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| Victoria Park, city park and community. Lake Stranahan view |
Fort Lauderdale land sales heated up during the 1920s
attracting buyers from around the nation and beyond its borders.
Alfred George Kuhn, an American resident of Mexico for 15 years, came to Fort Lauderdale in 1923 or 1924 with an idea about settling in the growing town with his family.
His plans included real estate endeavors. City pioneer
Frank Stranahan sold Kuhn a tract of 126 acres lying north and south of the
Edwards-Maxwell Hospital near downtown. It wasn’t waterfront property but held
promise; the tract included a stone quarry that could be converted into a lake
and connected to canals.
Kuhn contracted clearing, design and construction services
from Miami to begin work in 1924. The new community, “one of the most complete
in Broward County” was designated “Victoria Park,” named after his daughter,
Victoria (more on that name later).
A boulevard was built to circle the tract and its new
80-foot-wide streets. Fort Lauderdale News wrote that the boulevard was
destined to become part of “the new Federal Highway No. 4.” The rock pit, Lake
Stranahan, would be terraced and bordered by an English garden of lilies. Boats
could access the lake and ocean via the Sospiro and Navarro canals. Landscaping
was designed by Helen Brooks Smith (who bought builder M.A. Hortt’s house in Idlewyld
in 1925, see: https://janeshistorynook.blogspot.com/2023/10/the-idlewyld-story-hortt-converts-swamp.html
).
A feature of Kuhn’s development was “The Home Beautiful.” It was designed by Miami firm Stewart and Bareford with the “purpose of educating the public to build their homes.” The Home Beautiful served as a model but not referred to that way. News accounts claimed the new home was the “beginning of a Better Homes movement for Fort Lauderdale” and would improve building standards. The motto of Stewart and Baresford, the Fort Lauderdale News wrote, was “not how cheap” the construction, but "how good.”
Everything at The Home Beautiful
was built of the “finest products.” The newspaper was filled with ads of companies
proudly announcing they sold the materials that went into the model house: lumber,
cement building blocks, roofing, cabinets, hardware and more. The model house was
a win-win for stores and developer Kuhn. Models today, of course, are common sales
tools.
Advertisements targeted
March 14, 1925, as the first day of sales. Waterfront lots were offered for
$10,500. Other lots near the lake were sold in 1925 for $4,500. Later in 1925 some
ads indicated lots going on sale for “$935 and up.” (See https://janeshistorynook.blogspot.com/2017/05/fort-lauderdales-victoria-park-then-and.html)
Kuhn built a home in Victoria Park in 1925; he obtained a $100
permit for house repairs in the 200 block of NE 15th Ave. in 1942. I’m
assuming that’s the house he built in 1925.
Victoria Park survived the 1926 hurricane and the area’s real
estate ups and downs. Through the years, it established and has maintained a reputation
as one of the most beautiful communities in Fort Lauderdale—with prices to
match. The city of Fort Lauderdale includes a corner of the community on its roster of public parks.
More on Alfred Kuhn
One may ask why Kuhn lived in Mexico. Interestingly, he was
one of the very few “non-Latin” professional Jai Alai players there. Though I
could not find much on his Jai Alai career, it should be noted that the same
year he came here, the first Jai Alai Fronton was built in Florida in Hialeah
(see https://janeshistorynook.blogspot.com/2021/10/jai-alai-comes-to-south-florida-in-1924.html
) .
Kuhn bought a yacht or “sea skiff and cruiser” to bring sales prospects to his Victoria Park development. It was damaged by the 1926 hurricane and he sold it nearly unused.
In 1925 an ad in the Lost and Found section of the Fort
Lauderdale News read: Lost - “bag of men’s clothing lost between hospital
and filling station. Return to Mr. A.G. Kuhn c/o Las Olas Realty Co. Reward."
In 1942, another ad read: Sale or exchange home and
lots at reduced prices or will exchange for first class Washington, DC property.
3.6 acres on Middle River and Karen Canal - $9,000 – Alfred Kuhn, 205 Sweet
Building. (Kuhn also kept a home in Washington, D.C.)
At his death, Kuhn reportedly lived on Gordon Road off Las
Olas. He died at Broward General Hospital on December 18, 1951, at age 67 and
was buried in Boston, MA where his sister, Alice Covel, lived. His wife Pauline
had died about a year prior to his death in Washington, D.C. His son, Frederick A.
Kuhn, served in the “diplomatic corps in Peru” (U.S. State Department).
More on Victoria
Victoria Kuhn was born on Nov. 11, 1918, Armistice Day, thus
her name. Of note, she became a playwright. Several of her plays were performed in
New York City. One, “If the Greenwood” was performed at the Blackfriars Guild Theater
during the 1940s.
Sources:
The Miami News, Aug. 23, 1924
The Miami Herald, Aug. 25, 1924
Fort Lauderdale News, Jan. 13, 1925
Fort Lauderdale News, Feb. 23, 1925
Fort Lauderdale News, March 13, 1925
Fort Lauderdale News, March 25, 1925
Fort Lauderdale News, Nov.
14, 1925
Fort Lauderdale News, Dec. 2, 1925
Fort Lauderdale News, Dec. 24, 1925
Fort Lauderdale News, Dec. 19, 1951
Fort Lauderdale News, Aug. 26, 1925
Fort Lauderdale News, Jan. 11, 1927
Fort Lauderdale News, Jan. 22, 1941
Fort Lauderdale News, March 8, 1942
Fort Lauderdale News, July 7, 1942
Fort Lauderdale News, Dec. 26, 1946
Fort Lauderdale News, Dec. 20, 1951
