Lost Reminders: Florida Agriculture Before Suburbia

Today, where quiet streets line a suburban Florida neighborhood, a small, bustling town of sorts once stood. When the Everglades were drained in the early 1900s, it created dry land that eventually became host to several Florida cities that were formed in the mid-twentieth century. For many of those new municipalities, agriculture was an interim stage in the history of the area before incorporation took place. One such city, Coral Springs, was the site of a vast farming and ranching enterprise which included a now-forgotten settlement that existed decades before the city was established.

Karl Miller explains.

President Harry Truman at Everglades National Park in December 1947.

Prior to 1900, southern Florida was dominated by the enormous Everglades wetlands area, precluding development of much of the region.  Florida leaders launched the Everglades Drainage District in 1913, a body that oversaw the construction of a series of canals to drain the wetlands. The success of these efforts led to an increase in available real estate, helping to create the Florida land boom of the 1920s.

1920s and 1930s

Henry Lawrence Lyons (1893-1952), a farmer based in Pompano Beach, a city in Broward County on the southeast Atlantic coast, began his Florida career in earnest in the 1920s. A Georgia native, Lyons participated in the real estate boom, purchasing tracts of vacant property several miles inland and gradually building up a sizeable ownership while also serving two terms as a county commissioner. This buying activity was capped by an enormous 6,200-acre purchase in 1934, property that would later become Coral Springs. (1)

Using heavy mechanical equipment, Lyons and his workers cleared his holdings of natural vegetation, occasionally resorting to dynamite for more difficult situations. He dug his own system of canals to increase drainage from the grounds, made gravel roads, and created three-acre plots throughout the area. Lyons then planted crops, predominantly green beans, which were harvested by a seasonal team of 600 laborers, then sent to a facility in Pompano Beach which cleaned and sorted the crop before packaging them for distribution across the United States.[1]  By 1938, his operations were “on a tremendous scale, his payrolls gigantic” with shipments running “. . . into the millions of packages.” ([2]) When the 1930s ended, his enterprise expanded further to include cattle raising. 

While Lyons lived in Pompano Beach, his roughly one hundred permanent employees lived year-round in the workers quarters, described by a 1939 visitor:

      . . . at the center of the farm there is a veritable town – a cluster of buildings which
      includes hurricane-proof cabins . . . anchored in concrete foundations.  Here are the

      stables, sheds, and the machine shop, which has just about every gadget imaginable

      for making home repairs to the fleet of tractors, trucks, plows, listers, planters,

      ground dusters, and countless other machines . . . ([3])

The group of buildings was the nucleus of farm activity. Workers were largely African American, including sharecroppers Lyons brought from Georgia with the promise of employment during the Great Depression. They worked long hours in the fields and dealt with a range of perils including mosquitoes, alligators, poisonous snakes, and extreme heat, before returning each day to their quarters. Their efforts were a main component driving Broward County green bean production from a 1930 reported value of $800,529 to 1950 sales of $5,638,227. ([4])

Post-war period

In 1945, the United States Geological Survey created a map of Pompano Beach, including the Lyons farm. Far removed to the west from the nearest part of the city, a cluster of over two dozen structures appeared in the middle of the farm just north of Pompano Canal. Today, it would have been located close to Three Mountains Park, a city recreational area near the intersection of Riverside Drive and Atlantic Boulevard. ([5])

In 1952, Lyons died, and ownership of his estate passed to Lena, his wife. She ran the farm for ten years before selling the entire property in 1962 for one million dollars to Coral Ridge Properties, a South Florida development corporation looking to meet enormous post-war demand for suburban housing. Coral Springs was formally incorporated by an act of the Florida legislature the following year, and agricultural operations wound down to a close.

As a planned community, Coral Springs was built according to an intentional design. A series of aerial views taken regularly by Broward County from 1963 onward showed as construction gradually changed the landscape around the old buildings until they were finally demolished in the mid-1970s. ([6]) A subdivision named Shadow Wood then rose over the site, leaving no trace of the Lyons era behind.

While the rapid growth of Florida in the twentieth century seemed to almost create residential areas from thin air, the land had a past. As with many other new Florida cities of the time, Coral Springs was built on ground that had previously been agricultural. While gone now, the farm it followed had itself supplanted the natural state of the environment, transforming it and preparing it, in a way, for the next phase in the history of the area.

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[1] Clarence Woodbury, “Titan of the Bean Patch,” The Country Home Magazine 63(1), January 1939.

[2] Fort Lauderdale News, November 30, 1938.

[3] Woodbury, “Titan of the Bean Patch.”

[4] United States Census Bureau, 1930 Census: Agriculture Volume 2. Reports by States, with Statistics for Counties and a Summary for the United States, Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office, accessed December 18, 2024 at https://www2.census.gov/library/publications/decennial/1930/agriculture-volume-2/03337983v2p2ch07.pdf; United States Census Bureau, 1950 Census of Agriculture. Part 18: Florida, Statistics for Counties. Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office, accessed December 18, 2024 at https://www2.census.gov/library/publications/decennial/1950/agriculture-volume-1/34059685v1p18ch2.pdf.

[5] United States Geological Survey, Fort Lauderdale North Quadrant, Scale 1:24000, Washington, DC, 1945.

[6] Broward County Urban Planning Division, Aerials 1963 to 2000, Broward County, Florida, Township 48, Range 41, Section 34, 2000, accessed December 17, 2024 at https://www.broward.org/Planning/Pages/GIS.aspx.

