Early Florida History

1. Early Florida History The Spanish, the English, and Statehood

2. The First Floridians • About 10,000 years ago the earth began to cool, and this period is known as the Ice Age • Most of the earth’s water was frozen in huge ice sheets called glaciers • These glaciers froze up so much water that the sea levels were 350 feet lower than they are today • Florida was much larger in land than it is today, and animals migrated into Florida to avoid the ice • The earliest Floridians were nomads, or people who move from place to place in search of food • These people made weapons of stone and hunted Mammoths and Mastodons • By the 1500’s Native Americans had developed a complex civilization, and Florida was home to many Native Tribes • Florida was home to the following tribes: • Timucua and Apalachee who lived in North Florida and were farmers • Jeagas who lived in southeastern Florida and fished and hunted • Tequesta who lived in southern Florida and gathered food from the land around them • Tocobaga who lived in the Tampa area who hunted and farmed

4. La Florida • The first European to land in Florida was Juan Ponce de Leon • He landed on the east coast of Florida and named the land “La Florida” after Pascua Florida or Flowery Easter, which is a holiday in Spain • Ponce de Leon tried to set up a settlement in Florida, but his settlement was attacked by the Calusas • Ponce de Leon and his soldiers retreated to Havana, Cuba where he died of an arrow injury • Many other Spaniards tried to colonize Florida • Some of these expeditions believed that there was gold in Florida, and some wanted to conquer the native people • These men are known as conquistadors or conquerors • The Spanish also established missions • Hernando de Soto was a Spanish explorer who landed in Florida • His goal was to search for riches in the new land • He traveled from Tampa Bay all the way to Northern Mississippi • De Soto died along the Mississippi River, and his expedition was a failure, but he was the first European to explore the mainland of North America

5. Juan Ponce de Leon and Hernando de Soto

6. St. Augustine • Fort Caroline was founded by the French near modern day Jacksonville, and was a French stronghold • St. Augustine was founded by Pedro Menendez de Aviles and was a Spanish garrison, or military fort, and is the oldest permanent settlement in the United States • The King of Spain ordered Aviles to destroy Ft. Caroline and remove the French from Florida • Aviles attacked the fort and killed all the French living there • Sir Francis Drake, a British privateer, or legal pirate would frequently raid St. Augustine • Because of these raids, the Spanish built a fort named Castillo de San Marcos, to protect the citizens of St. Augustine from attack • These events would spark rivalry between the three nations over Florida, but Spain owned the territory

7. Castillo de San Marcos

8. British Florida • Britain and France were at war with one another in the French and Indian War and the Spanish sided with the French • During this war, Britain captured the city of Havana, Cuba; which was a major Spanish port • At the end of the war, the Spanish traded the whole Florida territory to the British to get Havana back • The British agreed to this, and took control of Florida • Florida was split into two colonies West Florida and East Florida (the 14th and 15th colonies) • These colonies did not rebel against Britain, and remained loyal throughout the Revolution • The British ruled Florida from this time to the end of the Revolutionary War • At the end of the Revolutionary war Britain agreed to give Florida back to the Spanish

9. A Battle in the French and Indian War

10. Florida as a US Territory • The United States fought in the Spanish American War, against Spain • At the end of the war, the US signed the Adams-Onís Treaty in which they agreed to give Texas to Spain, in exchange for Florida • The US took possession of the territory, and ran into problems with the native people of Florida • The Seminole Indians were an Indian tribe that was a mixture of other tribes and escaped slaves • The US wanted to get rid of the Seminole Indians in Florida, and took part in three wars against them, spending 10 years and 20 million dollars trying to do so • Many of the Seminole were forced to move to Oklahoma, but some survived by moving into the Everglades • In 1837 the territory of Florida was home to 48,000 people • These people started to petition the US government to allow Florida to become a state

11. Chief Osceola and General Andrew Jackson Leader of the Seminole in the Seminole Wars Leader of the US army in the Seminole Wars

12. Florida as a US State • Florida became a state on March 3rd, 1845 • More than half the population of the state at that time were black slaves working on plantations • It was for this reason that Florida joined the rest of the Southern Slave States and seceded from the Union when Abraham Lincoln was elected • To secede means to leave a government and become an independent state • There were many civil war battles throughout Florida including the Battle of Gainesville and the Battle of Natural Bridge • After the war, Florida entered Reconstruction, or the reorganization and rebuilding of the Southern States • Like most of the South, Florida had laws which required segregation, or the separation or isolation of a race