KEYS HISTORY: AFRICAN BAHAMIAN PRIVATEER & GROCER THOMAS ROMER LIVED TO BE 108
In a letter written dated March 3, 1935, poet Robert Frost wrote: “The oldest person I could find in the Key West grave yard...
BLACK HISTORY MONTH: ANDREW ‘SANDY’ CORNISH’S JOURNEY TO FREEDOM WASN’T EASY
The Florida Keys are a storied string of islands with tremendous history. Some of those stories are told repeatedly, like when Henry Flagler brought...
STATE ESSAY CONTEST FEATURES AFRICAN-AMERICAN CONTRIBUTION TO FLORIDA’S HISTORY
First Lady Casey DeSantis announced the theme for this year’s Black History Month contests will be Celebrating African-American Contributions to Florida’s History.
“Black History Month...
KEYS HISTORY: SALVAGE ACT OF 1823 BRINGS ORDER TO LAWLESS INDUSTRY SEEN IN THE...
I started a Facebook page the day before Christmas Eve and decided to call it Florida Keys History with Brad Bertelli. Fifteen years of...
KEYS HISTORY: 2 LARGE KEYS PROPERTY SALES OF 1946
I recently spent some quality time in a third-floor room at the public records office on Whitehead Street. The repository holds the documentation of...
KEYS HISTORY: APIARY BUSINESS BUZZES IN KEY LARGO
Key Largo’s Stellrecht Point, found on the bayside in the area of MM 105, is named for a German immigrant named Otto Stellrecht. Stellrecht...
KEYS HISTORY: LIEUTENANT DECLARES U.S. POSSESSION OF KEY WEST SOME 200 YEARS AGO
When East Florida and West Florida were still Spanish territories, they were wild, sparsely-populated frontiers.
The Spanish had established two ports. On the Atlantic coast,...
AN A & B STORY: FAMILY LEAVES MARK ON THE ISLAND CHAIN
This column appears weekly because the Florida Keys have more to offer than great fishing and diving, fantastic weather, spectacular sunsets and world-famous drinking...
KEYS HISTORY: CONTROVERSIAL CHECKPOINT BY FEDS LEADS TO CONCH REPUBLIC FORMATION
All hail the Conch Republic, a shelltastic micronation culled from the drastic need for some serious media spin.
It was 1982, and the war on...
KEYS HISTORY: NOVELIST DETAILS BLACK CAESAR SECRETS
A story republished in “The Jackson Standard” on April 22, 1858 is one of the oldest on record that addresses a pirate named Black...
