Harriet Beecher Stowe and abolitionists wrote of the glory of Florida, calling Yankees hither

Matt Soergel, Florida Times-Union
·3 min read
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"Uncle Tom's Cabin" author Harriet Beecher Stowe, who had a winter home in Mandarin, wrote numerous articles about Florida's natural beauty, some of which were collected in her book "Palmetto-Leaves." They were influential in encouraging Northern tourists to escape winters up there and come to Florida.
"Uncle Tom's Cabin" author Harriet Beecher Stowe, who had a winter home in Mandarin, wrote numerous articles about Florida's natural beauty, some of which were collected in her book "Palmetto-Leaves." They were influential in encouraging Northern tourists to escape winters up there and come to Florida.

Many histories of Florida point to the 1880s as the start of serious tourism in Jacksonville and across the state. That's not so, says John T. Foster Jr., a professor emeritus at Florida A&M University who graduated from the Beaches' Fletcher High School in 1964.

Instead, says Foster, it began a decade or more earlier — a phenomenon fueled in large part by three noted abolitionists who had a very real motive in promoting the image of Florida as a paradise. Basically they wanted to make Florida more Northern in its thinking, and less tied to the South of the Confederacy.

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The plush wooden sidewheeler John Sylvester transported winter tourists on the St. Johns River six days a week in the 1880s and '90s. It was the flagship of the Post Line, captained by owner John H. Post and considered the fastest large vessel on the river. In 1887 it traveled the 75 miles from Jacksonville to Palatka in four hours and 15 minutes.
The plush wooden sidewheeler John Sylvester transported winter tourists on the St. Johns River six days a week in the 1880s and '90s. It was the flagship of the Post Line, captained by owner John H. Post and considered the fastest large vessel on the river. In 1887 it traveled the 75 miles from Jacksonville to Palatka in four hours and 15 minutes.

Those abolitionists were Harriet Beecher Stowe, author of "Uncle Tom's Cabin" and a hugely famous and influential person whose winter cabin on the St. Johns River in Mandarin became a tourist stop in its own right.

Another was Northern Methodist minister John Sanford Swaim, who had moved to Jacksonville for his health. The third was William Cullen Bryant, a renowned poet and journalist.

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This postcard entitled "Old Home of Harriett Beecher Stowe, Author of Uncle Tom's Cabin, Mandarin, near Jacksonville, Fla." was postmarked on the back and dated April 25, 1911. Postage was 1 cent at the time.
This postcard entitled "Old Home of Harriett Beecher Stowe, Author of Uncle Tom's Cabin, Mandarin, near Jacksonville, Fla." was postmarked on the back and dated April 25, 1911. Postage was 1 cent at the time.

They published widely read books or articles in Northern newspapers extolling both the beauty and the business possibilities to be found in Florida. They had an influence, says Foster, who points to news accounts in 1874 saying Florida had seen 50,000 visitors during the previous season.

"You can imagine what that would have been like for a state of less than 200,000 residents,” he says.

Tourists in the late 1870s and early 1880s took advantage of steamboat excursions from Palatka up the Oklawaha River to Silver Springs and back. In this stereograph, a group of well-dressed tourists pose on the steamer Osceola. As the Library of Congress notes: "Stereographs consist of two nearly identical photographs or photomechanical prints, paired to produce the illusion of a single three-dimensional image, usually when viewed through a stereoscope."

In a brief paper, Foster writes: "The abolitionists had an ulterior motive for launching this vast Florida tourism publicity campaign. Their intent was to create a place of genuine freedom for all Americans. A new economy based upon tourism, new residents from the North, and cultivating novel agricultural crops, especially citrus, would offer a world of opportunities. As these developments unfolded, African Americans thrived in a far less racist environment."

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Seen at the Mandarin Museum and Historical Society is an 1881 pledge sheet of residents who donated money to pay for the Rev. Charles W. Sturgis to become the priest of the yet-to-be-built Episcopal Church of Our Saviour. First entry: $50 from "Uncle Tom's Cabin" author Harriet Beecher Stowe,
Seen at the Mandarin Museum and Historical Society is an 1881 pledge sheet of residents who donated money to pay for the Rev. Charles W. Sturgis to become the priest of the yet-to-be-built Episcopal Church of Our Saviour. First entry: $50 from "Uncle Tom's Cabin" author Harriet Beecher Stowe,

He writes of their efforts in two books published by the Florida Historical Society in 2019: "Calling Yankees to Florida: Harriet Beecher Stowe's Forgotten Tourist Articles" (written with his late wife, Sarah Whitmer Foster), and "At the Dawn of Tourism in Florida: Abolitionists, Print Media, and Images for Early Vacationers."

Scott Matthews, who's creating a Jacksonville history course for Florida State College at Jacksonville, will include Foster's work in a discussion of Emancipation and Reconstruction during the 1860s through the 1880s.

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An 1880 stereograph of the National Hotel in Jacksonville, which was growing into a popular tourist destination. In his book, "Calling Yankees to Florida," John T. Foster Jr. writes that by 1876, the city had six hotels: the St. James, the St. Johns, the Windsor, the Carleton, Nichols House and the Grand National.
An 1880 stereograph of the National Hotel in Jacksonville, which was growing into a popular tourist destination. In his book, "Calling Yankees to Florida," John T. Foster Jr. writes that by 1876, the city had six hotels: the St. James, the St. Johns, the Windsor, the Carleton, Nichols House and the Grand National.

Foster and Matthews say the effort of the abolitionists worked, for a while, in Jacksonville in particular where during Reconstruction the city's large Black population had opportunities for education and advancement not found in other Southern cities.

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That didn't last, however, notes Matthews: “From the very beginning there was tension with local whites and Northern migrants and missionaries. That was not unique to Jacksonville. There was that image of the quintessential carpetbagger, the Northerner who was coming down and telling how they were going to remake society in this more enlightened vision."

The abolitionists' efforts were for the most part written out of Florida history, Foster says, as generations of South historians ignored them and pegged the start of tourism to the 1880s — something he calls "the big lie."

This article originally appeared on Florida Times-Union: Harriet Beecher Stowe and others wrote of Florida's beauty