School bus reads HAVANA OR BUST! My father’s Stuart High senior trip for Stuart High, went to Cuba in 1954. (Photo Tom Thurlow)My father’s 1954 senior class, Stuart High School, Martin County, Florida. My father is in back row, far right second from end.(Photo Tom Thurlow)The book “Swamp to Sugar Bowl” was written in 1968 by Lawrence E. Will. (Borrowed from the library of Sandra Henderson Thurlow, historian.)
It is good to learn about the history and issues of the Everglades, South Florida, and our St Lucie River/Indian River Lagoon so that one day, in spite of the difficulties we face today, we will be able to fix our problem in the future…
Perhaps the greatest reason the our former Everglades are now overflowing with sugarcane fields is due to politics between Cuba and the United States. My father graduated from Stuart High School in 1954, and believe it or not, his senior trip was to Havana! Soon after, Castro’s revolutionaries took over Cuba in 1959. And as they say the “rest is history…” as the growing sugar fields blocked the flow of water south to the Everglades, the fate of our precious St Lucie River/Indian River Lagoon seemed forever doomed. But it is not, as nothing lasts forever.
This weekend my mother handed me a book entitled “Swamp to Sugar Bowl” by historian, author, businessman, and politician, Lawrence E. Will. I read the little book with great enjoyment. Although many things have changed since the book was written in 1968, it provides great insights.
This week I will be sharing some aspects of the books. Today I will quote a few excerpts from chapter 22, “Florida’s Sugar Bowl.”
“Brother if you’re addicted to using sugar you should come here to these Everglades. Sugar and molasses bring in 110 million to these glades each year, so let’s take a quick look at this sugar bowl. Back in 1922, at Moore Haven, the first feeble attempt was made at producing sugar, but the following year in Canal Point the first successful mill began to operate.
Map showing Canal Point. (Laurence E. Will)
This company was taken over by Southern Sugar Company, now the U.S. Sugar Corporation which ground its first cain in Clewiston in 1929. Although this company owned some 100,000 acres of the best land around the lake, under the US government’s regulation, the state of Florida was permitted to produce only nine-tenths of one percent of this nation’s needs.
However when Fidel Castro took over Cuba, the Everglades reaped the benefit. For a short time our government permitted the unrestricted planing of sugar cane. Oh brother, you should have seen how cow pastures and vegetable fields were plowed up and planted! Now we have 189,500 acres of sugar cane in the Glades.” –Lawrence E Will, 1968
US Sugar and Florida Crystals map ca. showing ownership of lands, and option to buy lands for state of Florida, 2008.Stats of Sugar average in Florida, 1991, Source Hazen and Sawyer, 1993)
I am not certain how much land U.S. Sugar Corporation owns today, but the Everglades option map from 2008 and IFAS statistics from 1993 show over 450,000 acres combining US Sugar and Florida Crystals.
Sugar has been grown in the glades since the 1920s but it exploded in the glades in the 1960s and became heavily supported by the US government due mostly to political reasons.
Ernie Lyons speaking. Timer Powers (right) and other community leaders in background, ca. 1950. (Photo courtesy of Sandra Henderson Thurlow, Thurlow Archives.)
Ernest Lyons, known to his friends as “Ernie,” is one of my heroes. You probably know of him, but maybe you don’t. He was a homegrown-boy become “newspaper man” right here in Martin County. He worked for what evolved into the “Stuart News” from 1931 until late into his life. Lyons won many Florida Press awards for his weekly columns that focused mostly on conservation, but also simply on the poetic natural beauty of our area. The bridge between Sewall’s Point and Hutchinson Island is named for him. He was an avid and talented fisherman.
Lyons Bridge marker. (JTL)
I think of Mr Lyons often when I walk the bridge and try to listen to his words floating in the winds and waves, and on the wings of the pelicans flying past. Today I would like to share a few words from his essay “Take Time, Enjoy the Real Florida,” from his book “My Florida.”
Ernest Lyons Bridge as seen from Sewall’s Point Park, 2014. (JTL)
“Millions come to Florida–and never see it. They are like motorized pellets in a glamorized pinball machine, hitting the flashing lights of widely publicized artificial attractions before bounding out of the state and back home…
But the Florida we love who have lived here most of our lives has no admission fee, except the desire to appreciate beauty, the awareness to see it and the time to enjoy it…
The real Florida is a land of beauty and serenity, a place to take time to enjoy dawns and sunsets beyond the river against silhouetted pines. It is a place to hear the wind in the needles of the pines and to remember the dancing wreaths of Spanish moss on live-oaks. Florida is for quiet contemplation on a sea beach, watching pelicans skimming the breakers in singe file like long vanished pterodactyls…
Florida is for amazement, wonder, and delight, and refreshment of the soul. It may take a little more time to hunt out and enjoy the real Florida, but you will be well repaid.”
I find that the “real Florida” is actually very close and hand, in my yard, in the sky, in the water. Yes, even in the destitute and tired river beauty still prevails. Just look when you drive over the bridge. Look and “see.”
Publications of books “My Florida” and “The Last Cracker Barrel,” compilations of Mr Lyons columns from the Stuart News, can be purchased at Stuart Heritage Museum, 161 SW Flagler Avenue, Stuart, FL.(http://www.stuartheritagemuseum.com)
Aerial of C-44 canal looking towards its connection to the South Fork of the St Lucie River, in today’s Martin County. ca. 1920s. (Courtesy of Thurlow Archives.)
Over time, some of the most obvious things become forgotten…such was it for me with the original connection point of the C-44, or “St Lucie Canal,” and the South Fork of the St Lucie River.
I have actually written about this before, but I came across the survey maps that really proves the point so I will share today….
Florida’s early flood districts and soon after, the Army Corp of Engineers, ACOE, were tasks by the state of Florida and the people to build the St Lucie Canal which came to be known as the C-44 canal. Today, this canal, that connects lake Okeechobee to the St Lucie River is one of, if not the greatest overall contributor, to the death of the St Lucie River that at its “end” blends together with the southern Indian River Lagoon. (See DEP link at end of this blog.)
Another aerial, ca 1920s, looking at the connection of C-44 and South Fork. (Thurlow Archives.)Aerial looking west along St Lucie Canal/C-44 and south fork of St Lucie River at “connection.” Thurlow Archives
After coming across some of my old, filed information lately, I stumbled upon this question of location that I was particularly interested in about five years ago. With the help of Sandra Thurlow, my mother, a historian, and famed surveyor founder–GCY, Chappy Young, “X-marks the spot” was finally really identified.
Mr Young’s survey map below shows the location. The easiest way for me to “see” it, is to note the almost figure 8 shape in the South Fork at the bottom of this survey sheet which is the same one in the photo above. So the location is northeast of this area close to where Four Rivers subdivision is located today.
I think it would be a good idea if the county put a sign up. Don’t you?
What is really weird to me is how “perfectly” the canal blends into the beautiful swerving South Fork. As so many things in life, It is not easy to see where one stops and the other starts….
Mr Young’s survey map shows the location where the canal intersected the south fork of the St Lucie River. (Chappy Young,GCY.)This Google map shows location with the purple pin.Very close up.Another map from Mr Young identifying location.Wider view to see location on Google maps.Another…
Aerial of Sewall’s Point taken by Arthur Ruhnke in the 1950s. Photo courtesy of “Sewall’s Point, the History of a Peninsular Community on Florida’s Treasure Coast,” by Sandra Henderson Thurlow. The peninsula is covered by a heavily treed hammock–although many areas were cleared for mansions, and pineapple fields earlier in the century.
Born in 1964, and growing up here in Stuart and Sewall’s Point, one thing I certainly had in my childhood was freedom. Freedom to roam. Freedom to explore. Freedom to get into trouble, or decide not to….Freedom to ride my bike. Freedom to climb trees. Freedom to read a book on an empty lot. Freedom to build forts. Freedom to catch butterflies, and to jump in the river with my friends with our clothes on if we wanted to….
Oaks of Mirimar, Sewall’s Point. (JTL 2014)
I moved to Sewall’s Point from St Lucie Estates in Stuart, in 1974. I was a 10-year-old child with my parents, and siblings. This area was still “small” not developed widely until the 1980s. Certainly, Sewall’s Point did not look as undeveloped as it did in the above photo from the 1950s—- before the “Bridges to Sea” were built, but it was certainly less developed than it is today. In fact, as a kid, I thought the entire pennisula was “mine, and we kids often played in the old, falling apart estates of an another era long past, most famously, the old “High Point Rod and Gun Club.”
The demolition of this building is what set my mother, Sandra Thurlow, on her path to write her book on Sewall’s Point (Sewall’s Point, a History of a Peninsular Community on Florida’s Treasure Coast.) In fact, it was the Sewall’s Point Commission in 1986, that “ordered the demolition,” as she states it, “of the lovely old home that stood on a bluff overlooking the St Lucie River…”
This event spurred Sandy Thurlow, “housewife,” on to become, as she calls herself, “the self-appointed history lady,” over time, writing four books on Sewall’s Point, Stuart, Jensen, and the House of Refuge on Hutchinson Island. She has educated and inspired thousands of people and won state awards. Now that I think about it, she became an “activist for history!”
Ironically, as the old adage says, “history repeats itself,” and I now find myself writing and having become a “self-appointed river activist” for the St Lucie River/Indian River Lagoon, spurred on also by its destruction.
There is always a silver-lining, isn’t there…? And when I was comparing the photographs “of old” with some below taken “today,” I noticed that one thing in Sewall’s Point still stands tall: many of its incredible trees. In fact, an arborist last year told me that Sewall’s Point is one of the only communities on Florida’s entire east coast, that still has much of its “native hammock” in tact.
Last night at a Sewall’s Point commission meeting in 2015, as a commissioner myself, I lost my composure. I think really for the very first time, ever….And although I consider myself, yes, rather intense, I pride myself on NOT losing my composure.
In discussion of pursuing policy making it tougher for residents and businesses to “hat wrack” (severely cut) or remove a tree without a permit, in one second of time, “I lost it.”
I lost it when I thought I was going to lose my fight. A fight I have been working on in the Town of Sewall’s Point for six and a half years. In the end, some miracle occurred and the commission directed the town manager to “look into it,” if nothing else, for the hardwoods or especially large-caliber oaks, many hundreds of years old…
I am embarrassed by how I acted. I even apologized. I think it is because protecting this place is in my blood and because when I was a kid I thought it was “mine….” and you know what? In way it is. It is all of ours.
Large oak cut back in 2014.Large oaks cut back at Sewall’s Point business, 2012.Oak with internal large limbs severely cut, 2013.One of two oak trees located on A1A in SP that once flowed with long limbs. In 2012, an “A1A Sewall’s Point design” was created at the direction of the commission for all AIA trees “to be allowed to canopy” over AIA after under-grounding the power lines. This large oak tree above, in a few hours, on a weekend, by one man and a chainsaw, hired by an oblivious manger of an area business was “hat-wracked,” to avoid the power lines. Other oaks and pines, east of this area, also “planned” to canopy, were cut just 3 weeks before the town paid FPL hundreds of thousands of dollars to underground the power lines. No fine was levied as the town was “seeking right of way” on the same property for AIA “improvements.” Code called for thousands of dollars in fines….the business apologized and hired an attorney while FPL feigned ignorance…Many trees are hat-wracked each year. Most offenders go before the code enforcement board which can lessen fines spelled out in the code. In any case, the practice of severe pruning continues….
Aerial, south Sewall’s Point (date unknown, maybe 1990s) Sewall’s Point is surrounded by the St Lucie on the west and the Indian River Lagoon on the east.South Sewall’s Point today-still many trees. (Photo 2015, JTL)
Historic photo, ca. 1850s, Martin County, courtesy of Sandra Henderson Thurlow, Thurlow Archives.)
I come from a historic agricultural background, on both sides of my family, so I feel like I can criticize it.
My Thurlow great-great grandparents grew thistles in New York, and my Henderson great-grandparents, from a long farming line, settled in Madison, Florida. My grandfather, Russell Henderson, was a well-respected soli-scientist and taught in the Agriculture Department at the University of Florida, even getting a mural painted including him by citrus legend, Ben Hill Griffen…
I ate boiled peanuts while learning about different crops and cows during my summer vacations as a kid while visiting Gainesville. I understand the connection and importance of agriculture to the success of both my family and to our country.
Florida’s Gov Broward for which Broward County is named, led in leadership to “drain the Everglades,” for agriculture and development. (Public photo.)
Nonetheless, as a product of the Florida Indian River Lagoon region since 1965, I have chosen to focus my energies on “natural preservation.” This is often at odds with agriculture and development’s values.
Again, I respect agriculture; it feeds us….
I just think some aspects of the industry have gone “too far,” and are too coddled by our state, especially regarding the pollution and water resources destruction caused by their now “agribusiness giant-ness.”
Nonetheless, agriculture has a stronghold on our state government beyond comprehension, beyond tourism, or “quality of life or quality for tourists.” Agriculture/sugar brags that agriculture “feeds the world,” not just the state. I guess this is good, but why should my state and local area be “raped and polluted” to feed the world?
Money…
Power…
Greed…
History…
No where is this more evident than the in Everglades Agricultural Area where the sugar industry “reigns king.” As of late, the sugar industry is not supporting the purchase of option lands that are FOR SALE. They have been able to convince the governor, and so far the state legislature, that is it unwise to purchase these option lands to start creating an EAA reservoir to store, clean and convey more water south to the Everglades to begin the journey of saving the Everglades as well as the St Lucie River/Indian River Lagoon and also the Caloosahatchee River. These estuaries and the people and businesses that live along them sufferer from the 1920 redirection of Lake Okeechobee’s waters east and west for the creation of the Everglades Agricultural Area or EAA.
Option Lands Map SFWMD River of Grass, Option 1 is 46,800 acres and shown in brown. (SFWMD map, 2010.)
Honestly, I am not sure why sugar is so against this land purchase. Their land is for sale! Is because they are making money now and not going broke as they were in 2008 when the option lands deal was legally arranged? Or they do just want to hold out for more money on those lands in the future? In any case, they are doing everything they can NOT to allow the option land purchase to occur as part of the 2015 legislatures’ ability to use Amendment 1 monies while the “environmentalist” community begs….and lake O is getting higher every day.
We all know that the sugar industry gives millions of dollars a years to government officials to secure their interests. This is important, but it is not most important.
What is important for all of us to realize is that the influence of the sugar industry and agriculture in general is much deeper than money. It is blood. And this why our fight for the St Lucie River/Indian River Lagoon requires new blood. A revolution of sorts. Don’t get scared by these words. Nothing is more “American.”
