It is safe to say that without railroads, Florida wouldn't be what it is today. Railroads connected the state's important cities and towns, conquered the peninsula's vast and seemingly impenetrable interior, ushered in untold numbers of settlers and tourists, and conveyed to market--faster than any previous means of transportation--the myriad products of Florida's mines, forests, factories, farms, and groves. Gregg Turner traces the long, slow development of Florida railroads, from the first tentative lines in the 1830s, through the boom of the 1880s, to the maturity of the railroad system in the 1920s. At the end of that decade nearly 6,000 miles of labyrinthine track covered the state. Turner also examines the decline of the industry, as the automobile rose to prominence in American culture and lines were abandoned or sold for hiking trails and green spaces. Meticulously researched and richly illustrated--including many never-before-published images--A Journey into Florida Railroad History is a comprehensive, authoritative history of the subject. Written by one of the nation's foremost authorities on Florida railroads, it explores all the key players and companies, and every significant period of development. This engaging and lively story will be savored and enjoyed by generations to come.

Florida's railroad heritage began in the 1830s amidst Native American upheaval and territorial colonization. Surpassing waterways as the primary mode of transport, the "Iron Horse" linked practically every town and city, carried tourists and locals, and ably conveyed the wealth of Florida's mines, factories, forests, groves, and farms. Nearly 175 years later, railroads still remain a dependable source of transport within the Sunshine State.

The history of Florida railroads began as early as 1834, when the Tallahassee-St. Marks Railroad incorporated. On April 14, 1836, the St. Joseph-Lake Wimico line was the first to be put into service, with trains operating between the boomtown of St. Joseph and the Apalachicola River. Although the Florida railroad "boom" began with Henry Flagler and Henry Bradley Plant, the expansion continued into the 1920s when the president of Seaboard Railway, S. Davies Warfield, extended his lines to Miami and Naples. With the passage of time, numerous railroads were bought, merged, or abandoned. Today, 12 full-service railroads are still operating as well as several port railroads.

Florida's size and shape meant a largely remote interior until shortly before the Civil War. The catalysts for blasting through that anonymity were three ambitious and very different visionaries who built railroads linking east to west and north to south: Henry Morrison Flagler, David Levy Yulee, and Henry Bradley Plant. Their iron horses transported people––rich tourists from New York, slaves from Africa sold in Havana––and goods from around the state and the globe: oysters, cattle, sugar cane, molasses, and phosphate. Versions of the main lines run today––hauling freight in and out of the state and carrying passengers to connecting lines nationwide. Yet Florida’s size and shape still get in the way of efficient auto trips and affordable inter-state air travel. A private company is today planning to build a high-speed passenger train from Miami to Orlando. This book is the complete history of railways in the state of Florida––telling the tale of its beginnings as well as its future.

Florida's railroads emerged in the 1830s amid Native American upheaval and territorial colonization. Many periods of development marked this fascinating heritage, but one era towers above the rest: the 1920s. It was then that Florida experienced a colossal land boom, one of the greatest migration and building stories in American history. People poured into the state as never before, real estate traded hands at breakneck speed, and the landscape added countless new homes, hotels, apartments, and commercial buildings. Florida's biggest railroads--the Atlantic Coast Line, Seaboard Air Line, and Florida East Coast--were unprepared for the tidal wave of traffic. Thus, the "Big Three" had to rapidly expand and increase capacity. Dozens of projects unfolded at great cost, by one estimate over $100 million. When the building frenzy ended, the railway map of the state stood at its greatest extent--some 5,700 miles. Further, the frequency of railway service within and to the Sunshine State reached an unprecedented level, never again to be repeated.

The fast-paced and gripping true account of the extraordinary construction and spectacular demise of the Key West Railroad—one of the greatest engineering feats ever undertaken, destroyed in one fell swoop by the strongest storm ever to hit U.S. shores. In 1904, the brilliant and driven entrepreneur Henry Flagler, partner to John D. Rockefeller, dreamed of a railway connecting the island of Key West to the Florida mainland, crossing a staggering 153 miles of open ocean—an engineering challenge beyond even that of the Panama Canal. Many considered the project impossible, but build it they did. The railroad stood as a magnificent achievement for more than twenty-two years, heralded as “the Eighth Wonder of the World,” until its total destruction in 1935's deadly storm of the century. In Last Train to Paradise, Standiford celebrates this crowning achievement of Gilded Age ambition, bringing to life a sweeping tale of the powerful forces of human ingenuity colliding with the even greater forces of nature’s wrath.