For Sale —American Paradise (63 page)

175. “Oh, I am so sorry for you folks”:
South Florida Developer
, January 13, 1928

175. Menninger also reported that the Brown-Cummer Company:
South Florida Developer
, January 27, 1928

175. The Seaboard Air Line Railroad closed its offices and railroad shops:
South Florida Developer
, February 3, 1928

175. Still, the 1927–28 tourist season:
Stuart Daily News
, January 5, 1928

176. “There are more tourists in Stuart”:
South Florida Developer
, March 23, 1928

176. “But I have just seen the state”:
South Florida Developer
, January 22, 1928

176. Parker Henderson, who was mayor of Miami in 1917:
Miami Metropolis
, November
20, 1916

176. The school, in the Blue Ridge foothills:
Miami Metropolis
, July 26, 1919

176. In August 1927, shortly after his father's death:
Miami Daily News
, August 28, 1927

176. . . . a businessman who'd apparently done very well:
Tuscaloosa News
, May 6, 1986

177. Capone boldly dropped his alias:
Miami Daily News
, July 1, 1928

177. “When I got in, a bunch of the boys met me at the train”:
Miami Daily News
, January 10, 1928

177. Noting that Miami's climate was “more healthful than Chicago's”:
Miami Daily News
, January 10, 1928

177. “I like Miami so well”:
Miami Daily News
, January 10, 1928

177. “I believe now is the time to buy down here”:
Miami Daily News
, January 10, 1928

178. . . . spotted by a local sheriff who was eyeing the next election:
Stuart Daily News
, January 3, 1928

179. When Capone's associates in Chicago wired money to him: Kobler, John,
Capone: The Life and World of Al Capone
(New York, G.P. Putnam's Sons, 1971) p. 220;
Pittsburgh Press
, October 9, 1931

179. Around mid-January, Capone called Henderson to his room:
Newark Advocate and American Tribune
, July 31, 1928;
New York Times
, August 1, 1928

179. “He would order food for about fifty people”:
Miami Daily News
, July 13, 1928

180. Capone showed his appreciation:
New York Times
, August 1, 1928

180. . . . the US Coast Guard began assembling patrol craft:
Miami Daily News
, January 13, 1928

180. A reporter duly jotted down the president's comments:
Miami Daily News
, January 15, 1928

181. On January 17, Al Capone moved from the Ponce de Leon Hotel:
Miami Daily News
, January 17, 1928

181. “This morning attention turns”:
The Capital Times
, Madison Wisconsin, January 20, 1928

181. Two days after Brisbane's column:
Miami Daily News
, January 21, 1928

182. A few days later, Capone and his brother Ralph:
Galveston Daily News,
January 31, 1928

182. Capone was fond of telling people that he'd served:
Miami Daily News
, June 20, 1928

182. . . . he tried to join the Coral Gables post of the American Legion:
Charleston Gazette
, March 9, 1928

182. On March 27, James and Modesta Popham sold:
Miami Daily News
, June 22, 1928

182. Henderson, in turn, quietly sold the property to Mae Capone:
Pittsburgh Press
, October 9, 1931

183. With the opening of the Trail only days away:
The Capital Times
of Madison, Wis., April 1, 1928

183. Edwin Menninger described the Trail:
South Florida Developer
, April 6, 1928

183. “This magnificent Tamiami Trail will open”:
San Antonio Light,
April 5, 1928

184. “The tremendous influx of visitors”:
Sarasota Herald
, April 24, 1928

184. . . . even the famously busy Thomas Edison: Albion, Michele Wehrwein,
The Florida Life of Thomas Edison
(Gainesville, The University Press of Florida, 2008) p. 136

184. “Approaching autos caused countless flocks of egrets”: Fritz, Florence,
Unknown Florida
(Coral Gables, Florida, University of Miami Press, 1963) p. 146

184. “No longer was it the unconquerable domain”:
Palm Beach Post
, November 30, 1981

184. “. . . an amazing engineering feat”: Author's interview with Bob DeGross, May 28,
2014

184. The day after the Trail opened:
Fort Myers Tropical News
, April 28, 1928

185. The Republican primary campaign of 1928 would go down in infamy: Tuohy, John W.,
The Chicago Mob. A History. 1900–2000
(Bad Guys and Bullets
Press.Com
, 2010) available online at
http://gunsandglamourthechicagomobahistory.blogspot.com/2012/12/pineapple-primary.html

186. George Merrick owed an estimated $29 million:
Lewiston Daily Sun
, July 6, 1928

186. On Monday, June 18, accompanied by three bodyguards:
Miami Daily News
, June 19, 1928

186. The day after the terse meetings:
Miami Daily News
, June 20, 1928

187. The following day, the
Miami Daily News
escalated:
Miami Daily News
, June 20, 1928

187. “Capone Deal Involves Lummus”:
Miami Daily News
, June 22, 1928

188. That same day, Parker Henderson gave up the lease:
Miami Daily News
, July 31, 1928

188. On Thursday, June 28, the Miami Beach City Council:
Evening Independent
, June
28, 1928

188. While Al Capone was tussling with local leaders in Dade County:
Miami Daily News
, August 5, 1928

188. In Knoxville, two of the men went to a Nash car dealership:
New York Times
, July 4, 1928;
New York Times
, July 5, 1928