Let’s study the history of sugar and the state of Florida’s pact:
In a 1911 Washington DC publication, of the 62nd Congress, document no. 89, entitled:
“Everglades of Florida.” —-Acts, Reports, and other Papers, State and National, Relating to the Everglades of the State of Florida and Their Reclamation,”
—we see that even in is the first documents of the publication produced in 1845, the year of Florida’s statehood, there was a resolution “recommending the adoption of measures for reclaiming the Everglade land in that state.” (By 1847 in a letter from Washington DC’s Honorable James D Westcott, Jr. to the Secretary of the Treasury and shared with the Florida legislature….)
It reads in response to the idea of draining the lands south of Lake Okeechobee…
“What would be the value of the now subaqueous lands, reclaimed by such work, I will not pretend to say….all of those (military men) who have resided in this vicinity, and who have repeatedly informed my that many of these lands would be the best sugar and richest lands in the United States.”
This publication reprinted as SOUTH FLORIDA IN PERIL, can be purchased at Florida Classic Library in Hobe Sound. (http://www.floridaclassicslibrary.com) It documents the early days of the 130 year tie between the federal, and state government as they all organized together with the agriculture industry to create the state of Florida, a sugar haven, that reached its true peak in the 1960 and 1970, with the exclusion of Cuba’s goods…
Here we are today, almost fifty years later and Cuba is perhaps reopening…and our state water issues in south Florida are out of control.
Today’s agriculture UF IFAS sites to help with research for agriculture improvement. Note sugarcane research center in EAA.(Source, UF/IFAS.)
Anyway, the book goes on for 203 pages documenting the state and federal governments’ support for agriculture in the Everglades and “how rich they would all become…”
That they were successful, I am happy; however; they OVER DID it, over-drained it, and refuse to see their own destruction, and their unfair advantage.
Blood is thicker than water….but “blood can’t be blood” without water…time for a change.
Stats of Sugar in Florida, 1991, Source Hazen and Sawyer, 1993.)
“Florida’s major field crop is sugarcane (mostly grown near Lake Okeechobee), which enjoyed a sizable production increase in the 1960s and 1970s, following the cutoff of imports from Cuba.” (http://www.city-data.com/states/Florida-Agriculture.html)
Portion of 1885 Francis La Baron Map of IRL/SLR. Courtesy of Todd Thurlow, Sandra Thurlow, and Rick Langdon correspondence, 2015.)
On Friday, I like to post something of beauty or interest regarding the St Lucie River/Indian River Lagoon. Old maps are about as cool as things get for me. They take my mind off my idea that things “are permanent.” For instance, the “mouth of the Indian River Lagoon” or its inlet/s, vary in “time and place,” as we can see from this hand drawn map of our area in the 1885 map above where the “inlet” is north of Ft Pierce and there is none in Stuart.
The St Lucie River/Indian River Lagoon is dynamic, and we too, although we may not realize it, are a huge part of that constant flux.
I wonder what people will think of our old satellite maps when they look at them in the next 130 years? Where will the IRL’s “mouth” be? Will some “mouths” have closed? Will there be others we have never even thought of?
My historian mother, Sandra Thurlow, shared this map with me and referred to it as the “Francis La Baron Map.” This portion posted above is just a section of it.
Francis La Baron, among other things, was the head of the Army Corp of Engineers.
La Baron’s map is incredible to study. How wonderful that our area was documented and that this documentation has been saved in Washington DC’s Library of Congress! Thank you to my brother Todd and my mother for bringing it to my attention. I think Todd will be using it in another one of his magic carpet videos in the future like the previous one he did of Peck’s Lake: (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yO650JyADwQ)
In closing, one of the historian friends my mother corresponds with is Mr Rick Langdon of Indian River Drive. I am including some of his thoughts on the map below that my mother shared with me. Very interesting! Hope you’ll share your thoughts too.
—–This “historically shoaling natural inlet” location is a bit further north… (of Ft Pierce); it’s almost a mile and a half North of the Ft. Capron location at the junction of (perhaps) 4 man-made “cuts” – the Bluehole Cut, the Garfield Cut, the Negro Cut, and the Ft. Pierce Cut.
It’s interesting too that this map shows only one natural outlet from the Savannas and that’s the one which leads to the Creek at the Beacon 21 Condo’s in Rio – (Warner Creek) …Rick Langdon
Same as above for viewing purposes. A Portion of 1885 Francis LaBaron Map. (Click to enlarge.)
“Bridges to the Sea,” Stuart, to Sewall’s Point, to Hutchinson Island and the Atlantic Ocean, 1965. Rhunke Collection, Thurlow Archives.
Since the 1960s, I have seen many bridges destroyed and rebuilt, right here in Martin County. They are symbolic of our history, our accomplishments, and our struggles.
I may be making this up in my memory, but I think I recall my parents driving me over the Palm City bridge when I was a kid and it was made of wood. The clunk of slow-moving, heavy car, over the uneven planks was somehow comforting, like the rhythm of a familiar horse. But times change, and bigger and “better” bridges are built…
The “bridges to the sea,” from Stuart, to Sewall’s Point, to Hutchinson Island–over the St Lucie River and Indian River Lagoon were built in 1958. Sandra Henderson Thurlow, in her book, Sewall’s Point, The History of a Peninsular Community of Florida’s Treasure Coast, discusses how the relative isolation of Sewall’s Point ended in 1958 when, two “bridges to the sea opened.” For 10 cents, one could come to Sewall’s Point, and for 25 cents, one could go all the way to the ocean. The tolls were removed in 1961 and the bridges formally named in 1965: “Evans Crary Sr,” and “Ernst F. Lyons”– going west to east.
I am almost sure, I also remember, my mother, or some history person, telling me “they” did not name the bridges right away as it was a political “hot potato.” Perhaps in the beginning there had been controversy regarding building the bridges and certain people did not want their names associated with them until the political fumes dissipated and settled upon something else? Perhaps I am making this up? Like my fuzzy romanticized memory of wooden bridge in Palm City?
I don’t know. But what I do know, is that bridges allow us to cross over, to get to the other side.
I am trying to build bridges to send water south to the Everglades and save the St Lucie River/Indian River Lagoon. This means working with the sugar industry; the South Florida Water Management District; the Governor; the state and federal Legislature; the Army Corp of Engineers; the County; and most of all the people who live along the Treasure Coast.
I must admit, jokingly, sometimes I feel like “jumping off the bridge.” But I won’t. With your help, I will rebuild it; make it higher, more beautiful, and less damaging to the environment. And hopefully, in the end, we will all be inspired!
Indian Riverkeeper, Marty Baum, and River Warrior, Robin Pittman, were wed December 20th, 2014, at Jensen Beach Christian Church, in Jensen, along the Indian River Lagoon. (Photo by Keri West, Keri West Studios, 2014)The Congregational Union Church’s lands were a gift of the Tilton family; the church was built in 1912. (Photo courtesy of historian Sandra Henderson Thurlow’s book , “Jensen and Eden on Florida’s Indian River.”)
Recently, the 1912 Jensen Congregational Union Church was the fabulous setting for a very special day. –A day of marriage, for Indian Riverkeeper, Marty Baum, and his beautiful bride, River Warrior, Robin Pittman.
The quaint, lagoon, pioneer-church, that saw so much happiness this day, has known many names, and many faces throughout its many years: 1912, Congregation Union Church; 1933, Jensen Community Church; and 1969, Jensen Beach Christian Church.
It has been a sanctuary along the Indian River Lagoon for 102 years…
“Love is Spoken Here” hangs above the door of the historic church. The bell is rung to announce the marriage! (Photo Keri West.)
The 2014 ceremony was a real “tear jerker.” The entire River Warrior community came together to make this union happen for Marty and Robin. –The perfect sanctuary; bright, beautiful flowers; fashionable hair styling; sumptuous food; decorations; a classic wedding dress; river invitations; bubbles to blow; a guest book; a river cake; and at the end of the day, pink rose petals on the bed of a romantic river cottage….
Photographer, Keri West and videographer, Kenny Hinkle Jr. documented the entire event; eloquent organizer, and preacher for the occasion, Jo Neeson, led the ceremony with many, many others giving their support.
At one point, the Reverend Guy Calvert looked upon the congregation stating:
“The church welcomes the River Warriors to this house…”
I sat between my parents and my husband, fighting back every tear. Thankfully, Gayle Ryan had knowingly handed me a Kleenex on the way inside.
I sat there thinking about my own marriage, and about how at the end of our life journey, love is really all we have to take with us.
“To find love along the Indian River Lagoon, I thought….this is wonderful…”
At the pulpit with Rev.Guy Calvert. (Photo courtesy of Rebecca Fatzinger.)
As Marty and Robin said their vows, I felt a deep sense of history, and how the Indian River has always brought people together, in fact for hundreds of years.
—The river is in us; it is us, and we are her…
It was a beautiful ceremony and I am thankful to have been there. Through the love of Marty and Robin, may the “living waters” of the Indian River Lagoon flow, renewed, once again for all of us….
The pews of the church were given by Henry Flagler.Congregation welcomes Mr and Mrs Marry Baum!Wedding Song, by Peter, Paul and Mary and sung by the congregation.Historic organ, also from Mr Henry Flagler.A happy day!
Stuart News article dated March 12, 1962 about the Ash Wednesday Storm and the breakthrough inlet at Peck’s Lake along the IRL.
In case you have been reading my blog the past week or so, you may have noticed that the date/s of Peck Lake’s Inlet breakthrough/s, into the Indian River Lagoon, along Jupiter Island, have been in question.
I originally wrote in my blog dated 12/12/14, “1948 and 1960” as the dates of the Peck’s Lake breakthroughs, based on my mother’s book Sewall’s Point, A History of a Peninsular Community of Florida’s Treasure Coast.
After I wrote, my mother contacted me saying that she had learned throughout the years that the date of 1948 and 1960 may be incorrect as she had taken the 1948/1960 dates off the back of historic photos from “The Ruhnke Collection” in her and my father’s history photo archives. Also there was the fact, that some old timers had said that date/s seemed a bit “off…” and that the 1940’s break may have been somewhere else…
Nonetheless, no one remembered the right dates. Time and tides fade all good memories, even at Stuart Heritage! (http://www.stuartheritagemuseum.com)
I am proud to say, due to some “history detective work” on the part of my mother, who yesterday actually went to the Blake Library and looked through the old papers on the microfilm machine, and a lead from a group email of friend, and attorney, Ted Guy, the exact and correct date of the 1960s break has been revealed!
The exact date that Peck’s Lake Inlet broke through in the 1960s was Thursday, March 12, 1962 during the famous “ASH WEDNESDAY STORM of 1962….” (Still working on 1940s date.)
Being raised Episcopalian, when I heard this clue, I had to ask my mother….”Mom, when is Ash Wednesday? ”
She looked at me and immediately spurted out : “Maybe 40 days before Easter….”
“The Ash Wednesday Storm of 1962 occurred on March 6–8, 1962 along the mid-Atlantic coast of the United States. Also known as the Great March Storm of 1962, it was considered by the U.S. Geological Survey to be one of the most destructive storms ever to affect the mid-Atlantic states. One of the ten worst storms in the United States in the 20th century, it lingered through five high tides over a three-day period, killing 40 people, injuring over 1,000, and causing hundreds of millions in property damage in six states.” (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ash_Wednesday_Storm_of_1962)
Close up of date on newspaper
This was my mother’s final message:
“Jacqui, because of your interest, we have finally pinned down the date of the article that had the wrong year on it. Your dad found a piece by the county on hurricane damage and it said Peck’s Lake washed through in 1965 as well…”
MYSTERY SOLVED, AND YET ANOTHER DATE REVEALED!
Thank you to all those who helped uncover this “mystery.” It is important to know as surely Peck’s Lake and other areas of Hutchinson Island and Jupiter Island, our ever changing barrier islands, will break through again.
Here are the photos of the Peck’s Lake 1962 breakthrough originally displayed , in case you did not see them the first time:
Peck’s Lake breakthrough 1962 (Photo Ruhnke Collection)Another angle, Peck’s Lake Inlet 1962 (Ruhnke Collection)Peck’s Lake Inlet open to IRL, ca. 1962Another Peck’s Lake photo after ACOE filled in, (Photo Ruhnke from Thurlow Archives.)Filled in after breakthrough….
“If a tree falls in a forest and no one is around to hear it, does it make a sound?” Quote attributed to Anglo-Irish philosopher, George Berkley 1685-1753.
The “Quisenberry House” located at 54 S. Sewall’s Point Road, built in late 1800s.Large waterfront lot facing the Indian River Lagoon.View along South Sewall’s Point Road.
To play off the famous quote by philosopher George Berkley: “If a house falls in a neighborhood and no one notices it, did it exist?”
Today, I am writing about the demolition of the “Quisenberry House,” in Sewall’s Point, along the Indian River Lagoon. The demolition of the house is quietly taking place. The house is over 125 years old, and certainly has a story to tell of its long existence…
Of course, the only reason I know really anything at all about the house is because of my mother, historian Sandra Henderson Thurlow. She has told me about the house since it was a bus stop for the kids going to Jensen Beach Elementary in the 1970s. Every day, sitting on the bus on the way to Highpoint, I would see that old-looking house, and every day, my imagination was set ablaze by its sight…
Mr and Mrs Harmer, 1907. (Photo, Agnes T. Parlin, courtesy of Thurlow Archives.)
“Who lived there?”
“What did they do back then?”
“Why do people say gangsters lived there?”
According to Sandra’s book, Sewall’s Point, The History of a Peninsular Community on Florida’s Treasure Coast, the house was built by Edgar and Katherine Harmer around the late 1800s. Mr Harmer died in a car accident at the Crossroads on Indian River Drive in 1920. His wife’s sister married Mr Jensen, (of today’s Jensen Beach), so the two families were very interconnected and helped with attracting other pioneer families to the remote Indian River area. The Harmers were prominent citizens of their day.
Later, in the 1920s the house was stuccoed, and became the home of Frank Quisenberry , a Detroit banker who worked for the well-known Knowles family for whom Knowles subdivision in north Sewall’s Point is named.
Mr Roger Quisenberry, who now own the home, tells stories of the house being used by Al Capone during prohibition. These stories have circulated for years, and when I was a kid in middle school, along that same bus route, I used to picture dark-suited gangsters in that house, laughing, smoking cigars, and counting their riches, with a giant bottle of rum or moonshine, and some shot glasses, sitting along a hard wooden table….
“It certainly seems like more fun than we are having today,” I thought, dressed in my cheerleading uniform, books in my lap, on the way to school…
Who really knows the truth, but certainly there is truth, that if the walls of that house could talk, there would have been stories to tell of a beautiful, fish and wildlife filled river, of gentle breezes and harsh storms, and of dreams broken and built, along the Indian River Lagoon….
The wrecking ball takes the old house down…12-7-14. (Photo JTL.)
