MYAKKA RIVER STATE PARK HALS FL-16 13208 State Road 72 HALS FL-16 Sarasota Sarasota County

WRITTEN HISTORICAL AND DESCRIPTIVE DATA

HISTORIC AMERICAN LANDSCAPES SURVEY U.S. Department of the Interior 1849 C Street NW Washington, DC 20240-0001 HISTORIC AMERICAN LANDSCAPES SURVEY

MYAKKA RIVER STATE PARK

HALS NO. FL-16 Location: 13208 State Road 72, Sarasota, Sarasota County, Florida

Latitude 27.240277, Longitude -82.315434 (center of the entrance station)

Myakka River State Park is located on Florida Highway 72, nine miles east of I- 75, in Sarasota County and Manatee County.

Significance: Myakka River State Park is significant in the early twentieth century history of Florida as one of the nine state park units created through state planning for natural resource conservation, recreation, and tourism during the New Deal era.

The Florida State Park System had its beginning in 1934 as a result of President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s New Deal program to relieve the economic distress of unemployed American youth during the Great Depression. The large outlay of federal assistance made in Florida during the New Deal era to preserve scenic, historic, and scientific resources of the State includes nine units of the state park system. In 1933, the Civilian Conservation Corp (CCC) was the first New Deal agency to begin operations in Florida. Between 1933 and 1942 the CCC assisted the state in constructing Florida Caverns State Park, , Gold Head Branch State Park, Highlands Hammock State Park, Hillsborough River State Park, Myakka River State Park, O’Leno State Park, and , and the Works Progress Administration (WPA) assisted in constructing Ravine Gardens State Park.

The assemblage of buildings, structures, objects, and cultural landscapes of the nine parks together exemplifies the New Deal era National Park Service inspired Rustic Style of master planned public recreational landscape.

This New Deal era cultural landscape of Myakka River State Park is at risk of being lost, threatened by the gradual diminishment of historic integrity, as are all nine New Deal era cultural landscapes in the Florida State Parks System. The reason is cultural landscapes are scarcely understood, Cultural Landscape Reports are lacking, maintenance is severely underfunded, and a shortage of technical staff is imperiling historic New Deal era cultural landscapes in Florida.

Description: These nine HALS Short Format surveys address the cultural landscapes of the nine Florida state parks that were master planned and developed for nature conservation, recreation, and tourism under federal economic relief programs of the New Deal era between 1933 and 1943.

Prior cultural resource surveys focused primarily on the buildings and structures MYAKKA RIVER STATE PARK HALS NO. FL-16 PAGE 2

in these nine parks and produced very little documentation on the cultural landscapes beyond recognizing the parks are the largest cultural resource, both in terms of acreage and number of components.1

This is work is prepared as a submittal to the 2014 HALS Challenge, “Documenting Landscapes of the New Deal” and not intended to be an in-depth survey of New Deal era cultural landscape resources in Florida. It can be stated based on these surveys that these nine parks merit consideration for a multiple property listing as a Thematic or Property Type under Florida New Deal Resources: Historic Landscapes of Conservation, Recreation and Tourism. It also is recommended to get them documented before they are lost.

The support of park managers and staff, Florida State Park System managers and staff, and the Florida Master Site File managers and staff is hereby acknowledged and appreciated for access to the parks, park archives, as well as personal accommodation and information.

Prior to Florida taking steps in 1935 to establish a system of state parks, efforts had been largely sporadic. The Florida Legislature in 1925 passed a law creating a Florida State Park System to provide public recreation, the preservation of natural beauty and historic association. No funds were appropriated and the establishment of a state park system languished.

The first public land set aside for recreation and preservation of natural resources was at Paradise Key in Dade County, in 1915, otherwise known as Royal Palm State Park. The park was later included in the National Park. Royal Palm State Park became the site of the first Civilian Conservation Corps work camp in Florida, CCC Camp SP-01.

Highlands Hammock was acquired in 1929 and developed as a private park through the efforts of the Tropical Florida Parks Association and opened to the public in 1931, and soon afterward was acquired by the state to become the first unit of the Florida State Park system.

