For Sale American Paradise: How Our Nation Was Sold an Impossible Dream in Florida, by Willie Drye
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For Sale American Paradise: How Our Nation Was Sold an Impossible Dream in Florida, by Willie Drye
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The story of how Florida became entwined with Americans’ twentieth-century hopes, dreams, and expectations is also a tale of mass delusion, real estate collapses, and catastrophic hurricanes. For Sale--American Paradise hones in on the experiences of American icon William Jennings Bryan, journalist Edwin Menninger, and others who shaped the image of Florida that we know today and who sold that image as America’s paradise. The cast also includes the Marx Brothers, Thomas Edison, Al Capone, a pack of backwoods bandits known as the Ashley Gang, and the visionaries and businessmen who poured their dreams and their cash into Florida in the roaring, raucous 1920s. A tale of a colorful and tragicomic era during which the allure and illusion of the American Dream was on full display—a Jazz Age period when Americans started chasing what F. Scott Fitzgerald called “the orgiastic future”—the book reveals how the 2008 collapse of Florida real estate was eerily similar to events that happened there in the 1920s What sets the mid-1920s’ Florida land boom apart from more recent booms-and-busts, however, is that this was the first time that emerging new technologies, mass communications, and modern advertising techniques were used to sell the nation on the notion that prosperity and happiness are entitlements that are simply there for the taking. Florida’s image as a place where the rules of everyday life don’t apply and winners go to play was formed during this dawn of the age of consumerism when Americans wanted to have fun and make lots of money, and millions of them thought Florida was the perfect place to do that.
For Sale American Paradise: How Our Nation Was Sold an Impossible Dream in Florida, by Willie Drye- Amazon Sales Rank: #739226 in Books
- Published on: 2015-10-20
- Original language: English
- Number of items: 1
- Dimensions: 9.31" h x 1.08" w x 6.38" l, .0 pounds
- Binding: Hardcover
- 312 pages
Review In the early years of the twentieth century, it took the efforts of some very determined people – including William Jennings Bryan and Henry Flagler, cofounder of Standard Oil – to draw the country’s attention to the state of Florida, which so the claims went, represented a huge opportunity for real-estate investors. In addition to developers, the relatively untamed state also attracted the attention of the criminal element: religious leader and Hollow Earth proponent Cyrus Teed; outlaw bank robber, murderer, and pop-culture hero John Ashley; and of course, furniture salesman Al Brown, who’s probably better known by his real surname, Capone. This lively, fascinating look at Florida’s early years profiles all these figures and describes not only the early growth but also the bursting of the bubble in the late 1920s, the result of a declining economy, the increasing profile of the crooks, and a hurricane that destroyed entire cities. Revealing reading for anyone interested in early-twentieth-century American history, boom-and-bust stories, and tales of outlaws. (Booklist)Drye (Storm of the Century) weaves stories of economic development, railroad construction, and outlaw behavior in this tale of Florida’s early boom years and the ensuing hurricane-triggered bust. On paper, Florida didn’t look like the most inviting of locales when it became a state in 1845. Hurricanes, roaring heat, alligators, and the impenetrable Everglades were enough to keep most folks away. In 1867, Harriet Beecher Stowe built a winter home near Jacksonville and began to sing Florida’s praises with rhapsodic descriptions of the state’s natural beauty, setting in motion a series of dispatches by Ulysses S. Grant, William Jennings Bryan, Warren G. Harding, and others encouraging northerners to consider the state as a vacation or respite destination—Miami in particular. A period of rapid growth followed, with roads and railroads connecting Miami to the Florida Keys as well as one carved through the formidable Everglades connecting Fort Myers to Miami, further enabling economic development. A lax attitude toward Prohibition didn’t hurt either. Drye has clearly done his research, but his narrative can be jarring with few segues between narrative threads. Still, Floridians, snowbirds and historians are sure to appreciate the story behind one of America’s most famous vacation spots. (Publishers Weekly)"Check out For Sale: American Paradise. Drye tells history the way it should be told." (Florida Times-Union)National Geographic News contributing editor Drye (Storm of the Century) paints 1920s South Florida as a phantasmagoria—a commodified fantasy peddled by an elite so as to exploit the masses. As William Jennings Bryan and other public figures boosted Florida for its warm climate and leisurely lifestyle, real estate speculators sold off undeveloped swampland to gullible northerners for wildly inflated prices. In time the market crashed because, in the words of one speculator, "we just ran out of suckers." Hurricanes also disrupted this metanarrative of paradise, devastating Miami in 1926 and inundating the Lake Okeechobee region in 1928. But state and business leaders downplayed the impact as "negligible," lest reports of thousands of corpses floating in the sugarcane fields scare off tourists. Meanwhile, Florida crime shifted from charismatic bootleggers and bandits such as John Ashley, who robbed banks and then fled to hideouts deep in the Everglades, to organized crime—Chicago mobster Al Capone wintered in Miami. Drye expertly weaves entertaining anecdotes and local color into his narrative, which often reads like a Carl Hiaasen novel. VERDICT This broadly appealing history book entertains and informs with its portrait of Florida as commodified fantasy, business enterprise, and disaster zone.—Michael Rodriguez, Hodges Univ. Lib., Naples, FL (Library Journal)"A fun read and a very interesting and engaging book. For Sale-American Paradise is a paradigmatic American story--looking for the good life. It captures a ton of this deep American restlessness, idealism and determination." William J. Bennett, host of Bill Bennett's Morning in America
About the Author Willie Drye has been a journalist for thrity-three years and is a contributing editor for National Geographic News. His first book Storm of the Century: The Labor Day Hurricane of 1935, was made into a documentary for the History Channel. He lives in North Carolina, dividing his time between Plymouth and Wilmington.