Due to a code enforcement infraction and law suit dating back almost a decade, the entire duration of my “commissionship” in Sewall’s Point, after much money spent, and lots of lawyers racking in the dough, the conflict has finally been resolved, and the house is being demolished. Built in the late 1800s, it is certainly one of Sewall’s Point’s and Martin County’s oldest homes. One of the few historic homes saved, the Captain Sewall’s Home/Post Office that used to sit at the tip of south Sewall’s Point was built in 1889; the House of Refuge was built in 1876; the Stuart Feed Store was built in 1901.
Primarily due to the stucco over the frame, the old wood house held moisture and had become extremely deteriorated. No one has lived in the home for many years. Any salvageable pieces of wood will be collected; and concrete, steel and other valuable materials will be salvaged.
Good bye to the old house upon the Indian River, and to the stories, known and unknown, that you held…
1905, House can be seen in background as Mr Harmer and northern guests stand along a cold and windy Indian River Lagoon. (Photo, Agnes T. Parlin, courtesy of Thurlow Archives.)
Just recently, my husband Ed and I had the hardwood floors of our 1977 home redone. During this time, we literally “moved out” into one room of the house for almost four weeks. As much as this turned my world upside-down, it forced me to go through all of the “stuff” I have acquired over the past ten years in my St Lucie River/Indian River Lagoon files. I found some cool things I had forgotten about.
The folder I am sharing today is entitled OLD INLET PHOTOS. It includes aerial photos of the Jupiter, Stuart (St Lucie), Ft Pierce, and Sebastian inlets. I borrowed the photos from my mother, historian Sandra Henderson Thurlow, years ago. My photos are copies of the originals. I believe she and my father acquired the photos through Aurthur Ruhnke’s Photography Shop that once was located in Downtown, Stuart.
Written on the back of all photos except the Sebastian Inlet, was the year “1936.” The photographer was R.B. Holt. The Sebastian Inlet however, has “1962” written on the back of the photo along with “Sterling Hawk’s name,” a different photographer.
I love old stuff like this; I hope you do too.
Enjoy and dream of a time long ago…the fishing must have been great, and look how undeveloped the surrounding lands were! The inlets helped promote the development of the Treasure Coast Region.
Of course before man created the inlets permanently along the Indian River Lagoon, Mother Nature’s winds and tides would decide if an inlet was open or closed to the sea. Over thousands of years, inlets opened and closed all along the Indian River Lagoon making the naturally fresh waters brackish for a time and allowing wildlife to flourish in these areas.
Man was attracted to these natural inlets as well. I was just reading last night about how the inlet at Jupiter closed in the 1860s when the US government was building the Jupiter Lighthouse. Nature’s closing of the inlet was a “great inconvenience.” Today we would also consider it a great inconvenience to have any of our inlets closed.
The problem is that they are not meant to be permanently open and erosion problems occur over time. As most things in life, there is a positive and a negative; the tricky part is figuring our just where to draw the line in the sand…
Jupiter Inlet, 1936. (All aerials from the Rhunke Collection, R.B. Holt is believed to be the photographer for all but Sebastian Inlet photo, Thurlow archives.)Jupiter Inlet, March 18, 1936.Stuart (St Lucie) Inlet, 1936.Ft Pierce Inlet, 1936.Ft Pierce Inlet, 1936.Ft Pierce Inlet, 1936.Sebastian Inlet, 1962. Photo by Sterling Hawk.
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All photos courtesy of Sandra Henderson Thurlow, historian. Her books on Sewall’ Point, Stuart, Jensen and the House of Refuge can be purchased at both the Stuart Heritage Museum, (http://www.stuartheritagemuseum.com) and at the Elliott Museum, (http://www.elliottmuseumfl.org).
Railroad Bridge, Stuart Florida. (Photo Jacqui Thurlow-Lippisch, 2014.)Classic photo of original wooden trestle bridge over the St Lucie River and train, 1894. (Courtesy of the Historical Society of MC and Sandra H. Thurlow.)Train going over new steel railroad bridge in 1905. (Archives of Historical Society of MC and Sandra Henderson Thurlow, “Stuart on the St Lucie.”)The present railroad movable part, “wide enough to accommodate a double track” was built/added in 1925. (“Stuart on the St Lucie,” Sandra Henderson Thurlow.)
Did you know that Henry Flagler’s Florida East Coast Railway was originally named “Jacksonville, St Augustine and Indian River Railway? ” I didn’t until I re-read The Railroad chapter my mother’s book “Stuart on the St Lucie.” The name was changed on September 9, 1895 to the infamous and famous “Florida East Coast Railway.” The train did and does, massively affect our Indian River Lagoon Region.
Yesterday, All Aboard Florida had a poster presentation at the Kane Center where the public was allowed to view and then put hand written comments in boxes. The Stuart News said 800 people showed up. When I was there, the tension was thick between the public and the paid, mostly young, working “presenters” in the room. These presenters looked exhausted. As usual business and outside politicians don’t know what they are in for when they come to Martin County. Like a mother bear protecting her cub, we fight for the beauty, tranquility and “quality of life” of our area. AAF met NOT All Aboard Florida. It was a train wreck…
I personally, am not against train travel at all, in fact I am for it, but I am against All Aboard Florida as there are no benefits, only unfunded mandated costs to the Treasure Coast area to maintain equipment and tracks and to alter the pleasant areas of downtown crossings that fill our counties.
Also it is so obvious that this is really about freight of course: the widening of the Panama Canal, the expansion of the Port of Miami, about feeding “all those people in Orlando” as it is encouraged to grow, consume, and excrete pollution that will drain down the Kissimmee then into Lake Okeechobee and be released into our rivers. It’s about Airglades Airport that really is not about the Sugarhill development “proper” as much as the already “approved” Airglades Airport Inland Port in Hendry County that will scare away every panther that has quietly walked that remote part of Florida over hundreds of years and yes affect Everglades restoration.
South Florida is headed to become a shipping center.
I recommend we lie down on the tracks. Honestly. I don’t want AAF’s freight corridor or fake passenger through trains. Not here.
Since a picture speaks a thousand words, I will stop “talking”and let you take a look at what we are, and you can image what we will become, how our real estate and marine industry will change, and what these new shipping tracks and trains will look like—unless of course, we rise up and change the course of history…never doubt that that can be achieved.
Google Earth view of Old and New Roosevelt Bridges today 2014.Train going over SLR railroad track 2014Close upThe railroad bridge up, built in 1925 and now expected to allow 32 more trains plus freight to drive over it.Close up view of the past to become the future.
Port Sewall development map, 1911. (Courtesy of Sandra Henderson Thurlow.)
I have wanted to share this Port Sewall land development map for a while as it is so interesting to observe.
Port Sewall, established in 1911, was one of our area’s first “planned developments.” It consisted of lands from the Hanson Grant that Captain Henry Sewall acquired through his family line. The infamous Hugh Willoughby later joined him and they formed the Sewall’s Point Land Company, which according to Sandra Henderson Thurlow’s book The History of Sewall’s Point: ” built the Sunrise Inn, dredged for a yacht turning basin, and planned to develop a deepwater port.”
Due to the Great Depression of the 1920s theses dreams evaporated but left this map that became the basis for part of South Sewall’s Point, Stuart, St Lucie and Old St Lucie Boulevard, Port Sewall, and Golden Gate.
The body of water in the Port Sewall map is today’s Willoughby Creek. The original name Oyster Creek, was changed. This is fitting as today when I look over the edge of the little bridge on Indian Street, I do not see many oysters, only manatees swimming around in dirty looking water.
Today, I pose what may be an odd question but it is one I think about in light of my Florida League of Cities meetings and friends that force me to think about climate change and where things are going in the future of South Florida.
This is not “bad,” it is just change. Just 12,000 years ago there were mammoths, mastodons, saber toothed cats, 17 foot tall sloths and broad horned bison walking around looking for watering holes and hoping not to get “bow and arrowed” by a paleo-Indian. Things change. Times change. Slowly. We must adapt.
As a side note, a few years ago my husband Ed and I visited his birth city of Buenos Aries, Argentina. We noticed, just like Ed’s father told us, Argentina’s development was further back from the river. Most of the lands along the water bodies were left for “everyone” along with wildlife and to promote the area’s fishing. This was prompted by periodic flooding and storms. Just like we have here….
“We,” on the other hand, have completely built out to the edge of the water, right up in fact or over every little creek and rivulet.
It may be a rhetorical question, but if we had it so do all over again, how would we develop our lands to ensure the integrity of the surrounding waters, giant hammocks, upland forests, forks, creeks, wetlands, and shorelines?
As a Sewall’s Point commissioner of seven years, one the “craziest” things I have ever heard was that FEMA would help our town buy out some of the shoreline houses that have experienced repetitive flood losses. Hmmmmm….But we would lose the tax base I thought…..but then if the water is coming up, and the storms seem to be getting stronger, and it is my responsibility to plan for the future of the town….is this really such a crazy thought?
Ft Lauderdale is doing this…..Miami is doing this…..
Most certainly many elements have added to the degradation of the St Lucie River and Indian River Lagoon. Intense coastal development is right up there.
As we move forward in light of climate change, there may be opportunities to offset that destruction. These changes are not something anyone is ready for or wanting to discuss.
Nonetheless, Mother Nature just may force the conversation. We should start thinking now, what exactly we are going to say to her, because she is coming…
Florida sailfish ad, ca. 1960s. (Florida Memory Project.)
I vividly remember my father going fishing for sailfish with his buddies in the 1960s and 70s; my brother has taught his three girls to “reel them in…”
Me? I have never caught a sailfish; I am not a hunter either. Nonetheless, I recognize that fishermen and women, and hunters are some of the strongest conservationist in the United States and around the world. People protect what they love…
I started thinking about sailfish recently because Jamie Burns asked me if I would be a “judge” for a boat theme contest taking place October 24-25 for the “Salt Water Sisters” Lady Angler Tournament.
I was honored to be included and started reading about the organization which is an arm of the famous “Stuart Sailfish Club” that formed in Martin County informally in the 1930s, and later formally in 1941. This organization set the bar on conservation in our area.
According to my mother, Sandra Thurlow’s book, Stuart on the St Lucie:
“Immediately after the club’s incorporation, Ernie Lyons announced the next immediate goal was the creation of a release button to be given to individuals who consistently released their sailfish….in 1941 records show that a record, over 5000 sailfish, were caught in a 90 day period, January through March 1941. Many sportsmen let their sailfish go but thousands were slaughtered only to be dumped into the river, carted off by garbage collectors, or used for shark bait.
Because of the efforts of the Stuart Sailfish Club, anglers soon began to compete for Curt Whiticar’s beautifully designed release button in preference to all the rest.”
Stuart Sailfish Club release button, designed by Curt Whiticar, 1941. It reads “Stuart Sailfish Club, Released.” (Photo courtesy of Thurlow archives.)
I think this is an amazing and inspirational story!
As a St Lucie River/Indian River Lagoon side note, I hear a lot of things about the Indian River Lagoon and someone once told me the sailfish spawn right off the St Lucie Inlet. In our area the fish can spawn a good portion of the year but mostly in the warmer summer months, therefore, polluted releases from our canals and Lake Okeechobee have an effect on the sailfish population in our area. Just one more reason to stop them!
Ernest Hemingway was an avid sailfish fisherman and popularized the sport. (Photo Florida Memory Project.)Drew family of Jacksonville in Stuart ca. 1920 fishing for sailfish. (Photo Thurlow archives.)Stuart Sailfish ClubSaltwater Sisters
In closing, I would like to wish all of the participants of the Salt Water Sisters Lady Angler Tournament “good luck” this weekend. Wear your “catch and release” button with pride in the memory of those who came before us and had the foresight to protect the beautiful creatures of the ocean and our way of life.
McCarty Ranch is/was located in St Lucie County and will be the future water supply for the City of Port St Lucie.
The first time I heard about McCarty Ranch was from, at the time, City Manager Greg Orvac. It was 2012 and he invited me up to Port St Lucie to see all the wonderful work they were doing building areas to clean water run off and to learn about how the city was planning for its future water supply.
I was told that the idea of McCarty Ranch was that the city would build a water treatment plant to withdrawal the polluted agriculture tainted water in the C-23 canal before it gets to the river, hold it, treat it, and use it.
“Wow,” I thought. “This is wild, I have heard of things like this in other areas of the state, but right here at home?”
This is great news about cleaning the filthy C-23 canal water that is one of many canals along with Lake Okeechobee releases killing our St Lucie River/Indian River Lagoon, (http://www.dep.state.fl.us/southeast/ecosum/ecosums/c23.pdf) but there is also a tang of future “water wars” in this scenario as cities jostle for securing their future water supply.
Port St Lucie recently has become the 9th largest city in the state of Florida and has approximately 250,000 residents. By 2060 or so, they expect 400,000 or more. Three years before I was born, in 1961, a handful of residents petitioned the legislature for the fish camp area to become a city…
By looking at the Google map above, one can see that McCarty Ranch is located just above the C-23 canal east of Gatlin Boulevard. The C-23 canal is the “county line” between Martin and St Lucie Counties. I do not really know the details, and I think the city and county are still arguing over details in spite of a front page article in Scripps Newspapers today, but one would think the city will either have to also annex some of the lands below the McCarty piece or just have giant pipes connecting it to the C-23 through a small connected parcel. Either way, I am sure over time it will occur. They will build what they need to remove by South Florida Water Management District, (SFWMD), permit, water from the C-23 canal and use it for their citizens.
You may be thinking, the McCarty name rings a bell because you know or because I recently wrote a blog about Dan McCarty awhile back. The blog was about how I stumbled upon a grave in Palms Cemetery along Indian River Drive that read: “Governor Daniel McCarty.”
Yes, the ranch belonged to this prominent St Lucie County, former 1800s pineapple, then ranch and citrus family.
If you have the time to listen to the first video link below, there is a fascinating video interview with Mrs Peggy McCarty Monahan, the granddaughter of Charles Tobin McCarty, talking about her father, the brother of Dan, the governor, saying to her when she was a young girl: “Water is gong to be an issue, water is going to be the most important thing…”
Through these words he was telling her that one day the ranch’s proximity to the City of Port St Lucie would make it ideal for water storage and supply. Many of these old time ranchers preached this theme to their children knowing we had worked so hard to get the water off the land and one day we would be trying to put it back on…
Apparently there are lakes and mined areas on the property for water storage; I am unsure if the original McCarty idea included drawing water from C-23 canal; it very well could be, as C-23 was built in the 50s and 60s and waste tremendous amounts of water to tide in order to drain the surrounding lands for agriculture and development.
C-23 is one of the dirtiest canals dumping into the St Lucie River; it will be good to remove some of the water before it gets to the river but will there ever be a day when it takes too much or Martin County wants that water too?
Sounds far-fetched for sure, but all I know is that stranger things have happened along the St Lucie River/Indian River Lagoon. Who would have though Port St Lucie would one day be projected to have over 400,000 people?
