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Murphy Burroughs Home
THE ORIGINAL TOWN SITE of Fort
Myers, consisting of 139.45 acres, was platted by Major James Evans in 1876 shortly after he acquired title to the fort site
from the federal government. the actual survey was made by Julian Arista, deputy surveyor of Monroe County, in which Fort
Myers was then located. The plat was located in December, 1876.
Much of the land in the original town was deeded to
pioneers who had settled there and the streets were laid out to conform with the property they were occupying. This explains
the irregularity of the street plan, something which has caused surveyors trouble ever since.
The number of inhabitants
eventually grew. By the mid-Eighteen-Eighties, approximately 100 families were living within the town limits. The need for
improvements and better law enforcement led the residents to incorporate the settlement as a town. Fort Myers was then incorporated
as a city by the State Legislature in April 1911.
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IN DECEMBER 1925, a wealthy winter visitor from Indianapolis
bought two single-family-home lots in Fort Myers on First Street near Billy's Creek for $160,000, certainly a noteworthy purchase
then. Hundreds of others also bought lots that month. The man from Indiana, a certain Mr. Hoosier, was interested in selling
the lots he had acquired, his motto being: Buy and sell, buy and sell. That's the way to make money. Hundreds of thousands
of other real estate seekers had the very same idea during the 1920s-all over Florida. Through the buying and selling of real
estate, Florida had its Big Boom, one of the craziest phenomena in America's real history. The beginnings of the Big Boom
go back to WWI. The public's capital reserves were copious. Farmers became rich. Factory workers pile up savings. Industrialists
and financiers made millions. The first signs of the Big Boom became evident between 1919 -1920 with the onslaught of the
Tin Can Tourists.
Two very renowned industrialists, Thomas Edision and Henry Ford, also found a friend in Fort
Myers, as did several others. Other businemen such as Walter Langford built his home in 1919, based on one he saw in Jacksonville.
After Langford's death, the home was purchased by George Kingston in 1925, and in 1953, it was acquired by the Methodist Church.
The house was only recently moved from the Methodist Church property, across Fowler Street, to a lot opposite the Burrough's
Home.
In 1901, John Morgan Dean, after being educated in Massachusetts and and subsequently founding a successful
furniture business, bought 38 acres adjoining Billy's Creek. Ten years later, Dean started developing the swampy, low-lying
area into today's Dean Park. Tour of Historic Dean Park,
During the Great Depression, the population of Fort Myers remained almost stationary. However, thereafter, the city really
started to spurt ahead and by 1945, the city had grown to a population of 15,198. Once travel restrictions had been removed
due to the war, the city's growth continued even faster than before. Subdivisions which had been borne during the Boom and
left to be overgrown with grass during the Depression, had been awoken to play host to hundreds of new homes in all parts
of the city. The city's infrastructure and facilities were improved, and Fort Myers was once again alive and booming.
Today,
after two decades of sluggish, or no growth, Historic Downtown has been rediscovered. The city's riverfront property has
been taken for high-rise luxury living. And many of the the city's original homes are being restored to their original
beauty and charm, making these landmarks very desirable for quality "Downtown living."
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