189. On Sunday, July 1, around three p.m., Frank Uale was having a drink:
New York Times
, July 2, 1928;
New York Times
, July 4, 1928

190. . . . Uale had been laid to rest in a $15,000 coffin:
Miami Daily News
, July 6, 1928

190. . . . Capone's plot to create an “alcohol empire”:
New York Times
, July 9, 1928

190. Henderson met first with Miami police chief Guy Reeve:
Miami Daily News
, July 31, 1928

190. Henderson stayed out of sight between meetings:
Miami Daily News,
August 7, 1928

191. The storm's eye made landfall just before dawn:
Miami Daily News
, August 8, 1928

Chapter Eleven: Blown Away

192. But Edwin Menninger, now publisher of both the
South Florida Developer
and the
Stuart Daily News
:
The Evening Independent
, August 9, 1928

193. Still, one sad death during the storm was discovered later:
Miami Daily News
, August 9, 1928

193. In his story for the Associated Press:
The Evening Independent
, August 9, 1928

193. The storm had dumped more than a foot of rain in some places:
Palm Beach Post
, August 14–17, 1928;
South Florida Developer
, August 17, 1928

193. One of those dikes near the town of Okeechobee on the lake's northern shore:
Palm Beach Post
, August 14, 1928

194. But in early July 1928, near the end of his four-year term as governor:
Miami Daily News
, July 6, 1928

194. William Griffis, editor of the Okeechobee News, disputed him:
South Florida Developer
, August 17, 1928

194. Davida Gates, who grew up in Belle Glade in the 1920s: Gates, Davida,
Growing Up Ain't Easy!: A South Florida Depression Chronicle
(Livingston, Texas, Pale Horse Publishing, 2008) p. 35

194. They were joined by thousands of migrant workers, most of them black: Hurston, Zora Neale,
Their Eyes Were Watching God
(New York, Harper Perennial Modern Classics, p. 2006) pp. 131–132

195. Money had not poured into the Glades towns the way it had in Miami:
Canal Point News
, reprinted in the
South Florida Developer
, September 14, 1928

195. “We in America today are nearer to the final triumph over poverty”:
Miami Daily News
, August 12, 1928

195. “Almost as great a boom as the east coast of Florida had in 1925 is the development that is now under way in the upper Everglades”:
Canal Point News
, reprinted in the
South Florida Developer
, September 14, 1928

195. On September 10, an Associated Press story predicted that the same coastal towns that had been roughed up:
South Florida Developer
, September 14, 1928

196. “Florida looks forward today to one of the best and most prosperous winters”:
South Florida Developer
, September 14, 1928

196. German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche noted that while irony's purpose is to humble and shame: Gemes, Ken, and Richardson, John, editors,
The Oxford Handbook of Nietzsche
(Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2013) p. 112

197. That same morning the SS
Commack
, an American freighter bound from Brazil:
Monthly Weather Review
, September 1928, p. 347

197. About 280 miles southwest of the
Commack
, the captain of the SS
Clearwater
: “Beating the Hurricane,” by William G. Shepherd,
Collier's
magazine, November 17, 1928, pp. 8–9, p. 40

197. Hurricane Charley, which carved a path of destruction across the Florida peninsula in 2004: Barnes, Jay,
Florida's Hurricane History
(Chapel Hill, University of North Carolina Press, 2007) p. 16

197. That storm's maximum sustained winds reached at least 145 miles per hour: Pasch, Richard J., Brown, Daniel P. and Blake, Eric S., “Tropical Cyclone Report/Hurricane Charley/9-14 August 2004, published by the National Hurricane Center, p. 2

197. A meteorologist in Pointe-à-Pitre:
Monthly Weather Review
, September 1928, p. 347

197. Alexander Hamilton, who was born in the British West Indies: Hamilton, Alexander, letter to the
Royal Danish American Gazette
, September 6, 1772; available online at
http://founders.archives.gov/documents/Hamilton/01-01-02-0042

197. The hurricane that crossed Guadeloupe in September 1928:
Monthly Weather Review
, September 1928, p. 347

198. At ten p.m. on September 12, a cannon boomed: “The West Indies Hurricane Disaster September 1928/Official Report of Relief Work in Porto Rico, the Virgin Islands and Florida,” by the American National Red Cross, p. 5; Box 750, Folder 284, West Indies Hurricane 9-13-28, Donated Records Collection (Formerly Records Group 200), Records of the American National Red Cross 1917–1934, National Archives and Records Administration, College Park, Maryland

198. The storm's arrival happened to coincide: Emanuel, Kerry,
Divine Wind: The History and Science of Hurricanes
(Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2005), p. 118; Kleinberg,
Eliot,
Black Cloud: The Great Florida Hurricane of 1928
(New York, Carroll & Graf, Publishers, 2003) p. 47

198. As the eye passed over Guayama:
Monthly Weather Review
, September 1928, p. 349

198. The
San Lorenzo
, a Puerto Rican passenger liner:
The Times
of London, September 19, 1928