1902 – A shark measuring 15 feet was caught from Curry’s Wharf near the harbor end of Simonton Street.
1917 – C.W. Saunderson resigned his seat on the Key West City Commission as he had received his Army commission.
1924 – One of the houses on the lot where the La Concha hotel was to be built was being moved to Simonton Street, next to the parsonage of the First Methodist Church.
1926 – The Key West City Council ordered the house of John Mastrajani (aka “Monkey Man”) to be torn down, “as it [was] unquestionably a menace to the surrounding houses in the area.”
1930 -The Key West City Council ordered a reduction in salaries of 18 city officials and abolished four police positions due to the depressed economy and people unable to pay taxes.
1934 – The Federal Emergency Relief Administration hired a band of Cuban musicians known as the “Sexteto Encanto” to play for passengers arriving mornings on the Overseas Railroad at Key West and afternoons at the highway ferry terminal on No Name Key.
1947 – The Strand Theater signed a $25,000 contract to install a 60-ton air-conditioning system.
1947 – A category four hurricane that hit the mainland caused winds of 56 mph in Key West with some minor flooding.
1955 – The State of Florida leased oil rights on 734,760 acres of Monroe County bay bottom land to the California Company for $1,106,000. The county did not receive any money from the deal.
1993 – A defecting Cuban Air Force pilot landed his MIG-21 fighter plane at the Naval Air Station. The plane was detected on radar about four minutes before it landed.
2007 – The City of Key West began installing debris traps in storm drains along Duval Street to help prevent garbage from being washed into nearshore waters.
2008 – A derelict, 25-foot sailboat found off Marathon was discovered to be the racing yacht Tabon that had wrecked on October 17, 2007, near the Cape Verde Islands, 3,000 miles away.
Information compiled by Tom Hambright, Historian Emeritus, and Dr. Corey Malcom, Lead Historian, Monroe County Public Library, Florida Keys History Center.
Image: The Strand Theater at 529 Duval Street C 1960. Photo by Key West Press. Monroe County Public Library, Florida Keys History Center.