Aerial of what was to become the City of Port St Lucie, 1957. (Photo Ruhnke/Thurlow collection, courtesy of Sandra Henderson Thurlow.)
The Jensen Bridge was completed in 1927. (Photographer unknown, photo courtesy of Bob Washam.)
The idea of a toll bridge over the Indian River Lagoon is not a new one as there were toll bridges in Jensen and Stuart in Martin County’s early days.
Toll Tickets for the Jensen Bridge. Courtesy Bob Washam.Cover of toll ticket packet for Jensen Bridge. Courtesy Bob Washam.
As my mother says in her Historic Jensen and Eden on Florida’s Indian River book:
“People fishing on both side os the Jensen Bridge made it necessary for automobiles to cross the narrow wooden bridge with extreme caution.”
Over time, we have had caution for people, but not for fish.
This morning the Tyler Treadway’s article in the Stuart News states there has been a catfish kill along the Indian River Lagoon Ft Pierce north; it is not yet reported to be in Martin County; in the 1920s no such virus or water quality issues prevailed and fishing was the sport of the day, some of the best in the nation, along the bridges, in the forks, in the St Lucie and Indian River Lagoon, along the clean and sparkling Atlantic Ocean…
Unidentified man with Goliath Grouper caught in Jensen area. Photo courtesy of Bob Washam.
Mrs Thurlow writes in her book:
The Jensen Bridge was instrumental in the development of Jensen with its numerous tourists camps. In the 1930s, the Pitchford, Gideon, and Wade camps sprang up at the western end of the bridge. Other camps, including the massive Ocean Breeze Park, soon followed. The Jensen Bridge was given so much publicity that it became a nationally famous fishing pier.”
“The Jensen Beach Bridge was advertised in the Martin County Chamber of Commerce Fishing Guide, published in 1935. (Courtesy of Robert McClinton Pitchford, Thurlow archives.)
Today the Indian River Lagoon is still famous for fishing, but also for its seagrass loss and declining fish stock. Yesterday, my father gave me an issue of Florida Sport Fishing, the lead article was entitled “Gator County, Florida ‘s Famed East Coast Lagoon System May No Longer Be the State’s Premier Destination for Giant Trout,” by Jerry McBride.
The beginning of the article reads:
“Two miles of previously lush green vegetation dotted with sandy potholes and carved by narrow channels–once home to monster gator trout–has been reduced to a single acre of sparse seagrass, I fished the entire stretch in less than an hour and paddled home… The estuary’s south end is losing its 80 plus year battle against polluted discharges from Lake Okeechobee, while the rest of the 156 miles long waterways faces an even more insidious adversary—a multi-source nutrient-fueled brown algae scourge that virtually overnight reduced 43,000 acres of rich seagrass habitat to a sandy desert…”
Most of this seagrass loss may have happened north of us, but it is here too. Also, the lagoon is one waterway, whether it is Lake Okeechobee and local canal releases here in Martin County, or brown tide in the central and north lagoon, we are all affected.
Usually on Friday I try to post something positive and happy.
I have been wanting to share friend Bob Washam’s Jensen Bridge photos, today was the day. Nonetheless, I could not ignore the slow and now pronounced losses to our Indian River Lagoon, especially in light of Mr Treaway’s article this morning.
If the tin-can tourist who hardly had a nickel in their packs could be raised from their graves to see what has happened to the Indian River Lagoon, I am certain they would say:
“You may have more money, but you sure lost a piece of Heaven…and which would you rather have?”
One good thing is that nature is programmed to heal itself, may we have the strength to continue to fight for some semblance of the “good old days,” and should we need to exact a toll on our bridges to start an IRL Fund, I’ll vote “yes.”
Thousands of dead hardhead catfish are floating in the Indian River Lagoon from Palm Bay to Fort Pierce.
Because only one species is affected and all the dead fish are juveniles mostly from 4 to 12 inches long, a local marine biologist believes the cause is a specific virus rather than poor water quality in the lagoon.
Weve had die-offs like this in the lagoon before, where only sea cats and nothing else was dying,said Grant Gilmore, lead scientist of Estuarine, Coastal and Ocean Science in Vero Beach.
The cause was a viral infection back then, so I would assume its the same this time. Kelly Richmond, a spokeswoman at the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission laboratory in St. Petersburg, said the agencys hotline has received 16 reports of dead catfish beginning Monday.
Staffers collected three live catfish and water samples from the lagoon for analysis.
Results should be available early next week, Richmond said, and the agency wont guess at a cause until then.
Paul Fafeita, a Vero Beach fishing guide, said he saw dead catfish Wednesday morning in the lagoon from the Barber Bridge in Vero Beach to the North Causeway bridge at Fort Pierce.
Im talking hundreds, if not thousands of dead fish,Fafeita said.They werent sporadic, one here and one there. They were steady, up and down the lagoon. Mike Peppe, a Sebastian fishing guide, reported seeing dead catfish Wednesday in the lagoon from Wabasso to the Sebastian Inlet.
They were everywhere,Peppe said.There had to be thousands. Look down and youd see a bunch of white things in the waterthe catsbellies.
The area of Ed and my back yard where grass has slowly been removed, planting areas enlarged, and mulched with leaves.
In 2010 the Town of Sewall’s Point passed a strong fertilizer ordinance, the first on Florida’s east coast. It was during this time, that I became “anti-turf grass.” Today when I look at a “beautiful” sprawling yard of green grass, all I see is fertilizer, pesticide, herbicide, and heavy water needs that are contrary to a healthy St Lucie River/Indian River Lagoon and a successful Florida future.
Native coontie.
In order to put my “money where my mouth is,” in 2010, I informed my husband that I was going to start removing the grass from our yard and mulching with leaves from our oaks, strangler figs, and other trees. As usual, he looked at me like I was slightly crazy, but as usual, he agreed.
This decision was made easier in that around this same time our well was starting to go dry and I had gotten estimates in from $5000 to $8000 to replace it. Not to mention the well guys said if they did drill, as it is well-known wells are going dry in this high hammock area of Sewall’s Point, and they were unsuccessful, Ed and I would still have to pay half.
“Not my kind of odds.” I thought, especially knowing water issues regarding wells, and salt water intrusion are only going to increase. Last week, in 2014, I changed the house over to “city water” as our well has finally died. I am very glad that over the past few years I have de-grassed the yard for the most part, a heavy water user, and filled it with Florida Friendly (http://www.floridayards.org) plants that do not require much watering. I am hoping to irrigate only once a week, or never, and just water by hand.
City water is expensive! The South Florida Water Management District states that “up to 60% of a south Florida homes’ water use can go to irrigation. That’s insane and a huge waste of water and money.
I have read that Florida produces 25% of the WORLD’S turf grass.(http://floridaturf.com/about/) Considering that, I’d say the state has an interest in keeping us “in grass.” This is a problem…a conflict of interest. I wish they were investing in inventing an attractive low-water/low-or no fertilizer, ground cover other than floratam type grasses; they would make billions, and help save the state’s precious spring, lake, and estuary waters rather than encouraging us to destroy them. The sod and fertilizer industries are multi-billion dollar industries that want to keep us “addicted.”
Well, I have broken free. 🙂
Back to my family, I have to say, also, that my brother-in-law, landscape architect Mike Flaugh (http://mikeflaughla.com) and my mother, always ahead of her time, also inspired me on this issues. As they too have de-grassed their yards years ago and their yards still look beautiful. Mike has “natively” and “Florida Friendly” landscaped some of the newest and finest homes in the area with no or little grass and these homes are examples of the “new yard,” “the conscious yard,” “the yard of the future.”
Today, I’d like to share some photos of my de-grassed yard in hopes of inspiring you, should you wish to be inspired, and hopefully are already! 🙂
Font of house is now ferns and other plantings.Creeping jasmine vine has replaced grass in the front yard. Loves shade or partial sun, but not full sun.Back yard where grass was removed and replaced with stepping stones and Florida Friendly plants.Front yard with stepping-stones and edged with ferns and plantings.Leaves from the trees in the yard are used as mulch, as they break down they enrich the soil.One area of the house in the front was left with grass for our dogs to run, and play, and…Bird houses for wildlife; wildlife increases dramatically once grass and chemicals are removed. The birds eat bugs.More native plants like this satin leaf started to germinate and grow once the grass was gone. I am letting more natives grow-letting the yard “be itself.”Native Beautyberry provides food for wildlife and color.Wild coffee grew like crazy in our area once the grass was out. It has colorful berries for wildlife and a shiny green leaf.Native firebush attracts butterflies.Golden dew drop with its pretty purple flowers is a butterfly magnet.Lantan, another butterfly and low water plant.Purple porter, yet another butterfly and low water native.Once grass was gone, this Mexican star, or something like that, started to come up all over the yard; it has a pretty yellow morning flower and is native.this century plant needs little water and has an interesting shape; native beach sunflower vine in rear.Crotants are not native but use little water and add color.Side yard…no more grass, with lots of blue flowering plumbago, also a low water, butterfly attracting, Florida Friendly plant.
St Lucie River Initiative’s Report to Congress 1995; River Dayz ’96 Festival booklet; and historic newspaper info in this article courtesy of historian Sandra Henderson Thurlow.
A woman’s right to vote did not come come in a day; stopping the horrors of slavery in the Untied States took a civil war and the life of one of our greatest presidents; most recently, we are seeing a revolution in gay rights.
These movements take time, but eventually, there is tipping point were things begin to change direction. As we know, our river movement has been going for almost 85 years as the first time the Martin County commission asked the ACOE to stop releasing Lake Okeechobee water into the St Lucie River was documented in their minutes of 1930.
1930 request of the MCBOCC for the ACOE to halt releases from Lake O to SLR.
Today I wanted to encourage you not to feel discouraged that the St Lucie Indian River Lagoon movement has been going on so long, but to feel empowered that you are part of something that is big, that takes years, and has a moral element to it just like human rights. This moral element is what in time will force the State of Florida and the United States of America to scrutinize our destructive drainage practices of the past.
As it says in our Declaration of Independence: When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires they should declare the cause which impels them to the separation.
For me, this document gives permission to pull away when necessary. We are and have been pulling away. We envision something better and we are willing to fight for it. Just for the record, some of those before us include:
1. Commercial fishermen in 1925, two years after the canal opened in 1923, in the newspaper of the day, The Florida Developer fought the destructive abundance of fresh water from the lake.
2. A 1931 article from The Florida Developer’s editorial team notes it was “critical” that the releases from Lake Okeechobee be stopped.
3. 1945 another paper, The Stuart Messenger notes that the river had turned into a “mud soup,” killing fishing; tourism; and real estate.
4. 1958 local citizens filled the Martin County Courthouse to discuss with a delegation of the Flood Control District and the Army Corps of Engineers the possibility of a third outlet from Lake Okeechobee. Although hopes were high, nothing materialized.
5. Editor, and writer for the Stuart News, Ernest Lyons (1931-1974) wrote many award-winning articles against over canalization in our area of not only C-44 from Lake Okeechobee but also C-23, C-24 and C-25 further north that drained even more polluted fresh water into the rivers. His newspaper/writing career continued for many years.
6. In the early 1950s the Izzak Walton Group; the Martin County Conservation Committee and the St Lucie- Indian Rivers Rivers Restoration League all fought for the river even garnering meetings with top government officials. Apparently the ACOE met with locals and a report was done “but nothing ever happened…”
7. In 1990 Ernest Lyons, who had been prominent in all groups listed in #6, died: to fill that void, “Leadership Martin County” in 1992 , with the help of Mr Bud Jordan, Kevin Henderson and Tim Kinane, founded the St Lucie River initiative whose report to Congress is today’s blog photo. Their “River Dayz Festival” on behalf of the river brought hundreds together, they created river materials for elementary, middle and high school students, focused on muck removal and business support.
8. In 1993 the Greater Martin County Board of Realtors joined in its support of the St Lucie River/Indian River Lagoon, sending out a letter stating that the organization had joined the St Lucie River Initiative and encouraged a “call to action to contribute to the organization and to write letters to government officials.”
9. In 1998, after the worst toxic algae bloom and fish kill/fish lesion outbreak ever documented in Martin County during heavy releases from Lake Okeechobee, the Rivers Coalition came into being unifying businesses and an education program as well as developing the Rivers Coalition Defense Fund set up to sue the Federal Government and others on behalf of the St Lucie River/Indian River Lagoon. Realtor Leon Abood, became the longstanding and outspoken chair.
10. On December 4th, 2010, a Rivers Coalition Lawsuit against the Federal Government was heard in the Court of Federal Claims in Washington DC. According to edited words of Karl Wickstrom, chair of the Defense Fund at that time, U.S. District Judge Lynn Bush wrote in her explanation:
“The St. Lucie River is by all accounts, a national treasure.The longterm environmental consequences of defendant’s, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers,’ massive discharges into the river are tragic, and the court takes note of plaintiffs’ tireless efforts to reverse that damage.”
The court ruled that a remedy to stop the harmful discharges must come not from the courts but from Congress; she dismissed the case, but it garnered national attention and moved issues of the river forward.
11. In 2011 the River Kidz were born of two 5th grade girls and became a division of the Rivers Coalition. They held two river rallies at the St Lucie Locks and Dam in 2012 during discharges from Lake Okeechobee. Senator Joe Negron, Chairwoman Sarah Heard, and other politicians mingled with parents looking for a way to deal with the discharges. Congressman Patrick Murphy later also supported the Kidz in their efforts. The key: parental involvement and youth.
12. 2009-2011, going public in 2012/13, it was realized a that a super bloom and brown tide algae bloom had killed 60% of the seagrasses in the northern and central IRL. Unusual Mortality Events (UMEs), declared by NOAA, followed for both endangered manatees and the protected bottle nosed dolphins. Hundreds of pelicans also died. This galvanized the counties of the IRL, southern, central and northern alike.
13. 2013, the ACOE starts releasing from Lake Okeechobee May 8th until October 21st. This time becomes the “Lost Summer,” toxic conditions ensue. Young Evan Millar and Clint Starling and others call for a rally at the locks on Facebook. Over 5000 show up. Beach rally later brings over 2000. Hands Across the Lagoon unifies thousands across the 156 mile lagoon as well. The STUART NEWS/SCRIPPS NEWSPAPERS starts a river news campaign that has educated thousands and is still going today. St Lucie County as well as Lee County River Kidz is born…
14. 2013 the Sugarland Rally in Clewiston; Senator Negron’s Senate Hearing on the Indian River Lagoon and Lake Okeechobee Basin; Congressman Murphy invites the state and local officials, the River Warriors, and River Kidz to to a meeting on the Indian River Lagoon and Lake O. in Washington DC. …..Commissioner Ed Fielding forms the Indian River lagoon County Collaborative unifying all counties along the lagoon. (Palm Bach quits.)
