Browse Items (281 total)

The Spanish laid-out the street system of St. Augustine in the First Spanish Period. They did not give streets formal names, but rather referred to them based on an important building alongside the road or to where the road led. If the road was…

Before the construction of the lighthouse, there were a series of wooden watchtowers in the area. The earliest reference to watchtowers dates back to 1589 on a map depicting the raid on St. Augustine by Sir Francis Drake. In 1737 the Spanish replaced…

This gate's history is directly related to the Cubo Line Defense which was a log stockade dating back to the very beginning of the 18th century.First built in 1739, its purpose was to help protect the City of St. Augustine from invaders by land. In…

This creek first appeared and was named on the Antonio Arredondo map of 1737. There is no definitive answer of who this lake is named after. It used to be the eastern boundary of the City of St. Augustine reaching as far north as present-day Flagler…

Completed in March of 1847 and owned by Burroughs E. Carr, it was one of the finest hotels of its time. It started off with seventeen rooms as the Magnolia House in the Territorial architectural style. It increased to forty-five rooms by 1853, and…

Opened on December 25, 1888, the Alcazar is the sister hotel to Henry Flagler's Hotel Ponce de Leon. It was designed by the same architects, and originally it was constructed with three floors, but after the 1891 season a fourth floor was added to…

The Governor's House got its start in 1598 as the Royal Governor of East Florida's residence when Governor Gonzalo Mendez de Canzo built his home on this property. The structure followed the typical city plans as a home and center for administrative,…

Before the construction of the large coquina fort, there were a series of nine wooden watchtowers/forts used to defend St. Augustine. The building of the Castillo was necessary to prevent easy destruction. Governor Don Manuel de Cendoya oversaw the…

The Hotel Ponce de Leon was opened in 1888 by Henry Flagler as a luxury hotel in St. Augustine, FL. Henry Flagler is accredited with modernizing St. Augustine and turning it into the "Newport of the South." This was his first hotel, but he went on to…