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    Boynton Beach
    Boynton Beach
    Boynton Beach
    Ebook182 pages48 minutes

    Boynton Beach

    By M. Randall Gill and Boynton Beach City Library

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    About this ebook

    Boynton Beach, located on South Florida s Atlantic coast, is known as the Gateway to the Gulf Stream. Ernest Hemingway once called these great ocean currents the last wild country left. Fishermen who study navigational charts understand that Boynton Beach is unique as the closest community to the Gulf Stream. Just minutes from the Boynton Inlet, water reaches a depth of 800 feet. Maj. Nathan Boynton came to the area in 1894, built a hotel, and envisioned a prosperous future for the idyllic village. Today Boynton Beach celebrates its diverse population, ideal location, and a rich and fascinating history that includes Henry Flagler s railroad, land booms, hurricanes, shipwrecks, and steadfast farmers.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherArcadia Publishing
    Release dateAug 24, 2005
    ISBN9781439613016
    Boynton Beach
    Author

    M. Randall Gill

    Author M. Randall Gill is a graduate of the University of Maryland and Princeton Theological Seminary and now serves as a Presbyterian minister. This volume was authored in conjunction with the Boynton Beach City Library with research assistance from Janet DeVries, library associate and archivist. Since the early 1900s, the library has been dedicated to preserving Boynton�s heritage. Photographs capturing the spirit of Boynton Beach were gathered from the Boynton Beach City Library, the Boynton Cultural Centre, the Boynton Beach Historical Society, and personal collections. The authors� proceeds benefit the Schoolhouse Children�s Museum to encourage children and families to learn about the history of our area.

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      Book preview

      Boynton Beach - M. Randall Gill

      book.

      INTRODUCTION

      In the year 1894, Maj. Nathan S. Boynton and Congressman William S. Linton, businessmen from Michigan, traveled the canal south from Palm Beach in a boat named the Victor. This small motorized launch was captained by Frederick C. Voss, a settler in the Hypoluxo area. These two men would prophetically become victorious in establishing neighboring communities in South Florida. Their boat steadily moved through the long body of water known as Lake Worth. This was the only way to reach the primitive frontier to the south. Blue herons and snowy white egrets swooped overhead as alligators gazed at the newcomers. For hours, the men could hear the crashing of the turquoise ocean waves to the east. To the west, they could smell the piney scrub flatlands.

      State historians believe the first humans migrated to Florida from Southern Georgia about 10,000 BC. Pottery shards, charcoal, and other artifacts have been found in the Boynton Inlet area and western sections of Boynton. Native Americans who left these artifacts could have been members of the Tekesta, Calusa, or Aias tribes who lived about 500 BC. By the 18th century, the majority of Seminoles had migrated farther south and settled in the Fort Lauderdale region.

      There is not any evidence of a Spanish explorer ever landing on this beach area. Explorer Ponce de Leon did sail by in his ship after his discovery of Florida in 1513. The swift, warm current of the Gulf Stream, just a few miles offshore from Boynton, would be an asset to the Spanish treasure ships returning to Spain. Many of the ships, however, never made it home, sunken by treacherous coral reefs, deadly hurricanes, and marauding pirates.

      According to early pioneer Charles W. Pierce, in the 1870s, the southeast coast of Florida was still a howling wilderness. In 1875, Capt. James A. Armour, the head lighthouse keeper at the Jupiter Lighthouse, acquired the future Boynton property from the United States government and built a small palmetto-thatched home. In 1877, a young man from Michigan, Dexter Hubel, located his homestead claim on the ocean ridge directly east of the present downtown area of Boynton Beach. Other settlers joined Hubel and had to scavenge the beach for necessities that would wash up from ships wrecked in a storm. Floating lumber would help them build sturdy homes. Sweet potatoes, swamp cabbage, and squirrel stew made a favorite meal during this time.

      By the 1890s, when Maj. Nathan Boynton was heading to this area, changes were already occurring. Wild game had retreated west of the canal, and the population was starting to grow. The Florida East Coast Canal, now part of the Intracoastal Waterway, was dredged from Lake Worth south all the way to Delray by 1896. Henry Flagler’s Florida East Coast Railroad was approaching, and settlers could hear the rhythmic chanting of workers laying rails off in the distance. When Major Boynton sailed into this tropical area in 1894, he stepped off his naphtha vessel onto the oozy muck bordering the canal. This distinguished Civil War veteran was immediately enthralled by the area and bought 400 acres of land, including a mile of ocean frontage. His friend, William Linton, would go south to Delray. Together these leaders formed the Michigan Home Colonization Company to encourage people to move to South Florida and be part of a new dream.

      Early settlers who were dropped off at the edge of this wilderness canal would ask the boatman, But where’s Boynton? It’s all around you, was his reply as he shoved off into the night. The pioneers were ready to experience the adventure of a lifetime. Major Boynton began constructing cottages and a hotel to serve as a winter resort for his friends and tourists from Michigan. Construction workers flooded the area, and many of them decided to stay. As they cleared the land, they found rattlesnakes hidden everywhere. Palmetto roots had to be tediously pulled out of the ground. Horse flies would bite the workers as they painfully labored in the broiling sun. The new settlers transformed Boynton with freshly planted tomatoes, beans, peppers, pineapples, oranges, and mangoes.

      S. B. Cade and L. A. King were two African Americans who farmed the muck-land north of Ocean Avenue. They were helpful to the new settlers who fought off the long-snouted razorback hogs and wild rabbits that were constantly raiding their gardens. It was a challenge to face mosquitoes as thick as dark storm clouds. Panthers screamed in the middle of the night and bears searching for turtle eggs left footprints on the beach. Pioneers in Boynton were hardy, and would not give up. An early pioneer said, "He who wants to walk under the palms must first suffer from insect

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