Qualla: Florida Keys

Florida Keys: Introduction

Mon, 23 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT

On April 23, 1982, the mayor of Key West declared war on the United States by hitting a Navy officer over the head with a loaf of stale Cuban bread. One minute later, the newly founded Conch Republic surrendered and demanded a billion dollars in foreign aid. It was a protest stunt against a federal highway checkpoint, but it captured something true about the Florida Keys: these islands have always existed on their own terms, a world apart from the mainland, closer in spirit to Havana than to Tallahassee. Stretching in a long arc from the southeastern tip of the Florida peninsula southwest to Key West and beyond to the uninhabited Dry Tortugas, the Keys are a coral cay archipelago of more than 1,700 islands strung along the Florida Straits, dividing the Atlantic Ocean from the Gulf of Mexico.

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Florida Keys: Born from Ancient Reef

Mon, 23 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT

The Florida Keys are not volcanic, not carved by glaciers, not deposited by rivers. They were built by living things. About 130,000 years ago, when sea levels stood higher than today, parallel lines of coral reef grew along the submerged Florida Platform. The northern and central...

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Florida Keys: Flagler's Folly, Flagler's Triumph

Mon, 23 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT

For centuries the Keys were reachable only by water. Key West thrived on wrecking revenues from the treacherous reef, growing into the largest town in Florida, a hub of trade with Cuba and the Bahamas. Then Henry Flagler decided to extend his Florida East Coast Railway across 128...

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Florida Keys: Island Time, Island Life

Mon, 23 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT

The climate of the Keys is tropical savanna, closer to the Caribbean than to the rest of Florida. Freezing temperatures have never been recorded here. Royal poinciana trees bloom crimson in summer. Key deer, a miniature subspecies standing barely two feet tall, browse the pine fo...

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Florida Keys: The Hundred-Mile Road

Mon, 23 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Today the Overseas Highway stitches the Keys together in a single astonishing drive. U.S. Route 1 runs from Key Largo at Mile Marker 107 down to Key West at Mile Marker 0, crossing 42 bridges including the Seven Mile Bridge, one of the longest in the world when it was built, conn...

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Florida Keys: Ninety Miles from Cuba

Mon, 23 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Key West sits just 90 miles from Havana, and the Cuban connection runs deep. After the Cuban Revolution, waves of emigres settled in the Keys, reinforcing cultural ties that had existed for centuries. Stories of Cuban rafters coming ashore are still not uncommon. The Keys have en...

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