A new renovation is restoring prominence to one of Key West's oldest public spaces.

On January 21, 1880, Ulysses S. Grant became the first U.S. President to visit Key West.

A New York Times reporter wrote a vivid description of the Key West in 1873.

In November 1831, a ship carrying 230 Irish laborers to New Orleans ran aground. The passengers rose up and caused havoc in Key West.

In 1880, Key West was briefly at the center of an alleged election fraud scandal in the Presidential election.

In 1964, a hurricane led the Beatles to make an impromptu stop in Key West.

The first locomotive to reach Key West was actually in 1853 - after it was salvaged from a shipwreck.

Passengers on a ship struck with cholera in 1852 were refused refuge in Key West and instead banished to desolate Sand Key.

Before key lime pie was Key West's signature dessert, Miss Etta Patterson's coconut cake was a favorite, served to Presidents.

An 1860 letter in the FKHC collection is a firsthand account of the conditions of survivors from a captured slave ship.

The 1733 wreck of a Spanish treasure fleet off the Keys led to some of the first English-language newspaper reporting about the islands.

The Cuban poet and artist Juana Borrero died in Key West at age 18 - but left a lasting legacy.

In 1938, work began on a cable-tending schooner - the last substantial tall ship to be built in Key West.

Emancipation played out differently in Key West than it did in other parts of Florida - or the country.

In 1927, a car dealer and a race car driver made the first trip from the mainland to Key West by automobile - partly on train tracks.

In 188, Dr. Lemuel Walter Livingston became principal of Key West's Douglass School - and the island's first Black physician.

A 1972 Key West Citizen story reports on the performance of a 'young Nashville folk gypsy' who had recently arrived on the island

Caribbean monk seals were part of the Keys eco-system for thousands of years - but were driven to extinction about 100 years ago.

Dr. John Loomis Blodgett came to the Keys as a physician - but left his mark by collecting plants that are still in many herbaria.

The diary of a young business clerk visiting Key West in 1843 offers never-before-seen details about life in the Lower Keys at that time.