The Birth of the City of Miami 9


 Florida experienced its worst freeze since 1835 on the night of
December 29, 1894. The cold wave, which originated in the Mid-
west, moved down the country so fast that it did not have a chance
to warm up as it headed southward. Nor did it give forecasters
adequate time to notify farmers in Florida of the coming danger.
Temperatures sunk to 14 degrees at Jacksonville, and 18 at Tampa.
West Palm Beach recorded 30 degrees; ice formed one-eighth of an
inch thick in a fountain in front of Palm Beach's Royal Poinciana. At
Titusville, the temperature dipped to 18 degrees, rising only to 34 the
next day and back below freezing the following night. A temperature
of 26 degrees for three hours or more would freeze the juice of an
orange, making it unfit for eating. Florida's famous citrus crop was
lost, as well as the winter vegetable crop in the ground throughout the
state.15
 The word from the most southerly region of Florida, a land that
could only be reached by an exhausting two-day trip by stagecoach
over rough roads or by boat over the sometimes dangerous open
water route, was surprisingly different. One farmer in a letter to a
Titusville newspaper said:


 Biscayne Bay [area] is not frozen out as yet, as will be shown
 by the shipments of tomatoes made this month. Between 200
 and 300 crates will be shipped from here tomorrow, the 14th [of
 January]. The cold did little damage here. Pineapples are not
 hurt as far as can be seen. The leaves on the banana trees are
 burnt some, but the fruit is not injured. Irish potatoes, beans
 and beets did not suffer from the cold, and we will have a full
 crop of tomatoes.'6

All over Florida, farmers, developers and homeseekers looked upon
their barren trees and fields and took note of this "freeze proof"
section of Florida.
 As farmers were struggling from the devastating freeze of
December 1895, Florida was hit by an even worse freeze. On the
night of February 7, 1895, the temperature dropped to 18 at Orlando
and Titusville, 22 at Tampa, 20 at Daytona, and 14 at Jacksonville.
The following day the temperature failed to rise above freezing through-
out most of the state. In Jacksonville, the St. Johns River froze a
distance of eight feet from the southern bank and was thick enough