1825 – The U.S. schooner Shark arrived at Key West with Captain Lewis Warrington, who was relieving Commodore David Porter as commander of the Navy’s West India Squadron.
1829 – The U.S. sloop of war Erie sailed from Key West in search of pirates who had captured the brig Attentive and had earlier murdered the crew of the brig New Priscilla as it sailed from Charleston to Havana.
1917 – The first long-distance telephone connection from Key West to Miami was made at 1:47 p.m. Later in the day the connection was extended to Savannah.
1934 – Under the supervision of Mollie Parker, island beautification chair, forces of the Civil Works Administration finished planting 1,000 coconut trees brought to Key West from Lignum Vitae Key. The trees were planted along Flagler Avenue, from White Street to the head of the island.
1946 – Key West road crews were levelling United Street east of White, along with many other marl streets in the area. These unpaved streets had had deep potholes in them for years.
1967 – The local plumbers union urged the Key West City Commission to ban the use of plastic pipe within the city. Commissioners had recently adopted the Southern Plumbing Code, which allowed the new material.
1970 – Congressman Dante Fascell was the speaker at the dedication of the new Islamorada Post Office.
1974 – The Lower Keys Development Corporation was organized, with the purpose of encouraging improvements in the area. Topics to be addressed by the group were a ferry between Key West and Miami, the 1976 Bicentennial Celebration, and the best use of surplus Navy property.
1994 – Key West resident Lucio Petrocelli, chairman of the Custom House Project, pledged a personal gift of $1 million toward the restoration of the landmark building.
2019 – Developers offered residents of the Tropic Palms, Water’s Edge, and Snead mobile home parks on Stock Island a year’s worth of rent somewhere else once construction began on the properties for the Wreckers Cay affordable housing complex.
Information compiled by Dr. Corey Malcom, Lead Historian, Monroe County Public Library, Florida Keys History Center.
Image: Telephone operators at work in Key West C 1920. Wright Langley Collection. Monroe County Public Library, Florida Keys History Center.