Henry Flagler

Henry Morrison Flagler (January 2 1830 – May 20 1913) was a United States tycoon, real estate promoter, railroad developer and Rockefeller partner. He was a key figure in the development of the eastern coast of Florida along the Atlantic Ocean and was founder of what became the Florida East Coast Railway.

Born in Hopewell, New York as the son of a poor minister, Flagler left school at 14 to become a merchant in Ohio. Through the grain and distillery business, he met John D. Rockefeller, in Bellevue, Ohio. After a business disaster as a salt manufacturer in Saginaw, Michigan, he moved to Cleveland and soon joined Rockefeller in what was to become Standard Oil. By 1872, it led the American oil refining industry, producing 10,000 barrels per day.

In 1877, Standard Oil moved its headquarters to New York City, and Flagler and his family moved there as well. He was joined by Henry H. Rogers, another leader of Standard Oil who also became involved in the development of America's railroads, including those on nearby Staten Island, the Union Pacific Railroad, and later in West Virginia, where he eventually built the remarkable Virginian Railway to transport coal to Hampton Roads, Virginia.

Henry Flager's non-Standard Oil interests went in a different direction, however, when in 1878, on the advice of his physician, Flagler travelled to Jacksonville, Florida for the winter with his first wife, who was quite ill. Two years after she died in 1881, he remarried. After their wedding, the couple traveled to St. Augustine, Florida. Flagler found the city charming, but the hotel facilities and transportation systems inadequate. He recognized Florida's potential to attract out-of-state visitors.

Though Flagler remained on the Board of Directors of Standard Oil, he gave up his day-to-day involvement in the corporation in order to pursue his interests in Florida. He returned to St. Augustine in 1885 and began construction on the 540-room Hotel Ponce de Leon. Realizing the need for a sound transportation system to support his hotel ventures, Flagler purchased the Jacksonville, St. Augustine and Halifax Railroad, the first railroad in what would become known as the "Flagler System" or the Florida East Coast Railroad.

The Hotel Ponce de Leon, now part of Flagler College, opened on January 10, 1888 and was an instant success. Two years later, Flagler expanded his Florida holdings. He built a railroad bridge across the St. Johns River to gain access to the southern half of the state and purchased the Hotel Ormond, just north of Daytona. His personal dedication to the state of Florida was demonstrated when he began construction on his private residence, Kirkside, in St. Augustine.

Flagler completed the 1150-room Royal Poinciana Hotel on the shores of Lake Worth in Palm Beach and extended his railroad to West Palm Beach by 1894. The Royal Poinciana Hotel was at the time the largest wooden structure in the world. Two years later, Flagler built the Palm Beach Inn (renamed The Breakers in 1901) overlooking the Atlantic Ocean in Palm Beach.

Flagler originally intended for West Palm Beach to be the terminus of his railroad system, but during 1894 and 1895, severe freezes hit the area, causing Flagler to rethink this original decision. Sixty miles south, the town today known as Miami was reportedly unharmed by the freeze. To further convince Flagler to continue the railroad to Miami he was offered land in exchange for laying rail tracks from private landowners, including Julia Tuttle, who ran a trading post on the Miami River, the Florida East Coast Canal and Transportation Company, and the Boston and Florida Atlantic Coast Land Company.

This led to the development of Miami, which was only an unincorporated area at the time. Flagler encouraged fruit farming and settlement along his railway line and made many gifts to build hospitals, churches and schools in Florida.

Flagler's railroad, renamed the Florida East Coast Railway in 1895, reached Biscayne Bay by 1896. Flagler dredged a channel, built streets, instituted the first water and power systems, and financed the city's first newspaper, the Metropolis. When the city incorporated in 1896, its citizens wanted to honor the man responsible for its growth by naming it "Flagler". He declined the honor, persuading them to use an old Indian name, "Miami". In 1897, Flagler opened the exclusive Royal Palm Hotel there.

Flagler's second wife, the former Ida Alice Stroud, had been institutionalized for mental illness since 1895. In 1901, the Florida Legislature passed a bill that made incurable insanity grounds for divorce, opening the way for Flagler to remarry. On August 24 of that year, Flagler married his third wife, Mary Lily Kenan, and the couple soon moved into their Palm Beach estate, Whitehall.

Built as as a wedding present to Mary Lily in 1902 by architects John Carrere and Thomas Hastings, Whitehall was a 60,000 square foot (5,600 m²), 55-room winter retreat that established the Palm Beach season for the wealthy of America's Gilded Age. Today Whitehall is now known as the Henry Morrison Flagler Museum.

By 1905, Flagler decided that his Florida East Coast Railway should be extended from Biscayne Bay to Key West, a point 128 miles past the end of the Florida peninsula. At the time, Key West was Florida's most populous city and it was also the United States' closest deep water port to the canal that the U.S. government proposed to build in Panama. Flagler wanted to take advantage of additional trade with Cuba and Latin America as well as the increased trade with the west that the Panama Canal would bring. In 1912, the Florida Overseas Railroad was completed to Key West.

In 1913, Flagler fell down a flight of stairs at Whitehall. He never recovered from the fall and died in West Palm Beach of his injuries on May 20 at 84 years of age. He was buried in St. Augustine alongside his daughter, Jenny Louise and first wife, Mary Harkness. Only his son Harry survived of the three children by his first marriage in 1853 to Mary Harkness.

There is a monument to him in Biscayne Bay, and Flagler College is named after him in St. Augustine. Flagler County, Florida and Flagler Beach, Florida are also named for him.

The Florida Overseas Railroad, also known as the Key West Extension of the Florida East Coast Railway, was heavily damaged and partially destroyed in the Labor Day Hurricane of 1935. The Florida East Coast Railway was financially unable to rebuild the destroyed sections, so the roadbed and remaining bridges were sold to the State of Florida, who built the Overseas Highway to Key West, using much of the remaining railway infrastructure.

References

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