1815 – Juan Pablo Salas, a Spanish Royal Artillery Officer station in St. Augustine, was given a land grant for the island of Cayo Hueso by the Spanish Governor of Florida Don Juan de Estrada.
1916 – W.D. Cash spoke to the Key West Rotary Club, and shared “interesting, as well as amusing” reminiscences of time Union forces held him as a prisoner in Fort Taylor for his Confederate sympathies.
1923 – 1.05 inches of rain fell in 22 minutes, flooding streets and sidewalks.
1924 – A recent newspaper article spurred Monroe County residents to question why the School Board had not built a school at Flamingo on the mainland. The people of that community paid taxes, but their children had no educational facilities.
1934 – Julius Stone, Florida administrator for the Federal Emergency Relief Administration, presented five signed copies of his book “Compulsory spending: a means to permanent prosperity through forced circulation of money” to the citizens of Key West.
1943 – The Rotary Club Beach Development Committee was working toward the establishment of a permanent public beach along the south shore of Key West.
1951 – The Walter Mickens Post No. 6021, V.F.W. and William Weech Post No. 168, American Legion, broke ground on a new Post Home at 803 Emma Street.
1967 – Key West won the Florida Little Major League State baseball title in a 6 to 1 victory over Pensacola.
1983 – County Commissioner Alison Fahrer’s one-vote election victory on November 2, 1982, challenged by losing contender Henry L. Rosenthal Jr. was upheld by Chief Circuit Judge M. Ignatius Lester.
1984 – Bill Butler, founder and “King” of the Key West Junkanoos, island entertainers since the 1950s, died at age 71.
1988 – Florence Maloney Spottswood died at age 96. She was the widow of Col. Robert Spottswood and mother of the late John Spottswood, who had served as Monroe County Sheriff and State Senator for many years.
1994 – Developer John V. Howard donated 137 acres to the Key Deer National Wildlife Refuge on Big Pine Key. “I don’t need it, and I have enough money to last me forever. I though it would be nice to do something altruistic,” he said.
2007 – The Village of Islamorada began construction of Woods Corner, the municipality’s first affordable housing project. The new development, across from Coral Shores High School, was being built in cooperation with the Middle Keys Community Land Trust.
Information compiled by Tom Hambright, Historian Emeritus, and Dr. Corey Malcom, Lead Historian, Monroe County Public Library, Florida Keys History Center.
Image: Key West Junkanoos, Dudley Lynch, Kenneth Rahmey, Lee Joe Whyms, Leonard Allen, Bill Butler, Charles Allen and Alven Scott. Wright Langley Collection. Monroe County Public Library, Florida Keys History Center.
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