Wilhelmina Celeste Goehring Harvey (1912 - May 3, 2005) was a philanthropist and the first female mayor of Monroe County, Florida. A "grand dame of Keys politics", she was frequently a public face of the Conch Republic. [1] Outside of politics, she was a science teacher and scuba diver. [2]
She was born in 1912 to one of Key West's original families. [3] [4] By 1935, she was a science teacher and taught summer school at Tulane University. She graduated from Florida State College for Women in 1937. [5] She served as treasurer and board member of a local volunteer credit union (later Keys Federal Credit Union) in the 1940s. [6] She married C.B. Harvey, who served as mayor of Key West in the 1950s. [3]
Harvey earned a master's degree in public administration in 1980. [5] In 1982, she was inducted into the Florida Women's Hall of Fame in its first year. [5] She served as the first female mayor and the first female commissioner of Monroe County, and was the first to be elected Mayor Emeritus. [7] [5]
In April 1982, citizens of Key West formed the Conch Republic, a satirical micronation, in response to a Border Patrol checkpoint that disrupted travel and tourist activity. Harvey became Admiral and First Sea Lord of the Conch Republic's navy, whose actions included attacking a Coast Guard cutter with loaves of stale Cuban bread. [8] [4] The Conch Republic became a Key West mainstay as a tourist attraction and a humorous method for the city to negotiate with state and federal governments. During the 1995 "invasion", she stopped and accepted surrender from Army Reserve troops. [9] She often served as the Republic's ambassador and met several presidents and foreign leaders in that capacity. [3] In 1991, she hosted Queen Elizabeth at Dry Tortugas National Park, acting as both Monroe County mayor and Conch Republic ambassador. [3] [2]
In 1986, she ran for Florida House of Representatives from the 120th District, ultimately losing to Ron Saunders in the Democratic primary runoff. [10] [11] In 1997, the Monroe County commissioners voted to name the new county government building as Harvey Government Center at Historic Truman School after Harvey and her husband. [1] In November 2000, she lost her re-election bid as Monroe County Commissioner, but remained a popular local figure. [3]
Harvey died on May 3, 2005, at the age of 93. She received a large public funeral. [4]
Monroe County is the southernmost county of the state of Florida. It is also the southernmost county in the United States. As of the 2020 census, the population was 82,874. Its county seat is Key West. Monroe County includes the islands of the Florida Keys and comprises the Key West-Key Largo Micropolitan Statistical Area. Over 99.9% of the county's population lives on the Florida Keys. The mainland, which is part of the Everglades, comprises 87% of the county's land area and is virtually uninhabited with only 17 people recorded in the 2020 census.
Key West is an island in the Straits of Florida, within the U.S. state of Florida. Together with all or parts of the separate islands of Dredgers Key, Fleming Key, Sunset Key, and the northern part of Stock Island, it constitutes the City of Key West.
The Conch Republic is a micronation declared as a sarcastic secession of the city of Key West, Florida, from the United States on April 23, 1982. It has been maintained as a tourism booster for the city. Since then, the term "Conch Republic" has been expanded to refer to "all of the Florida Keys, or, that geographic apportionment of land that falls within the legally defined boundaries of Monroe County, Florida, northward to 'Skeeter's Last Chance Saloon' in Florida City, Dade County, Florida, with Key West as the micronation's capital and all territories north of Key West being referred to as 'The Northern Territories'".
The Florida Keys are a coral cay archipelago 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. The southern part of Key West is 93 miles (150 km) from Cuba. The Keys are located between about 24.3 and 25.5 degrees North latitude.
The Overseas Highway is a 113-mile (181.9 km) highway carrying U.S. Route 1 (US 1) through the Florida Keys to Key West. Large parts of it were built on the former right-of-way of the Overseas Railroad, the Key West Extension of the Florida East Coast Railway. Completed in 1912, the Overseas Railroad was heavily damaged and partially destroyed in the 1935 Labor Day hurricane. The Florida East Coast Railway was financially unable to rebuild the destroyed sections, so the roadbed and remaining bridges were sold to the state of Florida for $640,000.
Wisteria Island is a federally owned, uninhabited island in the lower Florida Keys 645 yards northwest of the northwestern corner of the main island and city of Key West, Florida, Monroe County, United States. It is located 280 yards north-northeast of Sunset Key, its closest neighbor.
M. Athalie Range was a Bahamian American civil rights activist and politician who was the first African-American to serve on the Miami, Florida City Commission, and the first African-American since Reconstruction and the first woman to head a Florida state agency, the Department of Community Affairs.
Ron Saunders is an American politician who was a Democratic member of the Florida House of Representatives from the 120th District, which includes all of Monroe County and parts of Miami-Dade County, from 1986 to 1994 and again from 2006 to 2012. Saunders was born in Key West in 1954, to Jack A. Saunders, a state representative from 1960 to 1964 who served as a United States magistrate judge from 1978 to 1981. Saunders was a National Merit Scholar in high school and later attended the University of Florida, where he was a member of Florida Blue Key, graduating with his bachelor's degree in 1976 and Juris Doctor in 1979.
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