Beginning in 1933 and continuing to 1942, the CCC and Works Progress Administration (WPA) constructed an impressive collection of facilities in nine Florida state parks: Florida Caverns State Park, Fort Clinch State Park, Gold Head Branch State Park, Highlands Hammock State Park, Hillsborough River State Park, Myakka River State Park, O’Leno State Park, Ravine Gardens State Park, and Torreya State Park.

1 These nine HALS Short Format surveys are based on information from “Cultural Resource Survey, New Deal Era Resources in Nine Florida State Parks,” Unit Management Plans for each park, and other primary and secondary data particular to each park. MYAKKA RIVER STATE PARK HALS NO. FL-16 PAGE 3

The New Deal provided Florida with the latest in design, including Art Deco, Streamline Moderne, and in the nine state parks, the Rustic Style. Each park is a master planned public recreational landscape, and the assemblage of park buildings, structures, objects, and cultural landscapes are characteristic of the National Park Service inspired Rustic Style of park planning, design and construction.

These nine state parks are stylistically similar through the common use of native rough cut timbers and rubble stone, English Arts and Crafts detailing, and the harmonious cluster compositions of a “rural” natural setting. The model for this approach was compiled in the 1938 book “Park and Recreation Structures” by Albert Good, a landscape architect employed in the National Park Service Washington office. The book was an outgrowth of his original 1935 edition published with Civilian Conservation Corps funding. The book was a primary source for the National Park Service Rustic Style, with examples taken from state parks nationwide and a few from the national parks. It became the standard pattern book for park development in the New Deal era. “Recreation Plans Handbook,” published by the U.S. Forest Service in 1936, was another pattern book of the Rustic Style.2 “What made these books so seamless in their applications was the advocacy for adapting simple building types to local materials and methods of construction.”3

These pattern books produced similar buildings, structures, and objects from park to park, with local variations based on architect, local economics, and availability of construction materials and skilled craftsmen. The use of locally acquired materials and the limited variety of Florida building materials -- limestone, cypress, pine, and palm logs -- further emphasized the likeness in facilities from park to park. Park and building plans were produced under direction of Landscape Architect Emmitt Hill working as inspector for the Florida State Park Service and Landscape Architect Charles Vinten as inspector for the National Park Service in Florida. Together, all nine parks are recognizable as a type – a New Deal era Florida state park -- yet each is distinctive in its response to the natural environment. The master planning of each park responded to the features of the native environment, making no two cultural landscapes identical. It began with well- chosen units of land for the park, and then adapting the park recreational program to the environment.

2 The “Standard of Design” section in the appendix was written by Landscape Architect Frank A. Waugh. 3 Ceo, Rocco. “Building Close to Nature: The Early Architecture of Dade County’s Park System,” http://apps.acsa-arch.org/resources/proceedings/uploads/streamfile.aspx?path= ACSA.AM.96&name=ACSA.AM.96.32.pdf

MYAKKA RIVER STATE PARK HALS NO. FL-16 PAGE 4

Highlands Hammock State Park, for example, exemplifies an ancient subtropical forest on the central Florida ridge. Mayakka River State Park exemplifies a broad subtropical river flood plain. Hillsborough River State Park exemplifies river rapids running through a riparian hardwood forest. O’Leno State Park exemplifies a river running through a karst landscape. Florida Caverns State Park exemplifies a cavern complex in a karst landscape. Torreya State Park exemplifies high bluffs, deep ravines, and rare Torreya trees, and an antebellum plantation historical theme. Fort Clinch exemplifies the historical theme of a nineteenth century coastal fortification. Goldhead branch exemplifies a system of springs in a steepside ravine system and sinkhole lakes in a karst landscape on the central Florida ridge. Ravine Gardens exemplifies a floral display garden in a steephead ravine, and unlike the other eight natural parks, this an urban park.

These nine parks retain the essential physical features that enable them to convey historic significance and convey a sense of a historic environment. Alterations and intrusions of non-contributing resources have not substantially changed the historic landscapes. Original features retain historical integrity and many are unchanged from the period of significance.

There are seven aspects or qualities that contribute to the historic integrity of the park cultural landscapes: location, design, setting, materials, workmanship, feeling, and association.

Location is where the historic park was developed. All nine parks are in their original locations. Even as acreage was added since the period of significance, original boundaries were not diminished.

