Farms developed in 1911 by none other that C. C. Chillingworth. Chillingworth’s familiarly with the lands of Alligator Smith inspired Chillingworth to develop Palm City Farms twenty years later. Without Alligator Smith, there would be no Palm City. I think we can say, Alligator Smith is Palm City’s real founding father!

Chillingworth offered a lot in Palm City to those who bought ten acres further west in Palm City Farms. Note location of St. Lucie River for reference – 1911 plat map.

Me modeling alligator hat holder and pin jewelry carefully arranged by my mother.