15. In 2014 the fight has continued. The pressure has not let up. Presently the University of Florida is studying the issue of “sending water south…”
16. 2014, last week, the South Florida Water Management District and Dept of Environmental Protection and others recommend against Sugar Hill, a proposed development in Hendry County on option lands, most designated for Everglades restoration or trading.
It has been a long journey, but I am confident that the tipping point is coming. We have over drained our lands, we have destroyed our rivers and lakes, we are wasting 1.7 billion gallons of fresh a day to tide knowing we have a growning population coming…
If nothing else, it will be the need for fresh water and the knowledge that wasting it is wrong that will in the future push the St Lucie/Indian River Lagoon movement tipping over the edge…
ca. 1944 post card advertising Ocean Breeze Camp. (Photo, Sandra Henderson Thurlow’s book, Historic Jensen and Eden on Florida’s Indian River.)
I love driving north along Indian River Drive towards Jensen Beach from the Town of Sewall’s Point. The palm trees, the river, the old brightly painted houses, and the Town of Ocean Breeze. Since childhood, “Ocean Breeze Park,” has been an icon for retired people growing old and having a great time. A little crowded in there for my taste, but still, what a cool place!
According to Sandra Henderson Thurlow’s book, Historic Jensen and Eden on Florida’s Indian River, “In the 1930s, Harry and Queena Hoke along with their two teenage sons, came to Martin County in a red trailer that was their home.”
According to the family: “The trailer was so small you had to go outside to change your mind.”
After visiting Pitchford’s trailer camp further north, the family eventually purchased 23 acres of the former C.F. Wolf pineapple plantation. The formation of the town is an American dream story. After success as a park, they eventually incorporated in 1960 increasing their coffers and their land holdings by buying adjoining properties.
With a great advertising campaign and true caring for the lives and fun of their residents the park-city became a true home.
Early advertising for Ocean Breeze Park.(Courtesy of Sandra Henderson Thurlow.)Original site of Ocean Breeze Park, 1948. (Courtesy of Sandra Henderson Thurlow.)
According to the town’s Wikipedia article: “at the time of its incorporation, in 1960, the 65-acre park was said to be the largest privately owned trailer park in the United States.”
One of the great town stories is Mrs Geeben.
Mrs Dorothy Geeben, embodied the spirit of Ocean Breeze. She was mayor from 2001 to 2010. When she was re-elected in 2004 at age 96, the national media dubbed her “the nation’s oldest living mayor. She passed on January 11, 2010 at the age of 101 just short of her 102nd birthday.
The Ocean Breeze Park Clubhouse, social center for parties, dances, meetings and performances. (Thurlow collection.)Ocean Breeze Park, 1965.Recent aerial photo. (Internet)Photo 9-27-14 by Jacqui Thurlow-Lippisch and Ed Lippisch.Town of Ocean Breeze’s town limits.
Today new things are on the horizon for the Town of Ocean Breeze. Yes, it is run down, but it is improving. Flying over or driving through one can see that many trailers have been removed and western lands belonging to the town are being cleared for residential apartments. The town owns a tremendous amount of land as well as land in the Indian River Lagoon. (see chart above.) The Town of Ocean Breeze is a sovereign. They regulate themselves.
Hmmmm? What will the future bring?
Recently, there was a rumor going around that the town could ignore the county’s four-story height limit within its boarders and build condominiums to “see the sea.” I think that is doubtful, but stranger things have happened in Martin County and if Ocean Breeze is to evolve into the future it will certainly have to change.
According to Scripps Newspapers, after great financial difficulty the town was bought in 2013 by Carefree RV Resorts for Arizona for 16.5 million. The company owns 60 communities nation wide.
Although I know I’ve got many more good and productive years, I find myself thinking about where Ed and I might eventually downsize. I want a great location, a place where I can see the Indian River, somewhere within walking distance to town, and a community where I can have fun and grow old. Ocean Breeze just might be the ticket!
The nuns of Mount Elizabeth, St Joseph’s College, 1964. (Photo Aurthur Ruhnke, Thurlow photo archives.)
In the 1960s and 70s, when I was a kid sitting in my parents’ car, watching the world go by, I often saw a sight along Indian River Drive that even today, I can clearly bring into my mind’s eye: the nuns of the Indian River Lagoon.
It was a striking image for a child. The nuns in their black veils in the 90 degrees weather walking in unison under the royal palms, the sparkling river in the background…
St Joseph’s College was founded in 1890 and the branch that was located at today’s Indian Riverside Park, along the Indian River, opened in 1966.
The story of how the nuns got there is a rather ironic one, and today I will share this story.
First let’s set the stage…
The lands where the nuns lived was originally an ancient Indian burial mound, and in 1855 was included in the 100 acres of land purchased by wealthy gentleman, Henry William Racey whose son Charles Henry Racey eventually built a beautiful home atop the 4000 year old Indian mound; the site became known as “Mount Elizabeth,” shown below.
The Racey home on Mount Elizabeth, ca. 1892. (Photo courtesy of Thurlow photo archives.)
Later, the property was purchased by Judge Edward Swann, and next in 1936, by Coca-Cola heiress Anne Bates Leach and her husband Willaford. Their home was named “Tuckahoe,” or “welcome” in the ancient tongue of the once proud and strong native peoples. The estate was spectacular, as seen below.
During the 1940s, the Martin County Commission had “allowed” Francis Langford and her husband to dredge a marina and construct tourist cottages on their property immediately south of the Leach estate and “tourist camps” had sprung up along the Indian River shoreline from Jensen Beach to the northern boundary of Tuckahoe.
According to Sandra Henderson Thurlow’s book “Sewall’s Point, A History of a Peninsular Community on Florida’s Treasure Coast,”
“The Leaches felt that the value of their property was greatly diminished and they were infuriated when the county refused to lower their taxes. To “get even” they vowed to sell their property to an organization with a tax-exempt status…”
which they did….
The property was sold to the Catholic Church for $75,000 and in 1950 the estate became a novitiate for the Sisters of St Joseph. 🙂
Nuns in front of the former Leach mansion, now with dormitories, Tuckahoe. (Photo Aurthur Ruhnke, Thurlow photo archives.)
As we know, the campus of St Joseph eventually became the Florida Institute of Technology, a school that has created many of our local ecologically minded business leaders. After hard financial times the institute closed in 1986, and sat deserted for many years.
Then, through the very hard of work of a “redeemed Martin County Commission,” the land blossomed into “Indian Riverside Park,” a gem of our Treasure Coast.
When one looks at the history of the property, it is hard not feel like somehow, we’ve been blessed.
Tuckahoe today is a popular site for weddings and meetings. (All photo by Jacqui Thurlow-Lippisch, 2014.)Oyster and clam shells thousands of years old form the mound, the “mount” of Tuckahoe.View along the boardwalk of Tuckahoe.Historic marker for Mount Elizabeth, telling the story of the Ais Indians, Riverside Park.
Coat of Arms, Andros, Bahamas, 2014. As seen at Andros Airport. (Photo by Jacqui Thurlow-Lippisch 8-14)
I was recently struck by this beautiful coat of arms, or crest, or piece of art, hanging in the airport in Andros, Bahamas. My husband and I had flown there; it is only a 45 minute flight from Stuart. Adros, as most all the islands in the Bahamas, has a connection to our St Lucie River/Indian River Lagoon region here in Martin and St Lucie Counties.
Before I start, I’d like to say that I was not only struck by the beauty of this crest with its sailfish, flamingo, and conch but somewhat taken aback by the Spanish ship in the middle under the ancient South American Indian sun symbol of the Great Creator.
The words under the crest read, “forward, upward, onward, together…”Hmmm?
Italian, Christopher Columbus, sponsored by Spanish, king and queen, Ferdinand and Isabella, came to the Bahamas first in 1492 by ship; years later as the Caribbean became filled with mining operations and sugar plantations of great wealth, the native Arawak/Lucayns people of the islands were forced into slavery. The natives fiercely resisted, but most died of small pox due to having no immune system against Spanish disease. According to documentation, by 1520 the culture was “extinct.” As a former culture they had thousands (40,000 across the Bahamian Islands.)
The story of their annilation is one of the the most brutal instances of genocide in our human history.
Later captured African slaves were forced to replace the Arawak peoples on plantations, and ironically later in the 1800s the Black Seminoles of the United States emigrated via canoe from Florida to Andros. Many live there today in Red Bay working as sponge divers and artisans. After great tribulation, and they are still struggling today, the Bahamas became independent this time from England in 1973.
Time goes on. Things change and people move on for new dreams. Dreams in America. Where justice prevails for “all.”
One of the black families that came to our Indian River Lagoon Region in 1898, not from Andros but from Exuma was the Christie Family. My family holds the Christie family very dear as my mother, who wrote the History of Sewall’ Point in 1992, formed a close relationship with the Christie family as they had worked not as slaves, but a free men and women over generations, for the Andrews family and others who held great land holdings and beautiful winter properties on the peninsula of Sewall’s Point.
According to historian and author, Sandra Henderson Thurlow, “No one family has lived on Sewall’s Point with out interruption longer than the Christies. Their friendships knew no color barrier.”
The Christie Family’s knowledge and relationships with the powerful early families of Sewall’s Point is really what gave my mother, the ability and foundation to write her first book which has led to her career and great documentation of our area.
For the past seven years, I have served with Commissioner and former Mayor, James A. Christie, Jr. who is one of longest-serving public servants of the City of Stuart along the St Lucie River/Indian River Lagoon. We serve on the Treasure Coast Council of Governments together. As an elected official, Mr Christie has been a great supporter of the river movement. He will be retiring this September; I will be there to honor him.
So, yes, it really struck me, considering the destruction of native peoples, the environment, slavery, the birth of new counties and the death of old ones, that the crest was so happy and beautiful and read “forward, upward, onward, together…” surrounded by the birds and fish and sea life.
May we find the optimism in this difficult and sometimes horrific world. Let’s save our rivers and yes, let’s work together to “overcome.”
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A great book is on “this subject” is History of the Caribbean by Frank Moya Pons
Sandra Henderson Thurlow, historian and author, has written four books about the pioneer culture along the St Lucie River/Indian River Lagoon. (Photo, Tom Thurlow, 2011.)
As the jacket of her Sewall’s Point Book states:
“Sandra Thurlow was a resident of Sewall’s Point for twelve years before she became fascinated by its history. In 1986, the Town of Sewall’s Point commissioners ordered the demolition of a lovely old home that stood on a bluff overlooking the St Lucie River. Queries revealed that it was once the High Point Rod and Gun Club, a wildness retreat for a coterie of politically powerful Philadelphians. Further research uncovered a wealth of local history that needed to the shared and preserved. ”
As you may already know or have guessed, Sandra is my mother and the house was one the children of Sewall’s Point played in and got into trouble having lots of fun….And yesterday, we as a family honored Sandra’s 75th birthday and today she will be featured in my blog. 🙂
Even though she is my mother, it is my opinion that no one has done more for “Stuart’s” local history and no one has written more about the pioneer families who made their way along this wilderness, once known as “Santa Lucia” or the “Indian River Region.”
When I came back to visit Sewall’s Point and Stuart after graduating from University of Florida in 1986, I could tell things had really changed at the Thurlow house. My sister Jenny was getting ready to go off to school, I had been gone four years and our bedrooms were being transformed into offices. –Offices full of shelves and drawers of historic negatives, old maps from my father’s law office, abstracts, camera equipment, historic photos, taped interviews and the beginnings of what would become personal computers.
“Wow, ” I thought, “that’s cool, she and dad certainly will not suffer from empty nest syndrome when Todd leaves in another two years….”
As the years went on, she and my father, dove into the history of our area, and the history of our area is the history of the St Lucie River and Indian River Lagoon. A teacher by early profession and native of Gainesville, by 2008, my mother, with the help of my dad, had written and published four books: Sewall’s Point, the History of a Peninsular Community on Florida’s Treasure Coast; Stuart on the St Lucie; Historic Jensen and Eden on Florida’s Indian River; and together with my sister-in-law Deanna, Gilbert’s Bar House of Refuge, Home of History.
Book covers of the local history books written by Sandra Henderson Thurlow.
My mother taught me not to brag. But today I am bragging. It’s time. She has inspired and educated not only me but thousands of people. She has given talks, presented slide shows, worked with students in our local high schools, and has won state awards for her work.
I think she has helped make Martin County one of the “best documented histories” of our state. And through it all, whether she is writing about Captain Richards and his daughter Lucy of Eden struggling to grow pineapples in the sandy soil along the Indian River; or the first pioneers of Stuart trading with the Seminoles and calling their new-found paradise, “Stuart on the St Lucie;” or the early fish houses pouring over in Jensen Beach; or the shark fishermen in Salerno; or the lonely House of Refuge Keepers longing for the site of a ship or boat in river or ocean and who sustained themselves from the great riches of its waters; and even the documentation of the great detriment that came to this place through the false hope of canals and connection to Lake Okeechobee, she writes about the relationship of people to the land and the relationship of people to the water. The water is our history and we are the water, as that is why we came to this land….
Thank you mom for all of your work and happy birthday! Stuart is 100, you are 75 and I, your oldest, am 50. Time is flying, and the water that defines this place is still defining it as we fight to bring it back to health so that future generations can have some stories and write some books too.
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Sandra’s books are available at Stuart Heritage, 161 Flagler Avenue, Stuart, FL 34994 in Downtown Stuart.(http://www.stuartheritagemuseum.com) and through Amazon and Barnes and Nobel.
St Lucie River sunset photo, oak hammock, Sewall’s Point, 2008. (Photo by Jacqui Thurlow-Lippisch.)
History is a window, a window into understanding why and where we are today. The Town of Sewall’s Point along the St Lucie River/Indian River Lagoon has some of the most wonderful historical descriptions of its original beauty, and I believe that is why we try so hard as a town to keep remnants of that historic beauty today.
The town is a “Tree City;” a bird sanctuary; and there are very strict fines for cutting down trees with over a two inch across trunk. Development rules are supposed to be protective of wooded uplands and wetlands, sometimes this does not seem to be the case.
Nevertheless, today I will quote from a “Description of Indian River County,” as it was called, from a Maine Journal , The East Coast Advocate, April 24, 1891 by Rufus King Sewall. This document was transcribed by my mother, historian Sandra Henderson Thurlow in 2009.
Here we go and remember 1891 was the year before the St Lucie Inlet was opened permanently so the river waters were fresher..
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“At the Indian River Hotel, Titusville, we lodged for the night and were lulled with the song of two mosquitoes…at 5 a.m. the Indian River steamers called for embarkation south-bound and all aboard, most comfortable quarters in neat staterooms, spacious saloon and good service are found… The banks of the Indian River are general sops-wood, of cabbage palm, pine and cactus—uncleared because used as a screen against the fierce east winds which whip the orange and banana to death…Fine oysters, big trout, mullet, pompano, with channel bass abound…
The climate is the great charm of travel in the region. Within an hour of Titusville, the heavy, hot depressing , suffocating atmosphere of the interior of Florida suddenly changes to soft exhilarating, and cool refreshing inhalations, which the lungs expand to draw in with gateful sensation.
