Swampy's Florida

Here’s a photo of three dredges trudging across the lowest part of eastern peninsula Florida heading across towards Naples. This effort in the blazing hot sun was to build a road from Miami to Naples. If you think about, the reasoning to create this road makes as little sense as most road building today. Who was driving from Miami to Naples? Or vice versa? The reason is the same as why most roads are built today – especially today. The state was flush with tax payer cash as The Boom was roaring and they needed to spend it. This looked as good a reason as any. Realtors and developers were pushing extremely hard for it to exploit the area and had some wild dream of developing the area.

So these men risked life and limb to crush and grind across the unforgiving saw palmetto, the viciously sharp saw grass, swamp and tons of bugs. There was also no air conditioning and not a soul to be found anywhere. The men had to camp where they were and there were no camping areas around. It was about as rough and tough a job as could be found.

Eventually the road was finished and connected to, what is now, US 41 that connected to Tampa, thus the naming Tamiami Trail. Much of the area the road was built through became part Everglades and part Big Cypress Preserve.

This photograph is from the fascinating autobiography by Loren “Totch” Brown. Totch was a native who was an alligator hunter, professional guide, commercial fisherman and drug runner. This great book chronciless it all!
You can pick up your own copy by clicking here: http://amzn.to/2HhITDZ
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