Downtown Fort Myers

DownTown Fort Myers

At the beginning of our field trip to downtown Fort Myers we stopped at a cemetery that many years ago was a popular place to get buried at. This is where Edgar Watson was buried. He was murdered and was part of a very important unsolved mystery. Edgar Watson was born November 11, 1855 and died Oct 24, 1910. We visited the cemetery on October 26, 2010 two days after his death 100 years earlier. I thought that was very cool!

After leaving the cemetery was headed to downtown Fort Myers. Since this is my first semester at FGCU, I was excited to see downtown Fort Myers because I hadn't been there yet. On our way we passed by two very important houses which I think were Henry Ford and and Thomas Edison and they were next door neighbors. I had no idea that they lived in Fort Myers let alone were best friends.

This was the first thing we see when we all got off the bus. It is a memorial for Thomas Edison, Henry Ford, and Harvey Samuel Firestone. They all created products that benefited each other. For example, Edison was always trying to find new products to create rubber in making tires, Ford made cars, and Firestone made tires and would use the rubber that Edison was creating to make his tires. This was definitely the most interesting and exciting thing I learned on this field trip. I thought it was so cool that we were walking on the same floor these three very important people in our history once walked on.

The Calusa Hatchet River was used for transportation up and down the rivers. Page Air Field was used for training camps for the pilots. Also Buckingham Air Field was used during World War II to train bombers. Many people began coming to Florida also because tarpon fishing was very popular and Southwest Florida was known to have the best tarpon fishing.

I fell in love with the downtown area. I love how they have created the area to look like old times and not so commercialized. The roads are made out of bricks and the buildings still have the old look to them. Also some buildings have not been reconstructed since the first time they were built. I love the feeling it gives downtown. I definitely want to go back and continue to learn more about everything. I had no idea Fort Myers had such a history behind it.

-all the pictures were taken by me-