Cover of book “Sewall’s Point,” Sandra Henderson Thurlow. Sewall’s Point Post Office late 1800s.
It was 2 a.m. when the whistles sounded for San Lucie Landing at Sewall’s Point starting to wing acres of and acres of sleeping ducks whirring, splashing and diving, in dismay, before the lights of the rushing steamer and we rested on shore, while the St Sebastian turned toward Jupiter below. The river scene and surroundings were enchanting , sea and shore burnished with tinted rays of a sunrise and indescribably grand and novel. The ducks had grouped in shoals on their feeding grounds.
Fish were leaping in the light and the hum of her life stirred the evergreen prospective with a marked absence of bird song. In the east across the sound tree miles away, over Gilbert’s Bar, the broad ocean stretched beyond sight, the pathway of big ships southward bound clear to the naked eye. In front, Mangrove Islands bounded the horizon whose channel fretted the outgoing tides of Jupiter Narrows. Northward and west the broad reaches and pitch-pine plains of the deep and wide San Lucia shut off vision.
Underfoot and around the rock-bound bluff of the Peninsula of Sewall’s point in gorgeous green and gold, of satin-wood, oak, palmetto and rubber forest trees dazed the eye.
All strange and primitive with novel tropical surroundings out of reach the peninsula separating the Indian and San Lucie waters is a rockbound elevated ridge with bluff frontage on San Lucie shores in L. N. 27 degrees 15 min.
It is crowned with tall grown palmettos with tufted tops of palm leaves, naked branchless stems like the mast of a ship.
The water is pure and good…The largest trout I ever saw abound and shoals of mullet.
Sharks and alligators abound in the waters, and turkeys, bear and deer on shore in their season. In the creek opposite Point Manatee the fishermen linger with nets and gun to catch the sea-cow as they feed along the shore….”
The airs and winds are soft and balmy expect the northwest, refreshing, grateful to the lungs with wonderful healing properties and purifying effect exciting to outdoor activity and stimulating to vital forces…The entire atmosphere environment pregnant with healing…
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Interesting. Like poetry but for me “disturbing” as it talked about people hunting manatees. This at least highlights how we have changed historically, as manatee are protected today.
Sewall’s Point, photo by Ed Lippisch, 2011.
I hope you enjoyed that reading….
It was a beautiful world, there for the taking and we have taken it. For better or for worse we have. Let’s remember our history and that no matter what this place, this St Lucie River/Indian River Lagoon is today, it has always been “a place of beauty.”
May we revive her waters and her shores in respect to that which created this sacred place, and for those who have loved and documented her before us. Thank you Rufus King Sewall.
South Florida Developer headline 1931, “Locks in Canal Closed; Fishing to be Benefited. (Newspaper courtesy of historian Sandra Thurlow.)Written minutes from a Martin County Commission meeting in 1931 asking the state to close the locks, mentioning destruction to the river, and the importance to fishing industry. (Photo Martin County archives.)
The St Lucie Canal connecting Lake Okeechobee to the St Lucie River was constructed at the request of the state of Florida, the US Federal Government, and the local Martin County Chamber of Commerce, by the Army Corp of Engineers from 1915-1928. As this antique newspaper article of the Florida Developer above shows, by 1931 the Martin County Commission was already asking the state of Florida to close the gates and reporting clear evidence of the destruction of the St Lucie River/Indian River Lagoon.
I must thank my mother, historian Sandra Thurlow, for sharing this information and the photos in this post. She transcribed the 1931 article from the Florida Developer, a Stuart paper of the era. It reads:
South Florida Developer, November 6,
1931, LOCKS IN CANAL CLOSED; FISHING TO BE BENEFITED
Job of Checking Water Movement Was Completed Saturday TO KILL HYACINTHS; Fishermen Look For Decidedly Good Fishing the Winter
The east locks of the St Lucie Canal were closed Saturday, after being open nearly two years. In that time the level of Lake Okeechobee has been reduced from 18 to 14 feet.
The work of closing the locks began Friday morning under the direction of engineers for the Okeechobee Flood Control District. When they finished the job Saturday night, water continued to pour over the dam about as fast as before, in spite of the fact that the level of the canal had been raised 7 feet.
This morning the crew went to the west end of the St Lucie Canal to close the locks there and thus check the flow of water from the Lake.
The closing of these locks is regarded as highly important to the people of Stuart and adjacent communities, primarily because as long as they remain open, the ingress of water from the Lake made the St. Lucie River fresh, driving out the salt water fish and bringing in hyacinths. With the water cut off from the Lake, it is expected that the St Lucie River will again become salt and this should bring back the fish and kill the hyacinths. Fisherman say it will take about 30 days for the effects of the is change in water to be felt, but they are exultant that this change had come about in time to promote good fishing in local waters.
The minutes from the Martin County Commission meeting in 1931 also shown above are a bit harsher. The minutes state:
Be it resolved that the Board of County Commissioners herby instruct the Clerk to write the Trustee of the Internal Improvement Fund petitioning that they closed the gates at the Lake end of the St Lucie Canal until April 15, 1931, for the reason that the constant discharge of a large volume of dirty fresh water into the St Lucie River has killed all the shell-fish, driven out salt water fish from the river, filled the river with hyacinth and polluted the St Lucie River as to completely take away its attractive features and ruin its commercial value to our community.
According to local Everglades SLR/IRL expert, Dr Gary Goforth, (http://garygoforth.net/resume.htm), 1931 was the first year the amount of water released from Lake Okeechobee in to the St Lucie River was documented. Although there is no documentation of the releases that occurred prior to 1931, in 1931 it is documented that 1,414,414 acre feet of water was released from the lake into the river. This is over three times as much as was released into the SLR from Lake Okeechobee in 2013, (419,951 acre feet.)
The historic photos below document and show local people taking the water hyacinth issue into their own hands.
Downtown Stuart in 1931 showing over abundance of water hyacinth in SLR.(Thurlow collection.)South Fork of the St Lucie River, hyacinth removal, Rod and Gun Club-effort to solve problem with herbicide and dynamite, 1949.( Thurlow collection.)SLR filled with hyacinth, near Treasure Island. (Thurlow collection.)
On August 3rd at 10AM the people of Martin and St Lucie counties, on behalf of their government, will ask one more time for the state to close the gates from Lake Okeechobee to the St Lucie River/Indian River Lagoon.
As we have seen this summer, we have enough problems with our own local runoff that has been expanded since 1931 to include the building of C-23, C-24 and C-25 as well as the widening and deepening of C-44 for its enlarged “local” runoff. Things must change, we have known this for a very long time. Finally there are enough of us to make a difference.
Hope to see you at the rally and may the state and federal government know that we will never stop asking, some would say demanding, that the ACOE, through the federal government and the state of Florida “close the gates!”
An antique post card reads, “A Native of Florida,” ca. 1910. (Thurlow collection.)
I have always liked alligators. I have been around them as long as I can remember in one way or another. When I was a kid and we would go water skiing near North River Shores close to the North Fork of the St Lucie River, we would see small ones leisurely resting in storm pipes coming out of people’s seawalls; in my household everyone was always cheering for them as my grandfather Henderson, my parents, and later myself and brother also graduated from University of Florida. Jenny my sister is a traitor and went to Emory. 🙂
My parents have an awesome collection of alligator postcards that I will share today, and I figured now is a good time to write about gators as their babies should be hatching soon in nests along the fresh and some brackish areas of the St Lucie River/Indian River Lagoon. The females lay their eggs in early June and the little ones hatch out about 65 days later.
“Crocodilla” fossil records show alligators have been on the earth for more than 200 million years. That’s pretty amazing in and of itself. But they have had many hardships.
According to Sandra Thurlow’s history writings on our Treasure Coast, when many of the first pioneers came to Florida and took river tours, they often just shot as many as they could “for fun.” This went for egrets and herons too. Sorry. But what a bunch of idiots. I know, I must be open minded and look at things “historically” within the context of the times….kind of like how people drained the whole state with out thinking…
As far as alligators, more recently, hunting, poaching, the fashion industry, pollution, and loss of habitat pushed the Florida alligator to the brink of extinction by the 1950s. In 1967 the US government listed alligators as an endangered species and gave them protection. In one of the great comebacks of the “endangered,” alligators were increasing in numbers by the 1980s. They still have protections today, but are off the “endangered” list.
Here are some of the antique postcards from my parents’ collection.
Alligator post card collection ca,. 1910-20 (Thurlow collection.)
Recently, a friend called me up and asked if there was someone who could move a small alligator on her property in Palm City. I called trappers recommended to me, and each of them said by law, if the alligator was reported as a “nuisance” and was over four feet, it would be removed and killed, not relocated.
I found this depressing but this is how the state manages the “nuisance gators.” Apparently they may be used for their leather and meat keeping the population in check. Hmmm? The trapper also said, “If you don’t want it killed, just leave it alone, chances are it will move in time to another area.” This makes sense to me.
According to a Stuart News article by Ed Killer in 2010, in the state of Florida, the Florida Wildlife Commission from 1948 to 2009 documented that there were a total of 512 allligator bites; unprovoked: 330; provoked, 182; fatalities, 22. There have been two deaths in our Martin/St Lucie area. In 1978 a 14 year old boy was killed while swimming across Hidden River Canal off Bessey Creek and in 1984 an 11 year old boy was killed while swimming in a canal in St Lucie County. The alligators were 11-12 feet long.
This is terrible and heartbreaking. Like sharks, alligators share our environment are dangerous when large; we must be careful in their presence.
To end on a more positive note, in my reading I learned alligators have been noted using tools, like humans, a trait that belongs only to a few “intelligent” species. Yes. Alligators have been documented purposefully diving under the water putting sticks on their heads so water birds will land on them when looking for sticks to build their nests. Ingenious!
Maybe if we destroy the Indian River Lagoon and St Lucie River completely, along with the rest of the planet, they will return walking on two legs? Perhaps they would manage the waters of South Florida a lot better than humans…
St Lucie Estates, On the Beautiful St Lucie River, Stuart, Florida, 1926 booklet. (St Lucie Estates, Inc.)
In the 1960s, I grew up in St Lucie Estates, Stuart, Florida, the neighborhood just north and south of Kreugar Creek close to the St Lucie River, not too far from Downtown Stuart. Until I was ten, we lived at 109 Edgewood Drive. I loved that little brick house. I had full reign over the neighboring empty lots and could ride my bike on the “black road,” to get to a park, along the river, next to the Granfield’s house. The kids of the neighborhood often met there, and we pretended the gigantic, falling Australian Pine was a ship and we made it into our fort. We traveled across oceans. We fought pirates. It was a wonderful childhood.
As a kid, I had no idea of the long running issues with the St Lucie River/Indian River Lagoon, the canals, and Lake Okeechobee. I just knew I loved the river. I loved that I could escape there. Even when I was in high school, living in Sewall’s Point, I’d steal away and sit under the bridges and “think” in the privacy of the river’s ancient calm.
Today, at half a century, I am still in love with the river, but I view it in a different light. A light of history and destruction. My heart aches because I really don’t know if it can make it against the odds. Now that I am older, I know its complete destruction has been coming for a long time, kind of like a cancer. I am miffed that since 1923, when the ACOE first connected the C-44 to the South Fork of the St Luice, that locals were not able to stop the “drainage machine,” as Ernie Lyons, previous editor of the Stuart News, called it. I am miffed also that the state and federal agencies would so blatantly kill an ecosystem.
When I look through my mother’s historical data and read the ads for selling land in Stuart in the early 1900s, it is ironic that they all incorporate the St Lucie River into their sell while they were killing her.
“Stuart on the St Lucie, 1907;” “St Luice Estates, On the Beautiful St Lucie River, 1926;” “Stuart, Atlantic Gateway to the Gulf of Mexico, ca. 1926.”
The are all bragging about draining the Everglades; they are bragging about the digging of the Okeechobee Waterway from Stuart to Ft Meyers thorough Lake Okeechobee; they are basing the draw of the Stuart area on its location/proximity to the St Lucie River/Indian River Lagoon, and yet they seem to have no clue that by supporting the over draining and over dredging of everything, they have created the rivers’ own destruction!
All news ads and photos from Stuart on the St Lucie, by Sandra Henderson Thurlow, 2001)
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This is an excerpt from the St Lucie Estates sales booklet:
” St Lucie Estates is situated in one of the most gorgeous spots in Florida—the beautiful St Lucie River County…The St Lucie and the Indian River meet here to form one of the most wonderful bodies of water in the world—one hundred miles of navigable waterway, edged with luxurious tropical foliage able white sandy beaches…”
“In the introduction to my mother’s book, Stuart on the St Lucie, she writes” Pioneer businessmen of Stuart…realized the St Lucie River was the town’s greatest asset. To foster awareness they of the town’s superior location, they used “Stuart on the St Lucie” in promotional literature, on signs and as newspaper headings. Time has not changed the fact that the St Lucie River is the best thing about Stuart.”
Promotional signs to “Stuart on the St Lucie” along Dixie Highway from Jacksonville read as shown on list and stated, ca. 1919. (SHT).
The St Lucie is still the best thing about Stuart, and now we know better. The drainage of lands surrounding the St Lucie/IRL was too extensive. In order to make way for agriculture and real estate development. The St Lucie River and Indian River Lagoon now take on more than twice what was originally drained into them.
The excess fresh water and pollutants have all but killed the St Lucie River/Indian River Lagoon. This chart shows the original drainage in green and today’s drainage which has been added to the green area in yellow. Lake Okeechobee’s discharges, in pink, are often on top of this. It is too much.
The old adage says “history repeats itself.” Well, here in “Stuart on the St Lucie,” history cannot repeat itself anymore. We must create a new future.
Drainage changes to the SLR 1900s to today.(Citizen’s Report to Congress, 1995)
Historic postcard, Indian River Citris. (Collection of Sandra Henderson Thurlow.)
Thousands of years ago, humankind found a way to avoid the constant nomadic life of following big game, becoming more self sufficient, learning the art of agriculture. Nothing has made our lives better. Unfortunately, after thousands of years of its evolution, nothing has made our lives worse.
Don’t get me wrong, I realize that agriculture an important industry, the second largest after tourism, in the state of Florida. Still, we must look at its issues and try to make things better.
Agriculture is a high intensity land use, using large amounts of pesticides, fertilizers, and fungicides that over time accumulate in the water and the environment. The May 2014 issue of National Geographic states that “farming is the largest endeavor on earth using just under 40 percent of the earth’s surface causing the second largest impact to the earth, erosion.”
Much of the land in our area is devoted to agriculture as well, particularly citrus.
