The History of Florida (12 page)

centuries before instruments were used to measure them. Historians study-

ing topics other than agriculture have general y not taken weather events,

or soils, and thus economic productivity, into account even though until the

early twentieth century and the tourism and retirement booms, agricultural

production was a key to state revenues and hence central to many political

proof

struggles.

A final component of the ecology of the Floridas is the tropical storm.

Climate science has established that variability in the El Niño–La Niña

Southern Oscil ation (ENSO) phenomenon in the Pacific Ocean has im-

portant effects in the Caribbean and tropical Atlantic as well as over west-

ern and northern North America. When the El Niño is strong, upper-level

winds shear storm clouds forming in the Caribbean and tropical Atlantic,

thus reducing the number and severity of tropical storms. When La Niña

is strong, the reverse is the case. A recent study of various physical proxy

records has found a predominance of La Niña years (140 La Niñas, 110 El

Niños in the 324 years in question) during the years 1525 to 1850, many of

them strong (47 or 33.6 percent of La Niña years), very strong (27 or 19.3

percent), or even extreme (7 or 5 percent). Since 1850, El Niño years are

slightly more numerous (79 vs. 72 in 152 years, to 2002).14 Twentieth-cen-

tury data suggest that during La Niña years there is a high annual probabil-

ity (68 percent) of one or more hurricanes striking Florida, defined as the

area south of Tarpon Springs on the west and all of the rest of the peninsula

to the east. The stronger the La Niña, the stronger the probability of a hur-

ricane landfall on the peninsula or on the Gulf coast (especial y Texas and

52 · Paul E. Hoffman

Louisiana). Probabilities based on recent proxies and instrumental data do

not, of course, indicate what happened in earlier times.15 For those years,

like the better-documented ones since about 1850, specific historical records

are needed. What is presently known suggests that settlement in those years

was seldom affected by tropical weather, primarily, one suspects, because it

was clustered in the north and northeast of the present state, areas that do

not now receive many tropical storm strikes. But there were some, notably

one in 1599 whose storm surge swept over St. Augustine.

In sum, while we know a great deal about the general ecology of La Flor-

ida and peninsular Florida, historical knowledge is limited about how the

many aspects of that ecology interacted with Native American and Euro-

pean and African peoples’ attempts to wrest a living from the area in the

years before modern technologies allowed at least limited alterations of the

state’s ecology, sometimes with harmful effects that were not anticipated

when they were made. What is clear is that the general ecology of the pen-

insula shaped where people lived well into the twentieth century and con-

tinues to account for aspects of its history.

Notes

1. This chapter is drawn from Paul E. Hoffman,
Florida’s
Frontiers
(Bloomington: Uni-

proof

versity of Indiana Press, 2002), esp. pp. 2–17 and passim, and sources cited therein with

the addition of materials on climate.

2. E[mma] Lucy Braun,
Deciduous
Forests
of
North
America
(New York: Macmil an,

1950), pp. 296, 260–65, 284–89, 296–98, 195–97; B. W. Wells, “Ecological Problems of

the Southeastern United States Coastal Plain,”
Botanical
Review
8 (1942):533–61, esp. 534;

North
Carolina
Atlas;
Portrait
of
a
Changing
Southern
State
, ed. James W. Clay, Douglas, M. Orr Jr., and Alfred W. Stuart (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1975);

Charles H. Wharton,
The
Natural
Environments
of
Georgia
(Atlanta: Georgia Department of Natural Resources, 1977), pp. 5–9;
Ecosystems
of
Florida
, ed. Ronald L. Myers and John

J. Ewel (Orlando: University of Central Florida Press, 1990).

3. For simplicity, soil types noted herein general y are given by Great Groups from the

map in U.S. Department of the Interior, U.S. Geological Survey,
The
National
Atlas
of
the
United
States
(Washington, D.C., 1970), p. 87. Within each Great Group, there are many

subtypes based on the presence or absence of soil horizons, minerals present or absent,

moisture regime, mechanical characteristics, and color. For peninsular Florida, some 400

different named subtypes of soils have been identified. For more details, see Randall B.

Brown, Earl L. Stone, and Victor W. Carlisle, “Soils,” in
Ecosystems
of
Florida
, pp. 42–53.

4. Donald J. Colquhoun et al., “Quarternary Geology of the Atlantic Coastal Plain,”

in
Quarternay
Non-glacial
Geology,
Conterminous
United
States,
ed. Roger B. Morrison (Boulder, Colo.: Geological Society of America, 1991), pp. 629–50. Timothy Silver,
A

New
Face
on
the
Countryside:
Indians,
Colonists
and
Slaves
in
the
South
Atlantic
Forests,
The Land They Found · 53

1500–1800
(New York: Cambridge University Press, 1990), pp. 9–13, offers a simplified

explanation of this geology. For coastal soils as well as vegetation, see Norman L. Chris-

tensen, “Vegetation of the Southeastern Coastal Plain,” in
North
American
Terrestrial

Vegetation,
ed. Michael G. Barbour and W. D. Billings (New York: Cambridge University

Press, 1988), pp. 321–22.

5. De Soto’s surviving soldiers remembered Coosa (northwest Georgia) and Cofit-

achequi (near modern Camden, South Carolina), both places in the piedmont, as polities

of abundant food and good general conditions (Paul E. Hoffman,
A
New
Andalucia
and

a
Way
to
the
Orient
[Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University, 1990], p. 97); Juan de la Bandera, “The ‘Short’ Bandera Relation,” in Charles Hudson,
The
Juan
Pardo
Expeditions
,

rev. ed. (Tuscaloosa: University of Alabama Press, 2005), pp. 297–305.