Design is the combination of elements that created the historic parks, beginning with natural character of the land parcel, its spatial patterns, and the overlay of the park conservation and recreation master plan. Each park master plan is closely associated with the dominant landscape feature of its land parcel. All nine parks retain their original design and have retained essential character defining features and details to a high degree though alterations and additions and modernization of amenities.

For example, relocating the park entry station at Hillsborough State Park constitutes a dramatic non-contributing modification (adding a new entry road and new entry station) that obscures important characteristics of the original entry design and impairs the historic arrival/departure sequence, but those features could be removed without impairing the original design and appearance and should not preclude eligibility of the park under Criteria C.

Setting is the historical physical environment of the park. The park landscapes have changed over time, for example at Highlands Hammock State Park where eighty years of fire suppression and modification of surface water has resulted in MYAKKA RIVER STATE PARK HALS NO. FL-16 PAGE 5

a substantial change of the forest species composition and increasing density filling in openings in the forest canopy. Additionally, CCC-planted forest plantations are reaching maturity in parks where the conservation objective was reforestation. The park forests should be viewed not only as natural systems, but as contributing elements of the cultural landscape, and managed as cultural systems where modification constitutes a visual change in the original park design.

Materials are the combined physical elements that create the historic style, pattern, and configuration of the park. The loss of materials dating from the period of significance impairs the historic park setting, for example where wood shake roof material is replaced with asphalt shingles, and where original paint color is modified, and where New Deal era roadside limestone masonry culvert headwalls in Highlands Hammock State Park are removed and replaced with non-contributing material that is inconsistent with the historic period and compromises the overall interpretation associated with those facilities.

Workmanship is the physical evidence of the functional and aesthetic skill of the people who built Florida’s New Deal era state parks. The labor force was mostly unskilled and semi-skilled youth working under the direction of peer crew leaders, managed by skilled local experienced men, directed by camp superintendents implementing designs produced by professional landscape architects. Workmanship associated with the use of natural buildings materials is a critical component for eligibility of the parks under Criteria C. The Rustic Style and rusticated exposed surfaces ensured that the rustic atmosphere and natural beauty of the parks were preserved.

Feeling is the expression of the aesthetic quality and historic sense of the New Deal era Florida state parks. Integrity of feeling is associated with the concept of retaining a sense of place – the genius loci. For example, a New Deal era state park that retains its original design, materials, workmanship, and setting will express the feeling of the time that it was constructed and its historic purposes of conservation and recreation.

Association is the direct link between the New Deal era, the organizations and people who created the parks, and the parks themselves. These nine cultural landscapes are the most tangible manifestations of the historic events associated with the establishment of the Florida state park system. The passage of time, the changing needs and expectations for Florida parks, as well as better understanding of nature conservation have modified the direct associations with the original purposes, but the parks remain remarkably unchanged.

Myakka River State Park

Not only is Myakka River State Park one of the oldest State Parks in Florida, it is MYAKKA RIVER STATE PARK HALS NO. FL-16 PAGE 6

one of the three largest. The park also was one of the few in Florida developed, in part, by African American enrollees, around which controversy and a struggle against oppression ensued from racial prejudice involving the use of black youth to build the park.4

In August 1935 a workforce of fifty African American CCC enrollees from Company 5430 were relocated to Myakka River State Park. Florida was a racially segregated state through bigoted local prejudices and Jim Crow laws, and the local white community protested their presence. Rumors spread through Sarasota County that the CCC intended to replace the white camp with a black camp. Acting Superintendent Lawson spoke out forcefully in favor of accepting the enrollees. Sarasota's representative in the state legislature warned that “either the negroes would be placed in the park to work, or the CCC camp would be abandoned.”5 The community voted to reject the black enrollees. Buildings were locked, equipment was moved, the CCC camp was evacuated and the African American enrollees were transferred to the old Fort Moultrie military complex on Sullivan's Island in Charlestown, South Carolina. The loss of this CCC workforce was soon noticed and sentiment within Sarasota turned to favor a black camp to no camp at all. Less than a month after closing the camp, the African American company returned to continue developing the park.6

Many buildings and structures constructed by CCC workforce still exist in the park, including those likely built by the African-American CCC company. This New Deal era cultural landscape is historically significant particularly for its association with the contributions of the African American enrollee workforce/ That interpretation should be an “important component of the visitor experience.”7

Myakka River State Park covers approximately 58 square miles, stretching twelve miles east to west and eight miles north to south, of such vast openness that it has been compared to the African veldt. The park resembles Florida as it must have looked before the arrival of Europeans. This is the southernmost and most subtropical of the Florida state parks developed during the New Deal era.