The Indian River Lagoon region is famous for its delicious citrus and although the industry is in decline due to canker, it has had huge impacts on the IRL area due to the canal system built to drain the land and water the crops. The muck that has entered the lagoon since the early 1900s is mostly from erosion of canals, due to the runoff from agriculture as they drain their lands that were once swamp or wetlands.
The Indian River Lagoon Region runs from Palm Beach to Volusia Counties, along the 156 miles of the lagoon. (USDA map 2011.)
The USDA documented 89,367 acres of citrus in the Indian River Lagoon region in 2009, declining to 81,673 in 2010. There is a lot of land devoted to citrus, land that has been radically altered from its original state and affects the Indian River Lagoon as there are literally thousands of miles of canals attached and interwoven along these groves. All eventually dump to the river or other water body.
In 1994 the Florida Department of Environmental Protection (FDEP) determined that the north fork of the St Lucie River/Indian River Lagoon, a registered state “Aquatic Preserve,” was contaminated by pesticides that came from the citrus groves in the area of the St Lucie’s headwaters, Ten Mile Creek. (http://www.dep.state.fl.us/southeast/ecosum/ecosums/tenmile_creek.pdf)
In 2002, the Florida Department of Environmental Protection labeled the St Lucie River as “impaired.” Reading through the document there is clear determination of agricultures’ role in this process, especially with sediment run off, pesticides and heavy metals that have accumulated in the environment. (http://www.dep.state.fl.us/southeast/ecosum/ecosums/SLE_Impairment_Narrative_ver_3.7.pdf)
All postcards of citrus industry in Florida, ca. 1912. (Collection of Sandra Henderson Thurlow.)
Reading through the documents it is noted that many of the agricultural areas are quite old, as the post cards I am sharing today from my mother’s collection are from 1912 and 1914. According to the FDEP, many of the areas around Ten Mile Creek did not have BMPs, or best management practices in place, as they were there before such rules were voluntarily implemented in the 1980s and 90s.
I don’t get it. Our environmental agencies have seen the writing on the wall for decades and even with the modern implementations of BMPs, (http://solutionsforyourlife.ufl.edu/hot_topics/agriculture/bmps.html) where farmers try to minimize their impacts on our waterbodies, the rivers, estuaries, and lakes are filling up with excess nitrogen and phosphorus from fertilizer and other pollutants at an alarming rate.
Yes, the FDEP is implementing TMDLs or total maximum daily loads through the BMAP, or basin management action plan, where municipalities and counties are required to lower their nutrient levels in waterbodies, but these are 15 and 30 year goals, that most certainly will take longer to truly implement. Also agriculture is exempt under the law and Right to Farm Act. They, as mentioned, implement BMPs but it may take fifty or more years to get all farms up to speed, if ever. Do we have that much time?
In the meanwhile, we watch or rivers dying from local runoff from C-23, C-23, and C-44 supporting the citrus and agriculture industries in Martin and St Lucie Counties. On top of this, during major rain events, Lake Okeechobee, also full of agriculture runoff and high nutrients suspended in muck, from the sometimes back pumping sugar industry south of the lake, pours into the St Lucie River as well, wreaking any work we have done locally to meet local TMDLs.
Would I rather see the citrus lands developed for houses?
No. I rather fix the problems we have. And even though its called “corporate welfare,” I think state, federal, and local governments must help agriculture operate in a way that is not killing the environment. Some of the funds from the state this year that came out of the Senate Hearing on the IRL are doing this and the state really has been helping “forever,” but quietly, under the radar.
It is time to come full out to the public and explain the situation: we must feed ourselves and support our historic industry, but agriculture/citrus is killing our waterways.
In conclusion, of course the industry should make every effort itself to improve the situation, and some are more than others. In any case, we cannot just point fingers at them, we must help them. Perhaps we should bond together and put into law even better, stricter management practices, that will give the children of our state a future, not just eating, but also fishing, swimming and boating in a clean river.
Harold R. Johns, posing with a large tarpon, early 1920s, Stuart, Florida, St Lucie River. (Photo from Stuart on the St Lucie by Sandra Henderson Thurlow.)
When the pioneers permanently opened the St Lucie Inlet in 1892, it killed the freshwater grasses that filled the waterways creating a brackish estuary that due to the convergence of tropical and temperate zones, and the nearby warmth of the Gulf Stream, became “the most diverse estuary in North America.” (Gilmore)
After a short period of time, sportfishing thrived in the area, and fishing guides called Stuart the “fishing grounds of presidents” as US president, Grover Cleveland, vacationed and fished the area in 1900 and years after.
In spite of long standing issues with the health of the estuary, as late as the 1970/80s Dr Grant Gilmore of Harbor Branch documented over 800 species of fish living and breeding in the then healthy seagrasses around Sailfish and Sewall’s Point at the convergence of the St Lucie River and Indian River Lagoon. This was a larger variety of species in one place than any other area in United States. (Gilmore)
“Goliath Grouper” called “Jew Fish” at the time, Stuart. ca. 1920s. (Thurlow Collection)
Going back to the the 1930s, the 1938 Blue Book, a popular annual fishing publication of the time, lauds fishing throughout the entire Stuart area:
“The City of Stuart located approximately 20 miles south of Fort Pierce is world renowned for its fishing. Located as it is…it offers a variety of fishing similar to Fort Pierce but somewhat more pronounced, particularly with regards to the tarpon, sea trout, snook, channel bass, bluefish, crevasse jack, pompano and ladyfish. It’s fresh water fishing is particularly good far into the back county among the Sloughs with their tributary and drainage canals to Lake Okeechobee and the many drainage canals through this territory. These Sloughs and Canals offer splendid fishing for black bass, as well as for the larger game fish from the salt water, such as th snook and tarpon, that make their way into Stuart Harbor and on up into the both and south branches of the St Lucie River. –Particularly good fishing for these species can be had at the St Lucie Locks about 12 miles inland south of Stuart…”
All photos from Stuart on the St Lucie, Sportfishing chapter, by Sandra Henderson Thurlow.
It is interesting to note that although the Blue Book piece, written in 1938, celebrates Stuart’s fishing, one can find evidence of tension regarding the releases from Lake Okeechobee in the literature of the day as early as 1925.
Fearing the onslaught of development in the booming twenties and the changes brought on by the connection and building of the C-44 canal from Lake Okeechobee to the South Fork of the St Lucie River, beginning in 1923, the South Florida Developer’s, November 10th, 1925 headline reads:
Article 1925, South Florida Developer. (Thurlow collection.)
“Fish Will Leave the River As City Grows, Fisherman Assert, Sewage and Oil Sure Death to a Favored Sport is Verdict.”
The article quotes commercial fishermen who know that the over abundance of fresh water from Lake Okeechobee will chase away the salt water fish and that the oil on the water from development, perhaps from cars and road runoff, if excessive, won’t allow the fish to sufficiently breathe.
Fishing guide Phil O’Brian is quoted as saying: “I know the ways of the sea fish. They can’t stand fresh water; and they won’t stand sewer water. We have the fresh water now mixin’ in from Lake Okeechobee and we’ll soon have the sewer water.”
These pioneers are probably rolling over in their graves should they have learned about the story of the St Lucie/Indian River Lagoon most recently.
The St Lucie River was labeled “impaired” by the Florida Department of Environmental Protection in 2002 mostly due to pesticides and heavy metals from agriculture and urban pollution runoff accumulating in the sediment from all area canals, especially C-44 and Lake Okeechobee. In a way, just like the 1920s fisherman foresaw…
The fight against the area canals and Lake Okeechobee continues today, and if by the grace of God we can undo some of the hands of history, the St Lucie and Indian River Lagoon will surely heal herself and we once again could be the ” Fishing Grounds of Presidents…”
…but then we might have to get rid of that green and sprawling golf course at the Floridian.
The South Fork of the St Lucie River prior to the construction of the C-44 canal and nearby orange grove. Today, this area is Four Rivers subdivision in Palm City. (Photo ca. 1920, courtesy archives of Sandra Henderson Thurlow.)
For many years, I was searching for old photos and maps showing what the river looked like before it was intersected by the C-44 canal, at the south fork of the St Lucie River, in Martin County around 1923. The canal was widened and deepened many times thereafter, but according to documents, the construction began around that time.
I felt like a sign should be erected noting the spot were we changed the St Lucie River/Indian River Lagoon forever….I still have not done this, even after the spot was discovered.
Time went on, and one day my mother, historian, Sandy Thurlow, looking through her old aerial photos said, “Jacqui, I think I found it! That spot you are looking for.”
C-44 construction linking canal to south fork of St Lucie River, early 1920s. (Photos from archives of Sandra Henderson Thurlow.)
These are the aerial photos she sent me. I wanted to share. I will not write much today, as a picture speaks a thousand words….
“Jensen, Florida, After the Fire, May 3, 1908.” (Photo page 145, Historic Jensen and Eden on Florida’s Indian River, by Sandra Henderson Thurlow.)
The front page of today’s Stuart News, reads: “40 Acres Burn in the Savannas.” The wind shifted causing a prescribed burn to jump control lines. Unfortunate. There have been other fires in the history of our area too, like the great fire of Jensen in 1908.
“Jensen in Ruins,” Florida Photographic Concern, courtesy Sandra H. Thurlow.)
Here is an anonymous account of the 1908 fire in my mother’s book. The account was published in the Jensen Beach Mirror in 1962.
“The town of Jensen is burning down this morning. The fire rages up and down Commercial Street, from the river to the railroad tracks and beyond. It seems certain that each of the seventeen stores…will be consumed. Jensen has no fire department. Men are trying to stem the holocaust with buckets of water and what little power can be built with hand pumps and windmills…”
The fire’s location at C.H. Munch & Co. was determined but the reason for the fire never was… Jensen business was slow to rebuild after the 1908 fire and two years later another fire brought down the iconic Al Fresco Hotel that was located closer to the river just off of Main Street.
Historic post card of the Al Fresco Hotel, Jensen, late 1800s. (Courtesy of Sandra H. Thurlow.)
Many fires in Florida and in Martin/StLucie Counties are made by Mother Nature and not humankind. Fire is actually a heathy and needed part of our area’s pine, scrub, hammock, and swamp system. Fire naturally rejuvenates the land and habitat of the native animals and birds. Many native trees and animals have evolved over thousands of years to live in harmony with this fire system. Gopher turtle holes can be very long and deep, providing protection during fires to many species. Palmettos, sabal palms, and pines trees are “fire resistant.” Fire is nature’s way to bring nutrients (fertilizer) to the plants in a way that does not hurt the river as ash holds in the soil, and shortly after fires, a very obvious “rebirth” occurs.
This Florida Forest Service chart shows how frequently fires would occur if mankind was not suppressing them.
Chart by Forest Service showing frequency of wildfire in Florida if there were no human intervention.
Prescribed burns are an attempt to help nature, not hurt it. Unfortunately, when playing with fire, things can get out of control quickly. At least we did not have a fire like the Great Jensen Fire of 1908. ___________________________________________________________________
Antique post card of Indian River Drive. (Courtesy of Sandra Henderson Thurlow, ca 1940s.)Writing on back of post card sent to Jensen Beach from Germany as a V.E. Day souvenir.Indian River Drive today. (Photo Jacqui Thurlow-Lippisch, 2014.)
For six years I have driven north to Ft Pierce from the Town of Sewall’s Point, along Indian River Drive, to attend my meeting as a representative for the Treasure Coast Council of Local Governments.
I love this time. I love this road. It is a meditation, a prayer for me.
I know lots of stories that I heard throughout my childhood and they all seem to come alive as I drive through the cathedral of sabal palms, old plantations, and ancient live oaks; my car creeps up the rising ridge rolling at the 25 mile an hour speed limit; I gaze over the lagoon itself, sometimes quiet, sometimes moody, but always beautiful. Ospreys keep their high perch or fly in circles over my head, egrets and herons stand along the shallow shoreline; I pass ancient Indian mounds, and when I wave, the the warriors hold up their right arms in strength and friendship; I see old pioneers like Captain Richards, and Bahamian workers sweating buckets, as they labor to grow pineapples in the heat of the 1800s; I see their graveyards …Every once in a while, I have to stop day dreaming and let a family of sandhill cranes cross the road. Sometimes I think I see a pirate out of the corner of my eye…
The road is an old one, first an Indian trail on the pushed up Atlantic Ridge along the west side of the lagoon; later to become a river road for Florida’s early pioneers as they traveled along its “river highway,” trading supplies and establishing post offices. After being a military/wagon trail it evolved with the modernization of the post World War II era, and the event of the automobile, into a “modern drive,” and its large parcels were sold off and eventually the “Indian River Freeholder Association” formed in St Lucie County, for its protection and order. (http://rickinbham.tripod.com/TownOfSIRD/SIRD_History_2.html)
Indian River Drive covers more than our shores going more or less the entire 156 mile length of the Indian River Lagoon from Stuart to St Augustine covering five counties; thankfully it has been designated as a “Scenic Highway” in many areas. (http://www.floridascenichighways.com/indian-river-lagoon-national-scenic-byway/)
It is my favorite drive along our Treasure Coast.
If you have not driven it lately, on a beautiful morning please take a ride, and if your imagination gets the best of you, don’t be afraid to wave!
This aerial photograph is from Sandra Henderson Thurlow’s book, “Sewall’s Point, the History of a Peninsular Community on Florida’s Treasure Coast.” The photo was taken by Dillon-Reynolds Aerial Photography in 1968, ten years after the “bridges to the sea” were built to aid in transportation and development of the area.
Imagine yourself a developer in Florida’s early days along the St Lucie River/Indian River Lagoon. Land is cheap, people are coming, you can dredge and fill, you can create a marina, or bulkhead spoil islands filling and building on top of them, you can cut canals into the land creating more waterfront, and while you are smoking your cigar, you see the peninsula of Sewall’s Point. “Location! Magnificent! A perfect place for a series of hotels right at the tip of the lush pennisula surrounded by water…this would be, simply marvelous!” “Chi-$-Ching!”
Believe it or not, in 1957-1970 that scenario was very much the fate of the Sewall’s Point and the two islands off its tip. The 1957 zoning map, the year the town was incorporated, designated High Point, and the two islands at the southern tip of the peninsula as a “Business-2 Zoning District.” This zoning designation permitted “hotels with not less than 25 rooms, clubs, multiple apartments, and municipal buildings.” (Historic legal documents referenced in Sewall’ s Point, Sandra Henderson Thurlow).
Sewall’s Point zoning map 1957 shows the tip of High Point and two islands zoned for “business.” (Map, Sewall’s Point, Sandra Henderson Thurlow)
So why did not this developer’s dream come true?
“In 1970, a proposal to build multi-family dwellings on Sewall’s Point fell through when the members of the High Point Homeowners Association, working through the town government, defeated the the plan of Bessemer Properties.” (Thurlow) This was a feat, in that Bessemer was controlled by the Phipps family with wealth from steel manufacturing; they were very powerful.
