McGriff’s First Big Swing of ’99 Still Echoes Today
April 29, 2026
Ribault, Fort Caroline, and the Clash for La Florida
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On April 30, 1915, what we now know as Broward County was almost named Everglades County. Lawmakers were preparing to create a new county out of parts of Palm Beach County and Miami-Dade County when the Speaker of the House stepped in and renamed it for former governor Napoleon Bonaparte Broward (pictured).
Broward, a former riverboat captain from Jacksonville, built his 1904 campaign on a promise to drain the Everglades and open the land to farming and settlement.
Beyond the coastline, much of the region was difficult to inhabit before Henry Flagler extended his Florida East Coast Railway to Miami in 1896. The line helped launch Hallandale, Dania, Pompano, Deerfield, and Fort Lauderdale.
Broward pushed to dry the interior, securing funding to carve canals from the New River and move water from the wetlands to the Atlantic.
Draining the Everglades opened inland areas to agriculture and, later, steady suburban growth. Today, 1.8 million people live across 31 cities, shaping a landscape of neighborhoods, canals, malls, and sun-driven ambition.