Debunking the Orange Blossom Myth Part III

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By Seth H. Bramson

As was noted in our previous column, the orange blossom myth is and always has been a fable and a fairy tale, a story told by those seeking to attract new travelers, farmers and residents to the shores of Biscayne Bay. While it always had a certain allure, it was easy to dissect it and prove its unlikelihood if not its complete lack of veracity. Think about it! Would the greatest single person in Florida’s history simply extend his railroad sixty-five miles because a woman who was the daughter of old family friends sent him some orange blossoms? Not even a chance!

We have noted the terrible winter weather of December of 1894 and January and February of 1895 and how Julia Tuttle quickly advised Mr. Flagler that “the region around the shores of Biscayne Bay is untouched by the freezes” and implored him to come and see for himself. He did not, but, in his place, sent his two trusted and now-famous-in-Florida-history lieutenants James E. Ingraham and Joseph R. Parrott, who reported back to him that the conditions around the mouth of the Miami River were as Mrs. Tuttle had reported them to be and that the area was untouched by the icy blasts that had so devastated the rest of the state.

They brought boxes of truck (produce) and citrus back to Mr. Flagler, upon which, as noted previously, he wired Mrs. Tuttle the following words: “Madam: What is it that you propose?” And it was that telegram that set the stage for what was to follow. And what was to follow was the creation of a city.

In response to Mr. Flagler’s telegram, and in consultation with Mary and William Brickell, who had, several years earlier offered Mr. Flagler half of their holdings south of the river, Julia wrote back to Mr. Flagler. “My dear sir,” she began, and continued with “If you will extend your railroad to the shores of Biscayne Bay, and build one of your magnificent hotels, then in addition to the land south of the river already promised you by Mr. and Mrs. Brickell, I will give you one-half of my holdings, in alternate sections (a section is 640 acres) plus fifty acres for shops and yards north of the river.

Mr. Flagler readily agreed and a contract was signed by Flagler, Tuttle, and Brickell, with Messrs. Ingraham and Parrott as witnesses. Once the document was notarized and recorded, Mr. Flagler wasted no time, assigning Mr. Parrott, his railroad vice president, the not inconsiderable task of planning and completing the railroad to the above noted river. At the same time his contractors, McGuire and McDonald, were instructed to proceed with plans for a great hotel on the banks of that river, that project put under the direction of John Sewell, who, with his brother, Everest, later mayor of Miami, would open one of Miami’s first stores. (Although they claimed it to be the first, it is possible that Isidor Cohen, the first permanent Jewish settler to arrive on the shores of Biscayne Bay—that on February 6, 1896—opened his dry goods store prior to the Sewell Brothers doing the same thing.)

Construction of both the railroad extension from West Palm Beach and the new hotel began in the first half of ’95 and the railroad, renamed Florida East Coast Railway on September 7, 1895, pushed steadily south, construction hammers, spike mauls, the grunts of gandy dancers (the track layers) and the yells of construction bosses echoing through the South Florida piney woods. On April 15, 1896, less than a year after construction began, the first train, a construction and engineering supply train, arrived. What would, in three more months, become Miami, was connected to the world by railroad!

With the completion of track and the building of a very temporary station (lasting only about three months) at the corner of today’s Flagler Street (then 12th Street), and Avenue E (today’s Northwest First Avenue) the first passenger train, carrying Flagler, Ingraham and Parrott, slowly wended its way into the station. And how do we know that they were aboard? Because Isidor Cohen, Miami’s first permanent Jewish settler, was there to greet them, shaking their hands in congratulations and noting in his self-published 1925 book, “Memoir and History of Miami, Florida” that “they were a strange bunch.”

Three months following the arrival of the first passenger train, the new station opened at Sixth Street (now Northeast Sixth Street, the only street to keep its number when Miami’s streets were renamed and renumbered under the Chaille plan of 1921, when Miami’s NE—NW—SE—SW quadrant system was created) and the Boulevard (today’s Biscayne Boulevard). Until the new station was built at Avenue E and 11th Street (today, 200 NW First Avenue) as part of the Key West Extension construction project and opened in 1912, the Sixth Street Station served as the FEC’s passenger depot in Miami.

On May 15, 1896, the first edition of Miami’s first newspaper, The Miami Metropolis, was published (only three copies are known to exist, two at HistoryMiami reputedly in poor condition) and one (in fair condition) at The Bramson Archive in Miami Shores, one of the gems of that collection. Then, on July 28, 1896, without ever having been a village or a town or an incorporated area of any kind, Miami sprang into existence as a city and of that, and the Royal Palm Hotel, more next time.

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