4 Becky O’Sullivan. “Site Seeing: Myakka River State Park and the Civilian Conservation Corps,” Experience Archaeology, FPAN West Central Blog. http://www.flpublicarchaeology.org/blog/wcrc/2012/09/06/site-seeing-myakka-river-state-park- and-the-civilian-conservation-corps/. 5 Sullivan, John J. “The Civilian Conservation Corps and the Creation of The Myakka River State Park,” Tampa Bay History, Fall/Winter 1987, Volume 9, Number 2. 6 Adams, William R. (Coordinator). “Cultural Resource Survey, New Deal Era Resources in Nine Florida State Parks,” Proposal # DNR: 276-88/89, Historic Property Associates, Inc., St. Augustine, Florida, November, 1989:28. 7 Florida State Parks. “Myakka River State Park Unit Management Plan,” State of Florida Department of Environmental Protection Division of Recreation and Parks, December 7, 2004. http://www.dep.state.fl.us/parks/planning/parkplans/MyakkaRiverStatePark.pdf MYAKKA RIVER STATE PARK HALS NO. FL-16 PAGE 7

The park contains extraordinary scenic and biological values. Pine flat woods with scattered ponds make up most of the preserve.The Myakka River flows through the park, widened behind dams to form lakes, bordered by marshes, and marshes bordered by palm and oak hammocks.

Designated for its beauty and undeveloped character, twelve miles of the Florida Wild and Scenic Myakka River8 flows from its northeast to southeast corners through a landscape mosaic of pinelands, oak and palm hammocks, prairies and wetlands that flood the landscape during the summer wet season. Wildlife is abundant and the park is noted for bird life,9 with migratory birds described as reaching “spectacular concentrations.”10

The Myakka River with its upper and lower lakes is the principal topographical feature of the park. During the summer rainy season much of the park landscape is flooded. An elevated area named Shep Island nestled close to a long bend in the river a seasonal island that remains above the flood level. Sportsmen have long enjoyed the area and local residents picnicked there before it was a park. Shep Island also is where the CCC concentrated the main camp and recreational facilities. The largest concentrations of CCC cultural resources in the park are clustered at this main camp.

The park was planned with a “well-built net[work] of trails. A constant depth of water at the Upper Lake [behind a dam], a boat and saddle concession, picnic areas, overnight cabins, a playground, and a fish pond were all built in the 1930s by the Civilian Conservation Corps workforce.

In addition to the conventional recreational facilities shared by most of the Florida New Deal era state parks, such as cabins, campgrounds, trails, pavilions and various support structures, the CCC workforce at Myakka River State Park constructed water impoundments for enhancing the birdlife.

Myakka State Park is unique in the Florida State Park System in using palm logs for constructing five single-story cabins elevated above the ground on limestone foundation piers raising them above the water level of the annual flooding.

Constructed in 1935, cabin exterior walls are palm log secured to an internal post

8 The Wild & Scenic Myakka River. http://www.conservationfoundation.com/land- protection/wild-scenic-myakka-river/ 9 John H. Peyton, Student Wildlife Technician, Part 2, the topography of the Park, http://publicfiles.dep.state.fl.us/DRP/NCR/CCC_Driapsa/CCC%20Research%20- %20National%20Archives%202008/august%20trip%20073.jpg 10 Florida State Parks. “Myakka River State Park Unit Management Plan,” State of Florida Department of Environmental Protection Division of Recreation and Parks, December 7, 2004. http://www.dep.state.fl.us/parks/planning/parkplans/MyakkaRiverStatePark.pdf MYAKKA RIVER STATE PARK HALS NO. FL-16 PAGE 8

and beam structural system constructed of hand-hewn pine and oak. The palm logs are attached to the structural frame with heavy gauge wire and the spaces between the logs are chinked with an asphalt and sawdust mortar.

