The Florida
Keys are a coral cay archipelago located off the
southern coast of Florida, forming the southernmost part of the
continental United States. They begin at the southeastern coast of the
Florida peninsula, about 15 miles (24 km) south of Miami, and
extend in a gentle arc south-southwest and then westward to Key West, the
westernmost of the inhabited islands, and on to the uninhabited Dry
Tortugas. The islands lie along the Florida Straits, dividing the Atlantic
Ocean to the east from the Gulf of Mexico to the northwest, and
defining one edge of Florida Bay. At the nearest point, the southern part
of Key West is just 90 miles (140 km) from Cuba. The Florida Keys are
between about 24.3 and 25.5 degrees North latitude.
More than 95 percent of
the land area lies in Monroe County, but a small portion extends northeast
into Miami-Dade County, such as Totten Key. The total land area is
137.3 square miles (356 km2). As of the 2010 census the
population was 73,090 with an average density of 532.34 per square mile
(205.54/km2), although much of the population is concentrated
in a few areas of much higher density, such as the city of Key West, which has
32% of the entire population of the Keys. The US Census population estimate for
2014 is 77,136.
The city of Key West is
the county seat of Monroe County. The county consists of a
section on the mainland which is almost entirely in Everglades
National Park, and the Keys islands from Key Largo to the Dry
Tortugas.
History
The Keys were
originally inhabited by the Calusa and Tequesta tribes, and
were charted by Juan Ponce de León in 1513. De León named the
islands Los Martires ("The Martyrs"), as they looked
like suffering men from a distance. "Key" is derived from the
Spanish word cayo, meaning small island. For many years, Key West
was the largest town in Florida, and it grew prosperous on wrecking revenues.
The isolated outpost was well located for trade with Cuba and the Bahamas and
was on the main trade route from New Orleans. Improved navigation led to
fewer shipwrecks, and Key West went into a decline in the late nineteenth
century.
Overseas Railway
The Keys were long
accessible only by water. This changed with the completion of Henry
Flagler's Overseas Railway in the early 1910s. Flagler, a major
developer of Florida's Atlantic coast, extended his Florida East Coast
Railway down to Key West with an ambitious series of oversea railroad
trestles. Three hurricanes disrupted the project in 1906, 1909,
and 1910.
Environment
The climate and
environment of the Florida Keys are closer to that of the Caribbean than
the rest of Florida, though unlike the Caribbean's volcanic islands, the Keys
were built by plants and animals. The Upper Keys islands are composed of
sandy-type accumulations of limestone grains produced by plants and
marine organisms. The Lower Keys are the remnants of large coral reefs, which
became fossilized and exposed when the sea level dropped.
The natural habitats of
the Keys are upland forests, inland wetlands and shoreline zones. Soil ranges
from sand to marl to rich, decomposed leaf litter. In some places,
"caprock" (the eroded surface of coral formations) covers the ground.
Rain falling through leaf debris becomes acidic and dissolves holes
in the limestone, where soil accumulates and trees root.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Florida_Keys
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