Our Miami Beach logo carries the Florida alligator over “Florida Territory · Est. 1845,” the year Florida became a state — the shared emblem of every Merlin Classics Florida town. Printed in clean retro black-and-white that reads like an old crate label, the alligator stands for Florida as a whole; what makes this one Miami Beach is everything behind it — the Art Deco strip and its neon, the candy-colored lifeguard towers, the man-made island, and the winter playground where the sand meets South Beach.
Here’s the strange part: almost none of this was supposed to exist. A century ago Miami Beach was a barrier island of mangrove swamp and sand, good for coconuts and not much else. Then a New Jersey farmer named John Collins planted avocado groves and dredged a canal to ship them, and an Indianapolis millionaire named Carl Fisher — the man behind the Indy 500 and the first bright automobile headlights — looked at the tangle of mangroves and saw a resort. Fisher cut down the jungle, dredged up the bay bottom, and literally built the island into shape. The city they incorporated in 1915 was, in large part, made by hand.
Why People Visit Miami Beach
Miami Beach rewards visitors who want style with their sand: the world’s great Art Deco strip, a wide Atlantic beach, walkable streets, and neon nights. Add the South Beach glow and the year-round Florida sun, and the man-made island makes an easy case for itself.
