Foundations

The history of key west starts off with the Caloosahatchee. The Caloosahatchee were an indigenous group of people who originally lived in south Florida along with other native tribes that include the Tequesta and Seminole Indians. The Caloosahatchee commonly relied on waters for there food source. Later on the tribe encountered Spanish explorers around the same time of the arrival of Spanish explorer Ponce de Leon. Ponce de Leon discovered key west in 1521 on his expedition. Key west later on received the name Cayo hueso which means bone island in Spanish. On March 5^th 1822 Key west became a part of the united states also as Florida becoming a confederacy state key west stayed a part of the union. For the civil war in 1845 through 1866 Cubans were provided refuge and later on started owning thriving businesses in key west which would result in making Cuban cigars and it was due to Cuba’s ten year war. The areas in key west were named after people who are viewed as contributors of help building a sturdy foundation for key west. An example would be Duval street being named after territorial governor William, Pope Duval who has been in office from 1822 to 1834. With the name of key west’s county being Monroe county Monroe comes from the last name of president James Monroe. Over a period of time key west had an economy that changed over a period of time. The change was from ship wrecking to cigar production which took place in the 1800s. In 1890 the population of key west increased to closely 18,800 residents. Today in key west the population is at 26,990 people inhabiting key west occupying specific industries that help it grow as the prosperous place it is up until this point as underneath it lies an interesting history of people who arrived and made contributions to key west.