Creating a national park can take much longer than imagining one. For South Florida’s lower Everglades, the gap between a proposal and a dedicated park stretched across nearly two decades. Ernest F. Coe is the name most closely tied to that campaign, but the story also belongs to scientists, elected officials, journalists and civic groups who kept the idea moving. Today, Miami Airboat operates airboat tours within the Everglades and Francis S. Taylor Wildlife Management Area, part of South Florida’s wider Everglades landscape. The national park is a separate place, but its history helps explain how the region came to be seen as worth protecting.

A Landscape Architect in Coconut Grove

According to the National Park Service, Coe was born in New Haven, Connecticut, studied at Yale’s School of Fine Arts from 1885 to 1887, and later worked in landscape design. He and his wife, Anna, moved to Miami in 1925 and settled in Coconut Grove.

The Park Service’s biography says that during his explorations of the Everglades, Coe saw rare birds being killed and unusual orchids being removed from the wild. He feared that species would be lost without protection, and he began pressing for Florida’s tropical environment to be preserved.

From a Letter to an Act of Congress

In 1928, Coe wrote to Stephen T. Mather, the first director of the National Park Service, proposing a national park in the lower Everglades. That same year, supporters organized an association to promote the idea. The National Park Service’s finding aid for Coe’s papers reports that the Tropic Everglades National Park Association was formed at a meeting in Miami Beach on December 11, 1928. Botanist Dr. David Fairchild was elected president, and Coe served as its executive leader. The group later became the Everglades National Park Association.

The campaign quickly reached Washington. Senator Duncan B. Fletcher introduced park legislation in December 1928. On March 1, 1929, President Herbert Hoover directed the Park Service to study whether a park was feasible, and in early 1930 an inspection party visited South Florida. The finding aid lists its members, including Park Service director Horace M. Albright, Arno B. Cammerer, Roger W. Toll, T. Gilbert Pearson of the National Association of Audubon Societies, Dr. Hermon C. Bumpus, Fairchild, Representative Ruth Bryan Owen of Miami, and journalist Marjory Stoneman Douglas.

Congress approved the authorizing legislation on May 25, 1934, and President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed it on May 30, 1934. The Park Service’s park establishment history notes that the 1934 act described an area of 2,164,480 acres. It also set a strong preservation mandate: the park was to be kept as wilderness, with no development that would interfere with preserving its unique plants and animals.

Thirteen More Years

Authorization was a milestone, not a finish line. In the Park Service’s words, it took “another thirteen years to acquire the land and define the boundaries.” The 1934 act did not by itself put land into federal hands. That still had to be assembled.

Two contributions from Florida helped close the gap. The Park Service reports that the 1946 Florida Legislature appropriated $2 million to buy privately held land. The Florida Federation of Women’s Clubs also donated Royal Palm State Park, about 4,000 acres on Paradise Key, which became the nucleus of the new national park.

President Harry S. Truman dedicated Everglades National Park at Everglades City on December 6, 1947. His published address from that day acknowledges John Pennekamp as chairman of the ceremonies, along with Interior Secretary Julius A. Krug, Governor Millard Caldwell and Senators Spessard L. Holland and Claude Pepper. A Park Service anniversary release lists Coe and Douglas among the Floridians in attendance, along with Daniel Beard, the park’s first superintendent. The same release describes Everglades as the first national park set aside for its biological uniqueness.

Remembering Coe, and the Coalition

Coe died on January 1, 1951. The Park Service quotes the Secretary of the Interior as saying that Coe’s years of effort had earned him “a place among the immortals of the National Park movement.” On December 6, 1996, the park’s main visitor center was christened the Ernest F. Coe Visitor Center in his honor.

The Park Service describes Coe as having pushed the park forward almost single-handedly, and his persistence is well documented. Its own records also show how many others were involved:

• David Fairchild, who served as the association’s president
• Senator Duncan B. Fletcher, who introduced the first legislation
• Ruth Bryan Owen, T. Gilbert Pearson and the other members of the 1930 inspection party
• The Florida Legislature, which funded land purchases in 1946
• The Florida Federation of Women’s Clubs, which donated Royal Palm State Park
• John Pennekamp and the Florida officials recognized at the 1947 dedication

Taken together, the record suggests that a park boundary reflects many proposals, votes, purchases and donations rather than a single moment of inspiration.

Learning the history adds another dimension to the landscape. If you would like to see part of South Florida’s wider Everglades for yourself, you can explore Miami Airboat’s tour options within the Everglades and Francis S. Taylor Wildlife Management Area.

Sources

• National Park Service, Ernest F. Coe
• National Park Service, Ernest F. Coe (Everglades National Park history and culture)
• National Park Service, South Florida Collections, Records of the Everglades National Park Commission (aka Ernest F. Coe Papers), 1932-1945
• National Park Service, Park Establishment
• National Park Service, Everglades National Park Celebrates Sixtieth Anniversary
• Harry S. Truman Library, Address on Conservation at the Dedication of Everglades National Park
• Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission, Everglades and Francis S. Taylor Wildlife Management Area