Riviera Beach: mainland and Singer Island contrasts

Riviera Beach, mainland. Pawn shop sign reveals differences

By Jane Feehan

Riviera Beach in Palm Beach County is marked by stark contrasts. Its tall and glamorous condominiums stand side by side facing the Atlantic Ocean. This is Singer Island*, which is actually a peninsula. Bounded on its west by Lake Worth Lagoon, Singer Island—about 5,000 residents—is separated from mainland Riviera Beach. With a population of about 39,000 (2023), Riviera Beach is listed as one of America’s cities with an African American majority population (67.25 percent).

Residents of the mainland side live in older structures, some wooden, others stucco, most all in poor condition. Neighborhoods are marked by store front churches, open or shuttered family-owned businesses and a few discount retail stores.  In one area, a closed bank with dilapidated, ghostlike remains of its drive-thru serves as a gathering place for a few homeless or neighborhood friends.

Riviera Beach’s history mirrors that of many Florida towns formed after Henry Flagler’s East Coast Railway progressed southward to Miami. The town was first named Oaklawn, but prominent resident Judge Allen Heyser, whose wife Mattie ran the post office, changed its name in 1893. He had read a news piece by a visiting reporter refer to Oaklawn and its surrounds as the “Riviera of America.” According to a 1934 Palm Beach Post article, Heyser was able to get the name changed to “Riviera“ before other towns could pick it up.

Two years later, Bahamians looking for work boated 60-120 miles to the peninsula (or barrier island) to help build the Poinciana Hotel in Palm Beach. That part of the coast is the closest point to the Gulfstream than any other place in North America. Bahamian fishermen were familiar with the barrier island because they often stopped there to dry out their nets. A squatter’s community of Bahamians grew there as construction jobs did; the new residents called it “Inlet City.”  Today, many Riviera Beach residents can trace their roots to these Bahamians.

Interest about the area grew among prospective landowners and fishermen. George N. Newcomb bought the Riviera Hotel in 1901. Visitors included Henry Flagler and members of the Vanderbilt family. Inspired by growing interest in the area and prospects for the new railway, Newcomb bought 200 acres to plat the town as a resort community. 

Riviera was incorporated as a town in 1922. “Beach” was added to its name in 1941 and it incorporated as a city in 1959.  The Florida land rush of the 1920s benefited Riviera but not to the extent of other towns such as Palm Beach, Boca Raton, Fort Lauderdale and Miami. Paris Singer attempted to build his idea of a Coney Island on the peninsula but real estate crashed by 1926. His longest-lived legacy there is the name, Singer Island (the southern end falls within the municipality of Palm Beach Shores).

In 1959 a film was made by the Riviera Beach Chamber of Commerce to promote the city. The nearly 14-minute film, Treasures of Riviera Beach, was to be distributed to TV stations across the country, though it seems to have been shown at local civic events more than anywhere else. "Treasures" refer to possible pirate loot in nearby waters.

It wasn’t until the 1950s that the Black population increased in Riviera Beach, growing to 40 percent by the end of the decade. The city made news in 1962. F. Malcolm Cunningham, Sr. was the first Black in the South since the post-Civil War days of Reconstruction to win a city-wide election. He was elected to the City Council of Riviera Beach.

Singer Island in Riviera Beach

Since the 1980s, Riviera Beach has sought the attention of developers. Florida’s current status as the fastest growing state in the nation may serve as impetus for new interest, growth and redevelopment. Perhaps an updated version of the Treasures of Riviera Beach, will help seal the deal.  Riviera Beach has a lot to offer: its Palm Beach County location, the Port of Palm Beach, nearby Palm Beach International Airport and…its people.

Copyright © 2023. All rights reserved. Jane Feehan

* For more on Singer Island, see: index or use search box

Sources:

Miami News, Dec. 1, 1904

Miami Herald, Sept. 17, 1919

Palm Beach Post, Nov. 22, 1922

Palm Beach Post, Nov. 25, 1934

Palm Beach Post, March 3, 1959

Palm Beach Post, April 10, 1959

Palm Beach Post, Nov. 24, 1986

Palm Beach, Nov. 23, 1986

Palm Beach County Historical Society

https://cunninghambar.org/

Tags: Riviera Beach history, Palm Beach County history, Singer Island

Second deadliest U.S. hurricane hit South Florida 1928

Flagler Boulevard under water 1928
Florida State Archives/Florida Memory

 

By Jane Feehan

The Hurricane of 1928 or Okeechobee hurricane is ranked as the second deadliest in U.S. history, topped only by the 1900 Galveston hurricane, which killed about 8,000.

The 1928 storm spun off the African coast near Cape Verde in early September. It gathered strength crossing the Atlantic, then slammed into Guadaloupe, Puerto Rico, and the Bahamas, killing 900. During the early evening hours of September 16, the 130-mile-wide storm barreled into the Florida coast between Jupiter and Boca Raton.

Coffins Belle Glade 1928
Florida State Archives/Florida Memory

A storm surge 10-20 feet hit Palm Beach as the hurricane tramped westward into the farming region of Lake Okeechobee. Winds were estimated at 145 mph. Some say gusts measured up to 160 mph. A barometer in West Palm Beach plunged to 27.43, the lowest ever recorded to that time. A category 4 storm, it pushed water out of Lake Okeechobee into an area 75 miles long and six feet deep. The six-foot mud dike bordering the lake succumbed easily to the storm’s wrath.

The first day after the storm 50 people were estimated dead. (Population of South Florida then was about 50,000.) The official record eventually grew to more than 1,800 but many knew that number was inaccurate. In the blistering sun, the dead were buried quickly in mass graves. One of the mass graves was dug at Tamarind Avenue and 25th Street in West Palm Beach and now bears a State of Florida historical marker. Three fourths of the dead were non-white farm workers. (Well-known Fort Lauderdale builder Ed King, living at the lake, died as he tried to rescue two children.)

For years, farmers in the area continued to uncover human bones left by the 1928 hurricane – enough to justify a corrected death toll. In 2003 the official death number was raised to 2,500. Many say there were more who perished … all say the toll will never be known.

The mud dike was replaced by a 30-foot wall, the Hoover Dike (President Hoover visited). It hasn’t been tested by a category 4 or 5 hurricane and is in need of frequent maintenance. The storm caused $25 million in damage or $16 billion in today’s dollars. Hurricane Katrina’s damage was well over $100 billion.

Lantana 1928 hurricane
Florida State Archives

According to the National Hurricane Center’s publication, The Deadliest, Costliest, and most Intense United States Tropical Cyclones from 1851 to 2006, “sociologists estimate that people only remember the worst effects of a hurricane for about seven years.” An exception to that may be the Lake Okeechobee farmers who came across so many human remains for decades after the disaster.

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Copyright © 2021. All rights reserved. Jane Feehan

Sources:

National Hurricane Center:

http://www.nhc.noaa.gov/pdf/nws-nhc-6.pdf

THE DEADLIEST, COSTLIEST, AND MOST INTENSE UNITED STATES TROPICAL CYCLONES FROM 1851 TO 2010 (AND OTHER FREQUENTLY REQUESTED HURRICANE FACTS), 2007.

3. McIver, Stuart. Glimpses of South Florida History. Miami: Florida Flair Books, 1988.

Tags: Florida hurricane history, Florida history, Ed King, Lake Okeechobee