In 1970, after the confrontation, the town’s zoning map was changed to permit only R-1 residential zoning.
So, if you ever feel discouraged about the state of the Indian River Lagoon or other things, think of the story of Sewall’s Point, and remember, a small group of determined people can certainly change their world!
Aerial of Sewall’ Point, 1960 by Dillon-Reynolds Photography, showing new roads in Bessemer’s High Point sub-division.
An ad for the town of “Port St Lucie,” by Sewall’s Point Land Company that ran around 1913. It reads: ” Sewall’s Point Land Company is developing the new town of PORT ST LUCIE in the northeasterly corner of Palm Beach County at the junction of the St Lucie and Indian rivers, directly opposite the St Lucie Inlet.” At the time, this area was Palm Beach County, today it is Martin. (Ad courtesy of Tom Thurlow)
I have often wondered why Port St Lucie is inland. Where’s the port? Well apparently the name “Port St Lucie,” had been around before the City of Port St Lucie was incorporated in 1961, as originally Port St Lucie was going to be a town that would have been in today’s Martin, not St Lucie County.
The above ad ran around 1913 and was part of Henry Sewall and Hugh Willoughby’s Sewall’s Point Company’s original development campaign to develop Port Sewall and Golden Gate as the “Great Port of Stuart.” At the time, this area was Palm Beach County but became Martin County in 1925.
Under the ad’s photo it reads: “Looking across one of the Lakes toward the St Luice River and the Inlet.” I imagine the lake was either North or West Lake, still located in today’s Willoughby Creek area. The ad also states that the location of Port St Lucie will be “directly opposite the St Lucie Inlet.” Viewing a copy of the 1911 Port Sewall promotional map below, one can see exactly where that is located, Old St Lucie Boulevard, Stuart.
The advertisement in the long winded style of the day continues:
“The lands west of the railway is laid out in tracts for FARMS and GARDENS. East of the railway are the business lots and large residence lot for the PORT OF ST LUCIE and the WATERFRONT is divied into lots of about two acres each for FINE RESIDENCES and WINTER HOMES. Ten acres are reserved for a PARK and five acres for a large TOURIST HOTEL on the water front. Situated at the junction of the St Lucie and Indian Rivers and St Lucie Inlet with a climate tempered by the soft breezes from the GULF STREAM and every month in the year a GROWING MONTH and FRUITS, FISH, FLOWERS and VEGETABLES in abundance….TENNIS, FISHING, MOTOR BOAT, SAILING RACES, CRUISING INLAND WATERS.
The kicker phrase: PROFIT AND PLEASURE combined in an IDEAL LOCATION…
Well, the land bust and the Great Depression came to Florida in the mid 1920s so the “Town of Port St Lucie” and its great port were never built, but let’s fast forward to 1961 a bit north in St Lucie County, and the “City of Port St Lucie” surely did!
Believe it or not, today Port St Lucie is the 9th largest city in the state of Florida. With their high population they are a bigger political player than Martin County and I am thankful for their commission’s support of strict fertilizer ordinances and pro river issues in this year’s legislative session. Port St Lucie is a key player today and in the the future for the St Lucie River/Indian River Lagoon. The county has also been very supportive!
Back to our history lesson…
Before the 1950s, Port St Lucie was mostly ranch and fishing camp lands as this photo from Bud Adams for the publication Port St Lucie at 50, A City for All People, by Nina Baranski shows.
The story goes that in the 1950s the wilderness favored by hunters and anglers was discovered by Mike Cowles whose company published Look Magazine and also had ties to the Ft PierceTribune. Cowles was “taken by the beauty of the St Lucie River and the land along its banks” buying eighty-five hundred acres south of Ft Pierce. In 1953 through his “St Lucie River Land Company,” he filed the River Park plat, and began to develop and promote it. (Port St Lucie at 50, A City for AllPeople, Chapter 2.)
Cowles eventually traded his land holdings for stock in, newcomer to the game, General Development Corporation, (GDC), becoming chairman in 1959. After acquiring more ranch tracks, GDC made plans to incorporate into a city and with “hardly any residents” did so with full support of the legislature in 1961. And as we know, the rest is history…..
It’s interesting to note that the history of Martin and St Lucie Counties has always been intertwined, and that whether 1913, 1961, or today, it is the beauty and attraction of the St Lucie River/Indian River Lagoon that on a core level connects us all. Our future long-term job, together, is to save it.
This photo is not great quality but allows one to see how undeveloped St Lucie County was…This photo is courtesy of Sandra Henderson Thurlow, and is on the inside cover of “Port St Lucie at 50.” It is a rare aerial of the southern portion of St Lucie County taken in 1957 before its incorporation and development.
The book Port St Lucie 50 Years, A City for All People, by Nina Baranski, can be purchased at the Historical Society of St Lucie County (http://www.stluciehistoricalsociety.org)
An artist’s drawing of Harry Lyon’s mound, overlooking the St Lucie River and Indian River Lagoon, near today’s St Lucie Crescent at Bessey Point, Stuart, Florida, 1941. Artist, Charles Morgan, father of Mrs Arthur Dehon. (Drawing Courtesy of Rick Crary.)
Personalities taller than mountains are part of the history of our Indian River Lagoon Region and their spirits are still with us today. Let me explain…
In the early 1920s Harry Lyons, ( Ernie Lyons’ father) was a dreamer and promoter of Stuart. If you are a regular reader of my blog, you may recall his promotional song for the Great Port of Stuart. Harry had many ideas to promote Stuart and another occurred around 1941 when the drawing of the Stuart Mound above was composed.
My mother, historian, Sandra Thurlow, transcribed the following from Mr Harry Lyon’s memoirs regarding the building of his gigantic mound at Bessey Point near today’s road, St Lucie Crescent, that was to overlook the St Lucie River:
“The proper material is at hand in abundance, and the bulk of it could be delivered by barge (dredged from the river). Most states, including Florida, have numerous ancient earth mounds, some very large indeed, so nothing could be more ‘American.’ The mound would be a must for tourist and home-folk alike who would ascend and spend hours at the summit, paying .50 cents or $1.00 charge….” to the City of Stuart no less…
Well fortunately, or unfortunately, Mr Lyon’s name is still around but his mound “never got off the ground,” although in 1960 his northern neighbor, Waldo Sexton’s did.
Sexton, the legendary eccentric salvager/builder of Vero Beach, is well known for his creations and influences including the Driftwood Inn, McKee Jungle Garden, the Patio Restaurant, and many other creations which have shaped the ambiance of Vero Beach.
His finale was “Waldo Sexton’s Mountain,” that he created from dredge fill at Bethel Creek, adjacent to the Indian River Lagoon. It was touted as a tourist attraction but for Sexton, the impressive mound was to also be his burial ground. This drawing by Mittnach displays what it looked like.
In time, the mountain thrived but eventually fell into disrepair and was pillaged for its beautiful tiles. As mentioned, Patriarch Sexton, used to getting what he wanted, had the dream of being buried under the mound, but this dream did not come true.
Sr. Sexton passed in a nursing home and later, Ralph, his son, during a severe northeastern storm in 1972, in distress, decided to use the mound’s fill to reinforce the foundation of his father’s beloved Driftwood Inn, located across the street.
According to an article written by Denis McCarthy years ago, after destroying the mountain, “terrible things ensued.” Eventually Ralph along with The Driftwood Inn, so beautifully located between the Indian River Lagoon and the Atlantic Ocean, became a “distressed” property.
Then a series of odd tragedies occurred leading people to believe that Waldo’s ghost had truly cursed the great mound for those who were going to misuse it.
First, a developer trying to purchase the “denuded” mountain property had a heart attack; the next wealthy businessman “buyer” was killed in a plane crash on his way home after visiting and deciding to buy the property; later, one who did buy, fell ill, got divorced and went broke. Eventually a Mrs Heusen purchased The Driftwood Inn as the mound property sat empty and weedy. But Heusen took a different approach and decided to work “with” the ghost of Waldo Sexton keeping his signature style for all to see.
Waldo seemed pleased. Mrs Heusen publicly claimed she saw his ghost and that he often opened the door for her in the restored restaurant….
“I know this sounds weird, she said in McCarthy’s interview, but these things are real…”
Another thing to note is that according to McCarty’s article, Sexton was a “guru of environmentalism” in that he, like Frank Lloyd Wright, built with nature instead of against it. McCarty thought that perhaps Sexton’s ghost was telling us “enough is enough.” –No shopping centers on my mound. “Stop, before it’s too late!”
In conclusion, McCarthy says Sexton’s message most simply stated was: “Follow my example, and build in harmony with nature, not opposed to it…”
So if you believe in ghosts or spirits, you may want to take heed. 🙂
Portion of 1911 Sewall’s Point Land Company map showing area off of Sewall’s Point and Stuart where the great “Port of Stuart” was being developed.
The headlines of the South Florida Developer on December 29th, 1925 bragged about a Stuart along the St Lucie/Indian River Lagoon very different than the one we know today:
“Port of Stuart, Florida’s New Gateway. “
“The Opening of the St Lucie Inlet to the commerce of the world will bring to Stuart and all Martin County that belated recognition to which it is rightfully entitled by virtue of its strategic geographic location.”
“W.B. Shearer, recognized international authority on ports and waterways, makes the positive statement that of all the East Coast’s four hundred miles of waterfront, the harbor at Stuart is the the only port with natural advantages suitable for a naval base…”
“St Lucie Ship Canal Locks- the first link in the chain of waterways that will eventually form a navigable canal from the Atlantic to the Gulf of Mexico is the “St Lucie Ship Canal” now 95% complete. It’s completion will open up the fertile western portion of Marin County…”
As these headlines show, the “Port of Stuart” was not just a dream, in the early 1920s, it was a becoming reality. Details of the port still exists in dusty federal, state and local documents. If it were not for the Great Depression of the late 1920s and the difficulty for the ACOE in dynamiting the Anastasia rock from the bottom of the St Lucie Inlet, it could have been a reality.
So how could this be? Today an idea like this would be heresy!
Well, Captain Henry Sewall, for which the peninsula of Sewall’s Point is named, was one of many responsible for this “heresy.” Not only had he led locals to open the St Lucie Inlet by hand in 1892, he had served as county commissioner, and state representative.
In 1910 Captain Sewall and his powerful business friends, including adventurer Hugh Willoughby, founded “Sewall’s Point Land Company,” as Captain Sewall had inherited the tip of Sewall’s Point and large portions of waterfront and other lands along Stuart through his family linage to the famous Miles-Hanson Grant.
According to Sandra Thurlow’s book: “Sewall’s Point, the History of a Peninsula on Florida’s Treasure Coast,” after the formation of Sewall’s Point Land Company, the men got right to work building the Sunrise Inn on Old St Lucie Boulvard, and miles of roads in today’s Golden Gate; (see map above), government, bonds were held by the county and a turning basin at the tip of Sewall’s Point was dredged; this fill created today’s Sandsprit Park.”
A turning basin at Sewall’s Point? You’ve got to be kidding.
They were not.
Even poetry was written for the dream, ironically by beloved environmentalist, Ernie Lyon’s father:
Just One Place for the Harbor by Harry Lyons 1924
“Brave sailors in Atlantic storms, A harbor need for aid. They skirt the coast of Florida, Lest commerce be delayed. When hurricanes sweep o’er the deep, And ships grave perils face, ‘Tis the duty of all mariners, To seek an anchorage place. You’ll find the place for a harbor here, Where the old St. Lucie flows. There is room for ships at Sewall’s Point, Where the Indian River goes. No where else is there such an inlet, Down below or up above. There is just one place for the harbor! Stuart the town we love! From Stuart to Fort Myers at last, We’ll have a waterway, When the canal is finished, And they’re hastening the day. Across Lake Okeechobee, From the Gulf of Mexico, Oil and phosphate, fruit and lumber, Into Stuart soon will go.”
Sewall died in 1925 and the bottom fell out of the real estate market around 1926. Around the same time, two devastating hurricanes put the nail in coffin of the Stuart Port at the St Lucie River and Indian River Lagoon.
It is interesting to note that the St Lucie Canal, C-44, between Lake Okeechobee and the St Lucie River was completed not only for transportation and trade, but for flood control of agriculture and people working south of the lake. The prosperity associated with the canal for the local people of Stuart never came and the canal ended up being a major factor in the destruction of their beloved waterways…
Well time goes on, new dreams come and go; new fortunes are made and lost. But for old times’ sake, one can stand at Sandsprit Park, and look out to Sewall’s Point remembering perhaps Stuart’s biggest dream, the lost dream, and for many, a dream well lost, the dream of the “Great Port of Stuart.”
*Thank you to my mother, Sandra Henderson Thurlow, for sharing her historic articles to make this write up possible.
Stained glass windows from St Paul’s Episcopal Church of Eden, later St Paul’s Church of Walton, now at St Mary’s Episcopal Church of Stuart. (Photo JTL)
According to my mother’s book, Historic Eden and Jensen on Florida’s Indian River, there were a number of pioneer churches along the Indian River Lagoon.
One that strikes a special cord for me is St Paul’s that was built in 1898 but destroyed in the hurricane of 1949 as pictured below. (Photo courtesy archives of Sandra Henderson Thurlow.)
Thankfully the stained glass windows were saved, and today they are the backdrop for the altar at St Mary’s Episcopal Church in Stuart that was built in 1949, the year of the storm.
According to My mother’s Jensen/Eden book,”there were no churches for the earliest settlers of Jensen and Eden to attend,” but it was the African American community of Tick Ridge, along Savannah Road, that built the first in 1890. This church eventually took on the name “St Peter’s African Methodist Episcopal Chapel,” and is located between the Savannas and the Indian River Lagoon. A newer church, a CME, or Christian Methodist Episcopal Church, stands on the same location today.
A second church rose in 1899, also in Tick Ridge; it was baptist in denomination.
In 1898 the beautiful All Saint’s Episcopal Church and Cemetery (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/All_Saints_Episcopal_Church,_Waveland_(Jensen_Beach,_Florida) was built, still stands today, and is the oldest longstanding church in the area according to its Wikipedia write up; this is the church that can be seen on the west hill just north of Rio when traveling on Indian River Drive.
In 1903 the Eden Union Congregational Church was built and is still standing in old downtown Jensen; it the one with the really cool concrete blocks and once was painted bright yellow; and finally, the Community Church of Jensen was organized in 1938, eventually moving to its stunning and “heavenly” location on one of the highest sites in the county, Skyline Drive, Jensen Beach.
In the hard times of Eden/Jensen pioneers, people set priorities and organized to worship. In one form or another, most of these churches are still standing today. What an accomplishment to the spirit of the men and women who built and loved our area and have passed on.
I believe with out a doubt, they’re all still praying, and and thank God they are, because we all know, the Indian River Lagoon needs nothing short of a miracle!
