Ponce Inlet
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From the City of Daytona Beach’s website:
From the Town of Ponce Inlet Website:
From the Town of Ponce Inlet Website:
History of Ponce Inlet
| 1513 | Ponce De Leon explores Ponce Inlet area |
| 1565 | Spanish establish St. Augustine, and gain control of Florida, driving out the French. |
| 1763 | Spain loses Florida to English at end of French and Indian War. |
| 1768 | Dr Turnbbull settles a group of Greeks, Italians and Minorcans in the largest British colonial attempt in North America at New Smyrna. |
| 1783 | Turnbull County deserted by indentured settlers who go to St. Augustine. |
| 1790 | Spain attempts to settle outlands from St. Augustine, by use of land grants. |
| 1803 | Antonio Pons (Ponz or Ponce), a New Smyrna Minorcan, is granted 175 acres on the point where the lighthouse now stands, which he had been farming for 20 years. |
| 1806 | Antonio Pons is driven off by the Indians and moves to St. Augustine. |
| 1812 | Antonio Pons is killed while serving the King of Spain during the Patriots War, started by the Americans. |
| 1820 | Pons’ widow receives an additional grant of 230 acres in return for her husband’s service to Spain. |
| 1821 | Florida ceded to United States by Spain. Live oak lumbering began at Los Mosquitoes (Ponce de Leon Inlet). |
| 1834 | First lighthouse built on New Smyrna side of Inlet was destroyed by Indians and a storm. |
| 1842 | Bartola Pacetti, descendant of an Italian settler at New Smyrna builds a house of driftwood on fifty acres of Turnbull Grant of the north side of the Inlet. |
| 1860 | Mercedes Pacetti gains Ponce Grant from heirs through a tax sale. |
| 1867 | Florida Land and Lumber Company establishes the Village of Port Orange near the Ponce Grant . Postal stamp moved to Dunlawton Plantation, present site of that city. |
| 1870 | Congress appropriates $60,000 to secure a site and build a lighthouse. |
| 1883 | Ten acres purchased from Bartola Pacetti for $400 for lighthouse reservation site. |
| 1884 | Major ( formerly Brigadier General ) Orville Babcock, appointed engineer for building the lighthouse and who named the community Ponce ( Pons ) Park, drowns in the Inlet. |
| 1887 | Lighthouse goes into service on November 1st of this year. |
| 1890 | Nathaniel Hasty files Ponce Park subdivision plat. La Ponce Hotel built on the river shore. |
| 1903 | Bert Pacetti, son of Bartola, named Bird Preservation Warden of the Mosquitoe Inlet Sanctuary by President Theodore Roosevelt. |
| 1926 | Collapse of Florida Land Boom and work stops on Robert Pacetti’s dream . . . “The Inlet Terrace Hotel and Subdivision.” |
| 1928 | Name of Mosquito Inlet changed to Ponce de Leon Inlet. |
| 1937 | Coast Guard takes over U.S. Lighthouse Service and the lighthouse here. |
| 1941 | Families moved off lighthouse property with the outbreak of World War II. |
| 1946 | Electric power run to Inlet |
| 1960 | Hurricane Donna rips through Volusia County and Ponce Inlet with winds up to 100 mph. Electricity went out for 24 hours. |
| 1963 | Town of Ponce Inlet incorporated August 20th. First Town Council sworn in at the lighthouse office. |
| 1964 | Town leases lighthouse property for $1.00 per year from U.S. Government for a Town Hall. |
| 1969 | Water service brought to inlet by the Town. |
| 1970 | Light turned off and re-established in New Smyrna Beach across from the Inlet. |
| 1971 | First Ponce Inlet police car rolls into service on Good Friday night. |
| 1972 | Interior Department, U.S. Government, deeds lighthouse reservation to Ponce Inlet. |
| 1975 | Lighthouse open to public daily by preservation society. |
| 1980 | Ponce Inlet Government moves into new Town Hall. |
| 1982 | New light returned to tower and new balcony opened for public at top. |
| 1999 | Hurricane Irene rips through Volusia County and Ponce Inlet with winds up to 100 mph.~ Electricity went out for nearly three days. |
| 2003 | New Public Works facility is built at 4875 S. Peninsula, on the site of the old building.~ Dedication takes place November 21, 2003. |
| 2004 | Hurricanes Charley, Jeanne, Ivan, & Frances tear through Florida making this an unprecedented Hurricane Season.~ Power poles along Atlantic Avenue are snapped like tooth-picks, there is flooding, several homes are damaged and many trees are destroyed.~ Fortunately, no lives are lost here in Ponce Inlet.~ |
| 2005 | Ponce Inlet Police Dept. earns State Accreditation. |