A dam and earthen levee are important CCC projects. A dam of limestone walls on both sides was constructed in 1938 with a 300 foot long half-moon shaped concrete spillway in between. The 1,000 foot long and twenty-five foot high earth levee, called the Vanderipe Levee, was constructed in 1940 across Vanderipe Slough to retain the water level in the Upper Myakka Lake during the dry season. The constantly elevated water level caused an adverse effect on the natural environment, interrupting the annual cycle or wet and dry seasons upon which the native plant and animal species were dependent.11

History: Myakka State Park came into the state park system in 1934, primarily through the efforts of Arthur B. Edwards, a Sarasota real estate developer and appointee to the Florida Board of Forestry.12 Edwards led the campaign to develop a park in the Myakka River valley. Community leaders secured the CCC workforce to build the park through the donation of land.

An advance party of the CCC company from Green Cove Springs arrived on October 17, 1934, and set up a temporary tent camp until permanent structures were built. The CCC camp originally was established for state forestry purposes, but was soon converted to a state park camp, designated CCC Camp SP-4. The main party of the CCC company arrived for work on November 2, 1934.

They entered a land of stunning beauty with hammock forests, pine woods, open prairie, and rattlesnakes; yes rattlesnakes which found ways into the tents, making construction of barracks a top priority! CCC superintendent Earl Porter, reported “conditions in the tents are very unsatisfactory with outdoor kitchen, no floors, and rattlesnakes being found on the camp site and even in the tents.” Some enrollees became sick with malaria, and some deserted, shocked by the primitive conditions of the temporary camp in which they were required to live. It was not until January 1935 that the barracks and dining hall were completed.

By 1934, “the state engineer [had] started a survey of park land, and a landscape engineer from the Department of the Interior began to study the layout [, and the] Army was ready to bring a CCC company to the park.”13 Under the direction of

11 Florida State Parks. “Myakka River State Park Unit Management Plan,” State of Florida Department of Environmental Protection Division of Recreation and Parks, December 7, 2004. http://www.dep.state.fl.us/parks/planning/parkplans/MyakkaRiverStatePark.pdf 12 Sullivan, John J. “The Civilian Conservation Corps and the Creation of The Myakka River State Park,” Tampa Bay History, Fall/Winter 1987, Volume 9, Number 2. 13 Sullivan, John J. “The Civilian Conservation Corps and the Creation of The Myakka River State Park,” Tampa Bay History, Fall/Winter 1987, Volume 9, Number 2. MYAKKA RIVER STATE PARK HALS NO. FL-16 PAGE 9

Charles H. Schaeffer, the acting director of the Florida Park Services, the CCC workforce began building roads, bridges and cabins, digging drainage ditches and cutting trees and underbrush.14 Plans were shared between the Highlands Hammock State Park and Hillsborough River State Park, utilizing the drawings produced by Landscape Architects Emmitt Hill and Walter A. Coldwell. Prentiss French served as a consultant in reviewing the drawings.15 The park master plan bears the names of both Hill and Coldwell.16

In late 1934, Landscape Architect William Cook produced plans for five overnight single-room cabins with porches in front and rear.17 The cabins were constructed along the Myakka River north of the picnic pavilion. Completed in March 1936, the cabins reflect the rustic architecture of the pavilion. Each cabin is supported on limestone foundation piers. Large limestone fireplaces and chimneys accentuate the National Park Service Rustic Style. Park construction philosophy mandated a blending of buildings with the environment. The Rustic Style was the common theme that ran through all of the New Deal era state parks in Florida.

In June 1935, Acting Superintendent A.D. Lawson reported steady progress. A building for communal activities, called the Pavilion, was the company’s glory. With “service wings on each of two sides . . . [it] give grace and distinction to its appearance.” Limestone was carefully sawed to construct the ashlar floor.18

CCC construction foreman, J. Fred Chapman, explained how the cabins and structures were designed and built to blend with the native landscape. The cabins are framed up, he said, all around with hand-hewn timbers. Cut logs of native cabbage palm trunks are wired firmly in place to the heavy frame. This method eliminated saddle notching. The space between the logs was packed with an admixture of asphalt and sawdust. Shingles for the gable ends of the roof were hand-riven from cypress logs. Approximately eighty percent of the materials used in construction came from the park. The exception was the stone. Florida limestone was purchased for foundation piers, flooring for the pavilion, water fountains, and for completing the cabins with beautiful chimneys and fireplaces.

