Your Community


KEY DATES AND EVENTS


• 1810 President James Madison declares West Florida to be a U.S. possession.


• 1817 to 1858 Te Seminole Wars (three conflicts) were fought between the Seminoles, many of whom had formed alliances with the British or Spanish, and the U.S. Army. By the end of the wars, only about 200 Seminoles remained alive and free.


• 1819 Spain ceded East Florida to the U.S. 12 www.EsteroChamber.org


• 1845 Florida entered the Union as a slave state, with a population of about 140,000.


• Early 1880s Immigrant German Gustave Damkoehler and his family moved to Estero as the area’s first homesteaders, eventually own- ing 320 acres. Damkoehler experimented with raising honeybees, pineapples and coconuts and collected rare trees he received from a friend in Australia. Some of the trees remain in the gardens at the Koreshan State Park along


with his cabin, which may be the oldest sur- viving building in Lee County.


• 1884 to 1885 Te Estero Land Co. was set up in Key West to sell acreage here. Per the Florida census, Estero’s population was 29 people from nine families.


• 1890s Citrus growers arrived, including Hafner and Floweree. Estero’s first school- house was built, a wooden structure that was relocated to Estero Community Park by the


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