Florida Estates
Beginning around 1890, the William Deerings began wintering in Florida, first around St. Augustine, and later in the vicinity of Miami. Visiting them, both Charles and his half-brother became deeply interested in South Florida. Around 1908, Charles purchased some 212 acres of land in Buena Vista. In 1910, he hired Clinton Mackenzie to design a Spanish-style villa for the property. He hired the great Chicago landscape architect Ossian Cole Simonds to lay out the grounds. Here he supported the New York Botanical Garden by providing them 25 acres to grow cacti. Around this time, Deering made the acquaintance of botanist David Fairchild and allowed the US Department of Agriculture to establish an experimental station on part of his property. Deering became an avid naturalist and preservationist. The book Ornamental Gardening in Florida by Charles Simpson is dedicated to him.
Deering correctly foresaw that development would soon engulf the Buena Vista property, and by 1913 he had begun buying land further down on the coast, along Old Cutler Road. By 1915, he had acquired several hundred acres near Cutler and moved his winter quarters there permanently. His Buena Vista estate was broken up by developers during the land boom of 1925. Deering built a fine stone house on his second property. Now named the Charles Deering Estate, it is open to the public as a museum and nature preserve. Meanwhile, his brother James built an estate, Villa Vizcaya, on Biscayne Bay in Coconut Grove.
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Famous quotes containing the words florida and/or estates:
“In Florida consider the flamingo,
Its color passion but its neck a question.”
—Robert Penn Warren (1905–1989)
“No man, however benevolent, liberal, and wise, can use a large fortune so that it will do half as much good in the world as it would if it were divided into moderate sums and in the hands of workmen who had earned it by industry and frugality. The piling up of estates often does great and conspicuous good.... But no man does with accumulated wealth so much good as the same amount would do in many hands.”
—Rutherford Birchard Hayes (1822–1893)