Coconut Grove
"The Grove" was incorporated in 1819 and annexed by the City of Miami in 1925, was for a long time the bohemian district of Miami.
Isabella and Charles Peacock from England opened the first hotel in 1882 in Coconut Grove, and many black Bahamian immigrants were hired to work in the hotel, in construction and in the fields . They were believed to be the only people capable of withstanding the extreme heat and humidity, as well as the large mosquito population.
Early Coconut Grove settler Mariah Brown was one of the first workers at the Peacock Inn and her home is still at 3298 Charles Avenue.
E.W.F. Stirrup was the richest Black person in Coconut Grove. A Bahamian immigrant and carpenter who arrived in 1899, Stirrup built a real estate empire, constructing over 100 homes (shotgun houses) to rent to Black settlers, becoming a pioneering developer in South Florida. His historic home remains on 3242 Charles Avenue.
Dr. Horace P. Porter is credited for coming up with the name when he, waiting and hoping for a land grant, rented a home from Edmond D. Beasley's widow in 1873, who homesteaded 160 acres of bay-front property. He lived there for only a year and left when his land grant was denied. During that time, he established a post office which he named “Coconut Grove”.
Ralph Middleton Munroe, also known as "The Commodore” had begun visiting Biscayne Bay in 1877 and became friends with the Peacock family. He married his wife Eva in 1879. Two years later she became very sick with Tuberculosis so they moved to Coconut Grove for the climate.
Eva died in April 1882, and She is buried on the one acre land the Peacock family gave to him. It is now on the grounds of the Coconut Grove Library, and it is the oldest marked grave in Miami.
Between 1882 and 1886 Munroe spent the winters with his friends, the Peacocks, and in 1886 he made Coconut Grove his permanent home.
He soon built his own home “The Barnacle” which is now a museum, and engaged in wrecking in the waters around Key Biscayne, built sailboats, worked as a pilot for the Cape Florida Channel Company. Additional he opened a pineapple cannery, to which Waters Smith Davis from Key Biscayne sent all his pineapples. He was also one of the founders of the Coconut Grove Biscayne Bay Yacht Club and a leading designer of sailing yachts designing 56 different sailboats in his lifetime.
In 1927, the Coconut Grove Playhouse opened, which is, after the Historic Lyric Theater (1913) located in Overtown, the Tower Theater (1926) on Calle Ocho in Little Havana, and the Olympia Theater (1926) on Flagler Street, the fourth oldest theater in Miami.
From 1932 to 1945 Coconut Grove Dinner Key Marina was the headquarter of Pan Am Airlines and therefore next to the old offices in Key West, the birthplace of the Airline. Pan Am operated Sikorsky S-41 and Sikorsky S-42 flying boats called the Clippers.When the air traffic outgrew the location Pan Am moved their operations to a field far outside of the City of Miami called the Wilcox Field which is now the International Airport of Miami.
At Dinner Key Marina, Pan Am opened an Art Deco terminal building in 1934 and since 1954 this has been the City Hall of Miami and one of the most beautiful Art Deco buildings in Miami.
Coco Walk, with shops, restaurants, bars, and movie theater opened in Coconut Grove in 1990.
Every year there are many events in Coconut Grove, the Grove Food & Wine Festival takes place each April and each June, the Goombay Festival transforms Grand Avenue in Coconut Grove into a Caribbean Carnival. Since 1964 there has been the "Coconut Grove Arts Festival" and since 1982 the King Mango Strut parade has been organized annually.
The "Coconut Grove Housekeeper's Club", the oldest women club in Florida was founded in 1891 by Flora McFarlane and the beautiful Coral rock club house is still there today right next to the old library.
The primary purpose of the club was to improve the life for members of the community, but the club was also very involved in the protection of the Everglades with author and environmentalist Majorie Stoneman Douglas, who came up with the name “River of Gras” for the Everglades, being one of their members.
In the 1980’s and early 1990’s, before South Beach and Wynwood attracted people, Coconut Grove was the bohemian art district, the place to go out, the place for nightlife, bars and restaurants.
In 1926 famous botanist Dr. David Fairchild built a home on an 8-acre parcel on Biscayne Bay at 4013 Douglas Rd in Coconut Grove. He named it "The Kampong" and it is now a museum with over 3000 different plants.
Today 31,000 people live in Coconut Grove with an average household income of $170,809 and an Individual Average Income of $92,734.
Coconut Grove has long attracted celebrities, with past and present residents including Madonna, LeBron James, Christian Slater, and even Google co-founder Larry Page just to mention a few.
Sylvester Stalone, during the time he was married with Brigitte Nielson, owned a mansion right next to the Vizcaya.
Many movies were partly filmed in the Grove like Wild Things (1998), Any Given Sunday (1999), Absence of Malice (1981), Tony Rome (1967), Burn Notice (2007-2013), and Miami Rhapsody (1995) just to name a few.
Villa Vizcaya
Villa Vizcaya is a northern Italian renaissance castle built from 1914 until 1916 as a winter residence for the industrialist James Deering, the son of William Deering and heir to the International Harvester company who lived there until his death in 1925.
The original property had 180 acre in size and the interior decoration with numerous antiques was advised by the artist Paul Chalfin. The famous garden was created by Landscape architect Diego Suarez.
In 1945, the heirs donated 50 acres of land to the Archdiocese of St. Augustine to build Miami's Mercy Hospital and in 1952 it was signed over to the Archdiocese of Miami.
The main building was sold at that time for $1MIO to Miami-Dade County and since 1953 it has been open to the public as the Dade County Art Museum. It can be rented for corporate and private events and it was used as location for numerous films. In September 1987 Ronald Reagan met with Pope John Paul II there, and Bill Clinton welcomed the Latin American political leaders when he hosted the Summit of the Americas at the Viscaya in December 1994.
The museum contains more than seventy rooms of distinctive architectural interiors decorated with numerous antiques, with an emphasis on 15th through early 19th-century European decorative art and furnishings.