South Beach

Verified Timeline

Lore & Background

South Beach started as farmland. In 1870, Henry and Charles Lum purchased 165 acres for coconut farming. Charles Lum built the first house on the beach in 1886. In 1894, the Lum brothers left, leaving control to John Collins, who came two years later to survey the land. In 1912, the Lummus Brothers acquired 400 acres of Collins' land. In 1912, Collins started construction of a bridge from Miami to Miami Beach. Carl G. Fisher loaned $50,000 to Collins for the bridge, which was completed in June 1913. On March 26, 1915, Collins, Lummus, and Fisher incorporated the Town of Miami Beach. The area has gone through numerous changes, including the 1926 hurricane, which destroyed much of the area. Until the mid-1920s, antisemitic covenants were used to exclude Jews from neighborhoods north of Fifth Street. In the 1930s, Art Deco, Streamline Moderne, and Nautical Moderne architecture came to South Beach. In 1964, Jackie Gleason brought his variety series to the area. From the mid-1960s through the 1980s, South Beach was used as a retirement community. The Miami Beach Architectural District was designated in 1979. In the late 1980s, a renaissance began with an influx of fashion industry professionals. Thomas Kramer is credited with starting the construction boom.

In Their Own Story

The transformation of South Beach has been driven by dramatic turning points. In the mid-1960s through the 1980s, the area served as a retirement community filled with elderly residents on fixed incomes, while simultaneously becoming a base for 'cocaine cowboys' drug dealers. This era was immortalized in the 1983 film *Scarface* and the television show *Miami Vice*, which filmed extensively here because many buildings were already in poor condition. The narrative shifted again in the late 1980s when a renaissance began, bringing fashion industry professionals to the area. In 1989, Irene Marie purchased the Sun Ray Apartments on Ocean Drive. Thomas Kramer is credited with driving the subsequent construction boom and gentrification, turning the neighborhood into a destination for the wealthy, even as critics deride the new high-rises as a 'concrete jungle'.

Reader's Guide

South Beach is a major entertainment destination with hundreds of nightclubs, restaurants, boutiques, and hotels. It is popular with tourists from Canada, Europe, Israel, and the entire Western Hemisphere. The area is traversed by numerical streets running east–west, starting with Biscayne Street (South Pointe Drive) and Lincoln Road. Principal north–south roads include Bay Road, West Avenue, Alton Road, Lenox Avenue, Michigan Avenue, Jefferson Avenue, Meridian Avenue, Euclid Avenue, Pennsylvania Avenue, Drexel Avenue, Washington Avenue, Collins Avenue, and Ocean Drive. South Beach is considered a hub of LGBT lifestyle, home to many hotels, clubs, and nightlife. It hosts the Pride Parade and Pride Festival during Miami Beach Pride, which draws over 130,000 people.

Did You Know?

• South Beach claims to be the world's largest collection of Streamline Moderne Art Deco architecture.
• The Collins Bridge, completed in 1913, provided the first vital land link between mainland Miami and the beaches.
• Joe's Stone Crab restaurant opened in 1913, the same year Carl G. Fisher first visited the beach.
• The lifeguard towers on South Beach were redesigned by architect William Lane after Hurricane Andrew.