April 25

Postcard of the Key Wester Motel, featuring 87 rooms with private bath, pool, shuffleboard, dining room and cocktail lounge.

1832 – John J. Audubon arrived at Indian Key on the Revenue Cutter Marion.

1951 – A Compania Cubana de Aviacion four-motor aircraft carrying 34 passengers and a five-man crew flying from Miami to Havana collided with a Navy SNB-5 trainer with a two-man crew. Both planes crashed into the sea off South Beach with no survivors. The investigation later found both planes at fault in the accident.

1955 – The entire Key West City Planning Commission threaten to resign en masse in protest of what they said was the City Commission’s “complete disregard for state laws governing local zoning and general detrimental action against beautified planned growth of Key West.”

1961 – Charles Helberg, the builder and original proprietor of the Key Wester hotel, resumed control of the resort after it had been under the charge of an absentee hotel management group for four years. Helberg said the absentee model did not serve patrons, employees, or the community very well.

1975 – County Commissioner Harry S. Pritchard was unanimously elected mayor of Monroe County by the commission.

1980 – The Coast Guard ordered extra cutters to the Florida Straits to handle the increased flow of refugees from Cuban. This was the beginning of the largest peacetime operation in Coast Guard history.

Information compiled by Dr. Corey Malcom, Lead Historian, Monroe County Public Library, Florida Keys History Center.

Image: Postcard of the Key Wester Motel, featuring 87 rooms with private bath, pool, shuffleboard, dining room and cocktail lounge. Superfine Color Cards by Stein Craftsmen, Atlanta, Ga. Monroe County Public Library, Florida Keys History Center.