Everglades History

In 1926, Everglades City High School opened and graduated a single student. A century later, the school still anchors this small riverside community.

Deaconess Harriet Bedell spent decades helping Seminole families keep their patchwork, baskets, and craft traditions alive.

The historic Bank of Everglades Building has been secured, with the elevator shaft, balcony, ramp, and window covers complete as the next phase begins.

The full Outlaws of the Everglades documentary, telling the community's 1970s and 80s smuggling story in the families' own words, is now online.

The hotel and the swampland scam that built the Port of the Islands.

A century after the men of Chokoloskee shot Bloody Ed Watson dead at Smallwood's dock, people are still arguing about whether they did right.

Progress continues at the Bank of Everglades Building with the exterior staircase and second-floor balcony now complete, plus French door openings now visible.

Federal fishing restrictions squeezed Everglades City for decades before the drug trade ever arrived. Desperation and geography did the rest.