DISCOVER MIAMI BEACH IN ALL ITS
Leafy Splendor By Paul Scicchitano
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early everyone is familiar with the city’s spectacular water views and endless beaches, but most people may not know Miami Beach was once home to what was believed to be the world’s largest avocado and mango orchards in the world — or that the twin lanes of Australian pines along Pine Tree Drive were planted to protect the fruit trees from potentially damaging winds. Founding father and agriculturalist John Collins even created the Collins Canal to bring his valuable green fruit and exotic mangos to market. The canal dates back to 1912 — a decade before fellow founding father and consummate showman Carl Fisher would change the city’s destiny by triggering the first big wave of tourism in Miami Beach through a publicity photo shoot involving then President-elect Warren G. Harding. The president-elect posed with Rosie, a baby elephant Fisher acquired to promote the fledgling city — “the only elephant caddie in captivity,” cooed a photo caption at the time. The pachyderm was dangling the president-elect’s golf clubs with her trunk as Harding appeared in short sleeves on the links during a winter getaway in what would soon become America’s winter playground.
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