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Authors: Les Standiford
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sorts had cropped up. On the west coast of Florida, perhaps inspired by Flagler’s notoriety, a man named Henry Plant had been buying up a series of existing narrow-gauge railroads with the stated intention of extending a line all the way from Tampa to Miami. Plant had also built a deep-water pier that transformed Tampa into an important port on the Gulf of Mexico, and by 1891 he had completed his own extravagant hotel, the Tampa Bay, which, at $3 million, considerably exceeded the cost of the Ponce de Leon, a paltry $2.5 million.
Goaded by the outspoken Plant’s vow to “outdo” him, Flagler considered what he might play as a trump card. In a letter written to the
Miami Herald
many years later, Jefferson Browne, a Key West resident and onetime president of the Florida Senate, recalls being taken aside by Henry Flagler during the grand opening of the Tampa Bay Hotel. During that conversation, Browne said, Flagler first proposed to him the notion of extending his own railroad another four hundred miles to the south, all the way to Key West.
Flagler told Browne in that conversation that the logical end of all railroad building in Florida was to reach a deep-water terminus in proximity to Central and South America. In fact, some have argued, had Flagler been successful in getting the U.S. government to help him pay for the costs of dredging such a harbor in Miami’s Biscayne Bay, there might never have been a Key West Extension.
In any case, the Panama Canal was sure to be built one day, Flagler told Browne, while Plant’s imported symphony played and opera stars sang, and the nearest deep-water port in the United States was sure to have an enormous advantage. It soon became clear, Browne recalled, that Flagler was seeking Browne’s assistance in seeing that the existing government franchises for building such a line be set aside.
In 1883, General John B. Gordon of Georgia had obtained the first franchise from the state for the building of a railroad to Key West, but Gordon had little capital of his own, and had secured the rights in hopes of attracting deep-pocketed investors to the project. After building a few miles of track on the mainland, Gordon had gone broke, but other speculators had acquired the franchise in turn.
As Flagler argued, this series of petitioners were only schemers involved in the grossest speculation (not unlike contemporary consortiums tying up Internet domain names or seeking rights to the first Burger King franchise on Mars). Browne listened intently to Flagler, and, apparently unimpressed by the thousands of guests who strolled and rode rickshaws about the grounds of Plant’s hotel—dukes, duchesses, and theater stars included—finally gave his agreement to the railroad man from the other side of the state, sensing that Henry Flagler was the one man in all creation who might be able to pull off such an impossible feat.
Warming to the advantages such a railroad would open to his constituency, in 1894 Browne wrote an essay titled “Across the Gulf by Rail to Key West,” which was to be published in the
National Geographic
in June of 1896.
“Key West will within a short time be connected with the mainland by a railroad,” Browne asserted, adding, “It is not too much to say that upon the completion of the Nicaragua
[sic]
Canal, Key West will become the most important city in the South.”
Browne seemed to overlook the fact that the canal project, which had been mired in political maneuverings for more than twenty years, had also been assailed by critics who thought it as much of a crackpot notion as a proposal to build a railroad across the ocean. Of the latter, he was willing to grant that its having no precedent could possibly make it, “like all other great enterprises, a subject for a time of incredulity and distrust.” Still, Browne asserted, “it presents no difficulties that are insurmountable.”
In the piece, Browne laid out a route from Key West northward over the
Goaded by the outspoken Plant’s vow to “outdo” him, Flagler considered what he might play as a trump card. In a letter written to the
Miami Herald
many years later, Jefferson Browne, a Key West resident and onetime president of the Florida Senate, recalls being taken aside by Henry Flagler during the grand opening of the Tampa Bay Hotel. During that conversation, Browne said, Flagler first proposed to him the notion of extending his own railroad another four hundred miles to the south, all the way to Key West.
Flagler told Browne in that conversation that the logical end of all railroad building in Florida was to reach a deep-water terminus in proximity to Central and South America. In fact, some have argued, had Flagler been successful in getting the U.S. government to help him pay for the costs of dredging such a harbor in Miami’s Biscayne Bay, there might never have been a Key West Extension.
In any case, the Panama Canal was sure to be built one day, Flagler told Browne, while Plant’s imported symphony played and opera stars sang, and the nearest deep-water port in the United States was sure to have an enormous advantage. It soon became clear, Browne recalled, that Flagler was seeking Browne’s assistance in seeing that the existing government franchises for building such a line be set aside.
In 1883, General John B. Gordon of Georgia had obtained the first franchise from the state for the building of a railroad to Key West, but Gordon had little capital of his own, and had secured the rights in hopes of attracting deep-pocketed investors to the project. After building a few miles of track on the mainland, Gordon had gone broke, but other speculators had acquired the franchise in turn.
As Flagler argued, this series of petitioners were only schemers involved in the grossest speculation (not unlike contemporary consortiums tying up Internet domain names or seeking rights to the first Burger King franchise on Mars). Browne listened intently to Flagler, and, apparently unimpressed by the thousands of guests who strolled and rode rickshaws about the grounds of Plant’s hotel—dukes, duchesses, and theater stars included—finally gave his agreement to the railroad man from the other side of the state, sensing that Henry Flagler was the one man in all creation who might be able to pull off such an impossible feat.
Warming to the advantages such a railroad would open to his constituency, in 1894 Browne wrote an essay titled “Across the Gulf by Rail to Key West,” which was to be published in the
National Geographic
in June of 1896.
“Key West will within a short time be connected with the mainland by a railroad,” Browne asserted, adding, “It is not too much to say that upon the completion of the Nicaragua
[sic]
Canal, Key West will become the most important city in the South.”
Browne seemed to overlook the fact that the canal project, which had been mired in political maneuverings for more than twenty years, had also been assailed by critics who thought it as much of a crackpot notion as a proposal to build a railroad across the ocean. Of the latter, he was willing to grant that its having no precedent could possibly make it, “like all other great enterprises, a subject for a time of incredulity and distrust.” Still, Browne asserted, “it presents no difficulties that are insurmountable.”
In the piece, Browne laid out a route from Key West northward over the
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