Beechers, Stowes, and Yankee strangers

Modern Florida - a world of tourists, retirees from the North, and subtropical agriculture - began at the end of the Civil War among a group of Yankee reformers including Harriet Beecher Stowe, author of Uncle Tom's Cabin, and her brother, Charles, who lived in Florida between 1867 and 1885. This book tells the story of the group and of their designs for a postwar Florida.

Arriving in Florida nearly two decades ahead of Henry Flagler, the Beechers found a wild and inaccessible state with small remnants of a slave economy. As part of the work of Reconstruction, they dreamed of making the state a haven for freedmen and progressive northerners unhampered by the rest of the South's racial divisions.

Settling near Tallahassee and Jacksonville, they worked with Florida's First Lady, Chloe Merrick Reed, to effect changes in education, religion, economics, social and racial relationships, and politics, and they were instrumental in the transformation of Jacksonville from a small seaport to a vibrant city.