History of Davis Islands by Rodney Kite-Powell

Author:Rodney Kite-Powell [Kite-Powell, Rodney]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: History, United States, State & Local, South (AL; AR; FL; GA; KY; LA; MS; NC; SC; TN; VA; WV)
ISBN: 9781609498733
Google: MNpVvgAACAAJ
Publisher: History Press
Published: 2013-01-15T04:58:57+00:00

On September 8, 1565, Pedro Menéndez de Avilés arrived on the northeast coast of Florida and founded the fort and town of St. Augustine, thus establishing Spanish dominion over the territory. Three hundred and sixty years later, D.P. Davis wanted to honor St. Augustine’s founder with a memorial crypt for Menéndez on Davis Shores. Courtesy of the Tampa Bay History Center Collection.

The plan for Davis Shores called for the development to be roughly twice the size of Davis Islands. As such, the golf course planned for the community would also be twice the size, making it a regulation eighteen-hole course. The golf course never made it past the planning stages. Courtesy of the Tampa Bay History Center Collection.

Davis was not alone in his fall from realty grace. The entire Florida real estate market began a steady decline in 1926. As was the case with the start of the boom, Miami led the way in the decline. Problems began in 1925 when the Florida East Coast Railroad temporarily ceased freight service into Florida so the company could repair and update its line. In desperate need of building supplies, contractors and developers relied on improvised shipments aboard every kind of ship imaginable. That traffic came to a halt, too, after the ship Prinz Valdemar sank in the Biscayne Bay shipping channel in January 1926, rendering the channel all but useless. With faith in South Florida already faltering, the area was hit by a monumental hurricane on September 18. Winds in excess of 125 miles per hour tormented Miami for hours, accompanied by a devastating storm surge. Damage totaled into the millions, and the death toll reached over one hundred people. Florida’s vulnerability had definitively been proven once again.115

Outside observers were also quick to point out that Florida real estate was not on a healthy footing. The New York Times reported a “lull” in the Florida market in February. By July, the Nation claimed that the real estate business in Florida had collapsed. “The world’s greatest poker game, played with building lots instead of chips, is over. And the players are now…paying up.”116

Davis Shores continued to draw away all available resources, resulting in slower construction on Davis Islands. An overall shortage of building materials, tied to both the freight embargo by the Florida East Coast Railroad and demand from around the state, made matters worse. Davis had little choice but to sell his Tampa investment.

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