The ferry Monroe County leaving No Name Key.
1830 – William R. Hackley recorded in his diary: Rose with the sun and studied a case until court time. The jury found for the plaintiff in the case of Mathew Furlong. The case of the Territory of Florida vs. Norman Sherwood for the murder of John Wilson on the 5 day of July last by shooting with a pistol loaded with buckshot came on today. The prisoner being anxious for trial did not make use of his right of peremptory challenge to the full extent allowed by law. I was requested by the Judge James Webb to take down the evidence in the case and did so. The trial was protracted till near two. I left the courthouse before the jury retired. The jury brought in a verdict of guilty. The Sloop Brilliant of Groton, Captain Mason Packer, arrived this morning from New York in ballast she has come out to be a regular wrecking vessel on the Florida Reef. After dinner took a nap and read Stewart. After tea played euchre with Captain Henry A. Barclay against George Weaver and Captain Joseph Swiler. Went to bed about half past nine. Wind north northeast weather cool and pleasant.
1927 – The Monroe County, the first of the ferries to be used on the water gap in the first Overseas Highway, was launched in Jacksonville.
1965 – In the Key West city election runoff, Henry B. Lee III and John Hernandez were elected to the commission.
1968 – A three-year effort by the Rev. Russell Burns to obtain a major league baseball farm team was achieved when the Florida State League announced that the new San Diego team would sponsor a team in Key West in 1969.
1976 – Air Sunshine and Southeast Air Line merged effective this week. The merger of the two lines led to improved service.
1982 – At the organizational meeting of the Monroe County Commission, Jerry Hernandez was elected Mayor of Monroe County
1999 – Frank E. Taylor, owner and associate editor of Solares Hill, died at age 83. He had worked as an editor at a number of publishers before he retired to Key West in 1980. He had also produced the movie “The Misfits” starring Clark Gable and Marilyn Monroe.
Information compiled by Tom Hambright, Historian Emeritus, Florida Keys History Center, Monroe County Public Library
Image: The highway ferry Monroe County leaving the No Name Key landing. John Harold Sands Jr. Collection. Florida Keys History Center, Monroe County Public Library. https://www.flickr.com/photos/keyslibraries/47823445362