6. Eugene Lyon,
The
Enterprise
of
Florida;
Pedro
Menéndez
de
Avilés
and
the
Spanish
Conquest
of
1565–1568
(Gainesvil e: University of Florida Press, 1976), pp. 51, 210, and

personal communication.

7. Charles Arnade,
Florida
on
Trial,
1593–1602
(Coral Gables: University of Miami

Press, 1959); Hoffman,
Florida’s
Frontiers
, pp. 91–92, 97–99.

8. Andrew Turnbul ’s ultimately unsuccessful indigo-producing colony at New Smyrna

was built by clearing forests on the shores of the Indian River near Mosquito Inlet, a setting

giving access to this sort of richness as well as the resources of the mainland.

9. Marion M. Almy, “The Archaeological Potential of Soil Survey Reports,”
Florida

Anthropologist
31 (1978):75–91; Marion F. Smith Jr. and John F. Scarry, “Apalachee Settle-

ment Distribution: The View from the Florida Master Site File,”
Florida
Anthropologist
41

(1988):355–59.

10. Lewis H. Larson Jr.,
Aboriginal
Subsistence
Technology
on
the
Southeastern
Coastal
proof

Plain
during
the
Late
Prehistoric
Period
(Gainesville: University of Florida Press, 1980), is the general account of Native American subsistence practices, especial y in Georgia.

11. The St. Johns, and even more the San Sebastian, Matanzas, and North Rivers, pro-

vided St. Augustine with natural moats against European and Indian enemies, although

not to much effect, as the English sieges of the eighteenth century repeatedly showed.

Santa Elena, although on the southeastern tip of Parris Island, gained little advantage

from having the Broad River and Port Royal Sound and fringing marshes as “moats.” The

northwestern approaches to the island were too remote from the settlement and broad to

be effectively guarded against Native American raiding parties, as events of 1576 showed.

12. David W. Stahle, Malcolm K. Cleaveland, Dennis B. Blanton, Matthew D. Terrel ,

and David A. Gay, “The Lost Colony and Jamestown Droughts,”
Science,
n.s., 280, no. 5363

(1998):565.

13. Hoffman,
Florida’s
Frontiers
, pp. 86–87, 120, 142, 252–53, 265, 287.

14. Joël e L. Gergis and Anthony M. Fowler, “A History of ENSO Events since A.D. 1525:

Implications for Future Climate Change,”
Climate
Change
92 (2009):367–72 (table 9). The

number of proxies and the general quality of the data increase with time since 1525. The

figures for ENSO events between 1525 and 1850 are given because Florida’s exploration,

colonial, and territorial periods all took place during the Little Ice Age (LIA), ca. 1400–ca.

1850. In Europe and the northern latitudes of what is now the United States, this period of

cooling reduced crop yields by shortening the growing season, caused glaciers to advance

down Alpine valleys, and produced a variety of what contemporaries viewed as unusual

54 · Paul E. Hoffman

weather events. At present, no evidence has been found to suggest that this cooling had

any effect in the Floridas, nor has the LIA been linked to the ENSO-related events. None-

theless, I have separated the LIA period from the years that follow in case such links are

found in the future.

15. Philip J. Klotzbach, “El Niño-Southern Oscil ation’s Impact on Atlantic Basin Hur-

ricanes and U.S. Landfal s,”
Journal
of
Climate
24 (2011):1252–63.

Bibliography

Braun, E[mma] Lucy.
Deciduous
Forests
of
North
America.
New York: Macmil an, 1950.

Brown, Randall B., Earl L. Stone, and Victor W. Carlisle. “Soils.” In
Ecosystems
of
Florida,

edited by Ronald L. Myers and John L. Ewel, pp. 42–53. Orlando: University of Central

Florida Press, 1990.

Christensen, Norman L. “Vegetation of the Southeastern Coastal Plain.” In
North
Ameri-

can
Terrestrial
Vegetation,
edited by Michael G. Barbour and W. D. Billings, pp. 317–63.

New York: Cambridge University Press, 1988.

Colquhoun, Donald J., et al. “Quaternary Geology of the Atlantic Coastal Plain.” In
Qua-

ternary
Non-glacial
Geology,
Conterminous
United
States,
edited by Roger B. Morrison, pp. 629–50. Boulder, Colo.: Geological Society of America, 1991.

Ecosystems
of
Florida
, edited by Ronald L. Myers and John J. Ewel. Orlando: University of

Central Florida Press, 1990.

Gergis, Joël e L., and Anthony M. Fowler. “A History of ENSO Events since A.D. 1525:

Implications for Future Climate Change.”
Climate
Change
92 (2009):343–87.

Hoffman, Paul E.
Florida’s
Frontiers
. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2002.

proof

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and U.S. Landfal s.”
Journal
of
Climate
24 (2011):1252–63.

Larson, Lewis H., Jr.
Aboriginal
Subsistence
Technology
on
the
Southeastern
Coastal
Plain
during
the
Late
Prehistoric
Period
. Gainesville: University of Florida Press, 1980.

North
Carolina
Atlas:
Portrait
of
a
Changing
Southern
State
. Edited by James W. Clay, Douglas, M. Orr Jr., and Alfred W. Stuart. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina

Press, 1975.

Silver, Timothy.
A
New
Face
on
the
Countryside:
Indians,
Colonists
and
Slaves
in
the
South
Atlantic
Forests,
1500–1800
. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1990.

Stahle, David W., Malcolm K. Cleaveland, Dennis R. Blanton, Matthew D. Terrel , and

David A. Gay. “The Lost Colony and Jamestown Drought.”
Science
, n.s., 280, no. 5363

(1998):564–67.

U.S. Department of the Interior, U.S. Geological Survey,
The
National
Atlas
of
the
United
States
(Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1970).

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Botani-