The 1565 Massacre at Matanzas Inlet, Florida

Overlooking the popular seaside city of Saint Augustine, Florida is the Castillo de San Marcos, an imposing 17th century fortress constructed by early Spanish Colonials to project power and defend their settlements in Florida and surrounding environs. The role of the fortress had transitioned from that of a military stronghold to a delightful tourist attraction, enticing a multitude of tourists from around the world each year to visit. Not far from Castillo de San Marcos stand in scenic solitude a rather underwhelming fortified watchtower called Fort Matanzas. This peculiar structure was built near the site of one of early North America’s most grisly massacres, indicated by the name of the watchtower and inlet Matanzas, meaning massacre or slaughter in Spanish. It was here on this panoramic beach in September of 1565 that close to 250 French Protestants or Huguenots were slain per the orders of Admiral Pedro Menendez de Aviles, acting on behalf of his Sovereign Philip the Second of Spain. At this time Europe was plagued by a multitude of religious wars and conflicts stemming from the inception of the Protestant Reformation. The turmoil would spill out of Europe and manifest itself in the New World leading to dire consequences.

Brian Hughes explains.

A depiction of the massacre.

Following the Protestant Reformation in 1517 Europe swiftly spiraled into religious conflict in which unparalleled levels of violence, destruction, and horrors would not be replicated or surpassed until the Napoleonic and World Wars of later centuries. The impetus for religious reform is beyond the scope of this article but the results gnawed at the very foundational socio-political foundations of Europe and would persist for centuries. Certain regions were more embroiled in conflict than others, particularly the states of Central and Western Europe such as the Holy Roman Empire, France and Spain.

Coinciding with these horrific events was the further discovery and exploration of North and South America following the successful exploits of Christopher Columbus decades before. Shortly thereafter Europeans began to exploit these lands and transform them into new geopolitical fronts. The Spanish, staunch Catholics who spearheaded the initial discoveries quickly achieved dominance and gained the most influence in the whole of the Caribbean region as they established settlements and military outposts on islands such as Cuba, Puerto Rico, and a large Peninsula which jutted from the north which the Spanish named La Florida. But the Spanish would not be the only Europeans with ambitions of overseas Empire.

French presence

A small band of French colonists led by Jean Ribault and Rene de Laudonniere established a settlement at the mouth of the St. Johns River which the French named the River of May near the present-day city of Jacksonville. There they hastily constructed a small fort naming it Fort Caroline after the French Monarch King Charles IX. Most of the French Colonists were Huguenots an influential Protestant minority who fled their native France as a means to escape religious persecution, not entirely dissimilar reasons in which the Pilgrims fled England decades later.

The French presence to the north was troublesome to the Spanish as not only was Florida land claimed by Spain, but the majority of the French colonists were Huguenots, sworn enemies of the devout Catholics of Spain. This did not sit well with King of Spain, Philip the Second. Philip dispatched Admiral Pedro Menéndez de Aviles to establish a permanent settlement in Florida and simultaneously root the French interlopers out. Menendez departed span with 800 soldiers, sailors, artisans, and would be colonists, successfully reaching Florida in August of 1565. Landing first near Cape Canaveral Menendez turned northward finding good anchorage and deciding to make landfall. The Spanish would christen their new settlement “San Augustine” which remains to this day the oldest continuously inhabited city in the United States.

The French understood the vulnerability of their situation and Florida. Admiral of France and Huguenot leader Gaspard de Coligny ordered French Admiral Jean Ribault with 600 personnel to defend the fledgling fort. Ribault was able to catch up with Menendez off the coast of Florida and a brief, but inconclusive naval engagement followed. The French fleet withdrew allowing Menendez valuable time to regroup.

Bad luck would soon befall the French squadron as a hurricane swept the French fleet away from the coast granting valuable time for Menendez and his retinue.

Spanish attack

Menendez then led his body of troops overland to attack Fort Caroline. To this day the terrain of Florida, although flat, can be some of the most difficult to traverse. The Spaniards, burdened by cumbersome armor, gear, and weapons trudged through swamps, impenetrable forests all in the midst of the tropical heat of late summer in Florida. Much of these hardships were compounded by the fact that the same hurricane which swept Ribault's fleet away lingered to pour torrential rains upon the Spanish column.

In spite of these difficulties the Spaniards successfully reached Fort Caroline confirming Menendez’s suspicions that the fort was virtually undefended. The Spanish then launched a successful surprise attack capturing the fort and its surrounding outposts much to the shock and horror of the unsuspecting French colonists. The Spanish killed and captured the majority of the Huguenots who comprised mostly of artisans and various other laborers. Of the 240 occupants 132 were slain. Menendez decided to spare most of the woman and children from the initial slaughter as the Spanish quickly consolidated their position knowing that Ribault was still somewhere off the coast.

Miraculously, Ribault survived the hurricane and subsequent shipwreck along with a handful of his men. They began their trek northward hoping still to arrive at Fort Caroline in time. Menendez received word of this via local indigenous tribes and quickly gathered most of his men and marched south back towards Saint Augustine to intercept the Ribault and other French survivors.

Menendez successfully enveloped Ribault on the inlet that would soon bear the name of what was to occur. The Huguenot prisoners were given one final meal before being bound and brutally massacred on the beach. Only 16 prisoners would be spared, a mix of professed Catholics and artisans necessary for the survival of the new settlement.

The Religious Wars of Europe would only escalate and worsen over the coming decades, with the pendulums of power shifting for both Catholics and Protestants alike. But on a desolate inlet on the East Coast of Florida Huguenot ambitions of overseas Empire would perish forever.

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