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4 of 4 people found the following review helpful. It was all was too good to be true. By Paul Tognetti “The potent mixture of hopes, dreams, naked greed, vast sums of easy cash, and plenty of bootleg whiskey created an intoxicating, anything-goes atmosphere.” -- page 100They called it “The Roaring 20s”. Following the horrors of World War I, the American people were bound and determined to live the good life spurred on by a robust economy, unprecedented technological progress, and rapidly changing lifestyles. The automobile now made it possible for the wealthy and people of modest means to travel to places they never thought possible. Many Americans concluded that Florida was the place to be to prosper and to live the lifestyle that they had always dreamed of. In the first half of the decade more than 300,000 people would arrive in the state flush with cash and bound and determined to make their fortunes. Some were large industrialists with grandiose plans to build exciting new communities and projects while others were land speculators who bought and sold lots at a dizzying pace in the hope of amassing quick profits. Author Willie Drye chronicles Florida in the 1920’s in his new book “For Sale—American Paradise: How Our Nation Was Sold an Impossible Dream in Florida”. You will discover how and why so many gullible Americans bought into the mythology. It is a fascinating tale.In order to understand what was happening in the Sunshine State during this period it is essential to know the major players that were busy promoting Florida as a veritable paradise on earth. Many of them including Carl Fisher (Miami Beach), Barron Collier (Naples) and George Merrick (Coral Gables) had sunk large portions of their fortunes into these emerging communities. Then there were the cheerleaders led by the three-time Democratic presidential candidate William Jennings Bryan and journalist Arthur Brisbane of the New York Journal. Both were instrumental in cranking up the hysteria that would lead to the land boom of the mid 1920s. Drye does a nice job of getting his readers up-to-speed on all of these characters. Meanwhile, Prohibition was the law of the land but large numbers of the citizenry simply chose to ignore it. As a result, outlaws like the notorious Ashley Gang, who dealt in moonshine, rum running, bank robbery and various other illegal endeavors also stood to make a killing. They would be a thorn in the side of both law enforcement and law-abiding citizens for several years.But the good times would prove to be very short-lived. Beginning in July 1926 a series of powerful hurricanes would make landfall along the Florida coast. Most people caught up in the land boom had no idea of the damage and destruction that a hurricane could cause. They had been living in a dream world. The results of these storms were devastating. According to Willie Drye “Much of the deadly debris—perhaps most of it—came from the shoddily built houses that had been slapped up by boomers obsessed with cashing in on the burgeoning rental market. Building inspectors had looked the other way while houses were thrown together, and the fortune seekers pouring into Miami had been more than willing to rent them for exorbitant prices.” Fortunes were wiped out overnight. There was certainly plenty of blame to go around. The problems were exacerbated by the failure of respected publications (The Wall Street Journal among others), various business interests, and prominent media members to accurately report the extent of the damage to a largely unsuspecting public. Instead they chose to perpetuate the myth. The final straw came in September 1928 when two more powerful storms came ashore that breeched the dikes at the southern end of Lake Okeechobee with cataclysmic consequences. It would take Florida at least two decades to recover.If I had a bit more latitude in rating “For Sale—American Paradise” I would assign it three and a half stars. After considerable thought I have decided to round it upward to four stars primarily because this is an important facet of our history that Americans need to know about. Frankly, I did not find Willie Drye to be a particularly gifted storyteller. The events depicted here are presented in a very matter-of fact manner and the author often utilized short, choppy paragraphs that I sometimes found annoying. However, since I have read other books about related subjects, most notably Lee Standiford’s marvelous “Last Train to Paradise: Henry Flagler and the Spectacular Rise and Fall of the Railroad that Crossed an Ocean” and Eliot Kleinberg’s “Black Cloud: The Great Florida Hurricane of 1928” I was happy with the fact that this book managed to fill in a number of gaps in my understanding of precisely what was going down in Florida during this tumultuous period. For those who know little or nothing of these events “For Sale—American Paradise: How Our Nation Was Sold an Impossible Dream in Florida” would definitely merit a look. Recommended.
3 of 3 people found the following review helpful. Just like his previous books Willie takes the ride down memory ... By Wayne Neely I starting reading this book and it made me feel as if I was living in an era of days gone by. Just like his previous books Willie takes the reader on a ride down memory lane. I really and truly loved this book and I will gladly endorse this book and I promise you that if you read this book 1) You won't regret it 2) You won't be able to put this amazing book down (I missed an episode of NCIS to read it) 3) You will get a vivid and historical view point of Florida in days gone by and learn how Florida became to be known as the 'Sunshine State'.
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful. Fascinating Characters and Stories of 1920's Florida By Amazon Customer Willie Drye's remarkable gift for story-telling shines through in this captivating new book. The Jazz Age characters come to life, as do their dreams, their schemes, their visions and their shortcomings. Florida and the 1920's are themselves central characters, but so is human ambition, greed, and creativity, which are timeless. This book is by no means just for Floridians, but I do think that it would make a great gift for anyone with an interest in or connections to Florida. So, read it yourself, no matter where you are from, and get some copies for your friends and relatives who have visited or plan to visit Florida. You are sure to enjoy the book and your friends will thank you.The book is also an impressive feat of research. The exhaustive end notes are a sort of road map of the author's tireless pursuit of facts and details. The notes are also a lot of fun to read, giving texture and background to the narrative.I highly recommend For Sale American Paradise. It is a very enjoyable ( and educational) book as well as a top-notch contribution to the field of historical journalism.
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