14 http://www.abrock.com/FloridaParks/Myakka/myakka.html 15 Landrum, Ney C. A Legacy of Green, The Making of Florida’s Magnificent State Park System. The Florida Park Service Alumni Association, 2013:56. 16 Personal observation by David Driapsa, May 15, 2014. 17 Adams, William R. (Coordinator). “Cultural Resource Survey, New Deal Era Resources in Nine Florida State Parks,” Proposal # DNR: 276-88/89, Historic Property Associates, Inc., St. Augustine, Florida, November, 1989:26. 18 Adams, William R. (Coordinator). “Cultural Resource Survey, New Deal Era Resources in Nine Florida State Parks,” Proposal # DNR: 276-88/89, Historic Property Associates, Inc., St. Augustine, Florida, November, 1989. MYAKKA RIVER STATE PARK HALS NO. FL-16 PAGE 10

In the early-1940s, additional public facilities became necessary as increased numbers of visitors toured the park. The south picnic area, including a pavilion, latrine, and water fountain with limestone surfacing was developed between March and September 1941. By 1942 the area east of the present entrance station was referred to as the “Colored Picnic Area.”19

In February 1935 Acting Superintendent A.D. Lawson carefully summed up the company’s achievements. “We have had ideal working weather; very little rain; and at present time dry weather is doing quite a bit of damage to the one hundred thousand Pine seedlings recently planted.” He also listed the accomplishments: 9.5 miles of telephone line 212 lineal feet of 2.5' x 4' culverts 32 feet of truck trail bridges 18 feet of combination bridge and cattle gap 30 feet of cattle gap and bridge crossings 5.94 miles of all-weather truck trail 38.43 miles of 16’ plowed boundary line fire break 50 miles of 8’ plowed, random fire break 108 miles of 8’ plowed lines for tree planting 3/4 miles of truck trail

The fire tower was erected in 1936.

Construction of roads began in 1934 and continued through 1941. The original Clay Gulley wooden bridge was constructed in 1936. The main road connecting the north and south gates was eighty-five percent completed by July 1938. The recreational facilities were opened for public use in 1936. The park was officially dedicated on February 28, 1941, and with their work complete, the CCC camp was deactivated.

Sources: Adams, William R. (Coordinator). “Cultural Resource Survey, New Deal Era Resources in Nine Florida State Parks,” Proposal # DNR: 276-88/89, Historic Property Associates, Inc., St. Augustine, Florida, November, 1989.

Florida State Parks. “Myakka River State Park Unit Management Plan,” State of Florida Department of Environmental Protection Divisionof Recreation and Parks, December 7, 2004. http://www.dep.state.fl.us/parks/planning/parkplans/MyakkaRiverStatePark.pdf

Landrum, Ney C. A Legacy of Green, The Making of Florida’s Magnificent State Park System. The Florida Park Service Alumni Association. 2013.

19 Adams, William R. (Coordinator). “Cultural Resource Survey, New Deal Era Resources in Nine Florida State Parks,” Proposal # DNR: 276-88/89, Historic Property Associates, Inc., St. Augustine, Florida, November, 1989:27. MYAKKA RIVER STATE PARK HALS NO. FL-16 PAGE 11

Sullivan, John J. “The Civilian Conservation Corps and the Creation of The Myakka River State Park,” Tampa Bay History, Fall/Winter 1987, Volume 9, Number 2.

Historian: David Driapsa, Historical Landscape Architect Chair, HALS Committee Florida Chapter, American Society of Landscape Architects

July 31, 2014

2014 Entry HALS Challenge: Documenting the Landscapes of the New Deal

Ranger station at park entrance (State Archives of Florida, Florida Memory, 194-, Florida Park Service Collection, Image Number: FPS00678, http://floridamemory.com/items/show/116718).

MYAKKA RIVER STATE PARK HALS NO. FL-16 PAGE 12

Cabin (State Archives of Florida, Florida Memory, 196-, Florida Park Service Collection, Image Number: FPS1218, http://floridamemory.com/items/show/117402).

Family in picnic area (State Archives of Florida, Florida Memory, 196-, Florida Park Service Collection, Image Number: FPS1223, http://floridamemory.com/items/show/117407).