June 25
- Florida Keys History Center
- 3 hours ago
- 2 min read
1826 – A letter written at Indian Key said “the musketoes are so numerous and voracious that they keep the hogs squealing, the dogs barking, and the fowls cackling all night.”
1928 – Eighteen Girl Scouts of Key West Troop A, accompanied by three adults, left on the Overseas Highway for a two-week camping expedition at Lower Matecumbe Key.
1946 – State Game Warden Chas. A. Lange warned Lower Keys residents that a nesting female alligator was near the pool at the Botanical Gardens on Stock Island. The alligator was fiercely protective of the nest and aggressive and Lange had an encounter with it, which required him to beat it back with a stick.
1976 – The Bicentennial musical “Cayo Hueso ‘76” opened at the Waterfront Playhouse. The musical that gave a colorful history of the island was written by Jim Russell with historic research by Betty Bruce and Peggy Murphree.
1976 – The General Services Administration announced it was declaring 40.47 waterfront acres of the “Harry Truman Annex” at the former Key West Naval Base as surplus property. The Little White House was exempted and was being withheld for later disposition because of its historic value.
1982 – The last Navy C-121 Super Constellation left Naval Air Station Key West on its last flight to the Air and Missile Museum in Florence, SC.
1982 – Father Joseph F. Beaver, “Key West People’s Priest,” died in New Orleans at the age of 64. A Jesuit priest, he was born in Key West and served nine years as parish priest in his native city.
1991 – Bobby Marion Francis was executed in the Florida State Prison at Starke for the August 17, 1975, murder of Titus Walters in Key West.
Information compiled by Dr. Corey Malcom, Lead Historian, Monroe County Public Library, Florida Keys History Center.
Image: Dive boat Coral Reef docked at the Truman Annex waterfront, Key West, 1979. Photo by Raymond L. Blazevic. Monroe County Public Library, Florida Keys History Center.
