Caladesi Island

Caladesi Island. . Ancient ceremonial and burial mounds on Caladesi Island are evidence of pre-European activity by countless generations of Native Americans. After the Spanish conquest of La Florida in the 1500s, the island was a site for seasonal encampments and fish ranches. This use spanned 300 years. Tall ships moored offshore. Soldiers and sailors came ashore to hunt, fish, and camp. Smoked and salt fish, plumes, and hides were traded with Cuba. For two decades, including the years of the American Revolution, the British ruled Florida before the Spanish regained control in 1783. Acquired by the U.S. as a territory in 1821, Florida became a state in 1845., Swiss immigrant Henry Scharrer, a self-taught naturalist and protector of Caladesi, established a 156 acre homestead here in the 1880s. Born there in 1895, a daughter Myrtle is remembered for rowing daily to Dunedin to attend school, and for writing a memoir of Florida pioneer life: Yesteryear I Lived in Paradise. Visitors to the homestead included Fritz Kreisler, Robert Lincoln, Eddie Rickenbacker and Carl Sandburg. Caladesi Island became a Florida State Park in 1967. It is a rare surviving example of a naturally evolving barrier island with coastal dune, mangrove, maritime hammock, and pine flatwood habitat.