Local History

R.D. Carter and son E.E. “Ed,” shown here in the early 1950s, worked on local engineering projects that continue to be part of our lives today.

The Man Who Put Vero on the Map

TWO GENERATIONS FOLLOWED R.D. CARTER INTO THE FIELDS OF ENGINEERING AND AGRICULTURE

BY TERESA LEE RUSHWORTH

This article, now slightly revised, originally ran in the April 2008 issue of Vero Beach Magazine.

When a baby boy was born in Eufaula, Alabama on August 10, 1877 and named Robert Daniel Carter, in part after family friend Daniel Boone, one might have suspected that he was destined to lead an adventurous life. For starters, his father, Dr. Wilbur Wesley Carter, had had an eventful four-year career in the Confederate army, wounded at the Battle of Chickamauga and captured at least once by Federal forces. Then, after the war, during the painful “Reconstruction” period, Wilbur shot and killed a carpetbagger who broke into the Carter home. As a result of this incident, the family relocated to Tennessee.

Wilbur and his wife, Blanche, had five sons, of whom Robert Daniel was the eldest. The move to Tennessee proved providential for R.D.; there he met Miss Lillian Purkey, and they were married on Valentine’s Day 1901. Educated by correspondence courses in the field of civil engineering, R.D. worked for a time in North Carolina and then, in 1909, accepted a position with the Daytona Beach engineering firm of C.M. Rogers & Co. It was a good time to be a civil engineer in Florida, as many strides were being made in laying down the infrastructure in various areas.

The town of Vero was one of the places whose moment for progress had arrived. Herman Zeuch of Davenport, Iowa was about to purchase 55,000 acres of what is now Indian River County, and he hired Rogers to determine the feasibility of converting this giant marshland into prime farmland that could be marketed to Northerners interested in seeking their agricultural fortunes in sunny Florida. Rogers assigned the task to a crew of 12 surveyors 175

1715 Eleven of 12 ships of a Spanish fleet carrying silver treasure are lost in a hurricane off the coast of Vero Beach, just seven days into their journey from Havana to Spain; hence the name “Treasure Coast.”

1888 H.T. and Sarah Gifford and family arrive and begin to organize the nascent settlement into the town that today is Vero Beach.

1891 The U.S. Postal Service accepts the application of the town of “Vero.” It is believed that Sarah Gifford chose the name based on the Latin word for “truth.”

1919 The town of Vero is incorporated, with A.W. Young as its first mayor. Riomar, the first residential development on Vero’s barrier island, is established.176

and engineers, who arrived in January 1912 with a wagon, a team of mules, two large tents, a cot for each man, cooking utensils, a large supply of groceries, and a cook who was expert at preparing meals on an open fire. The expedition was led by R.D. Carter.

At $3 per acre, the land was a good investment for Zeuch, but there was much to be done. It took a year to complete the survey alone; most of the work was done in ankle-deep to knee-deep water. The men would set up camp on a spot of high ground, work a few miles’ radius out from the camp, and then move the camp to the next refuge of high ground.

Decades later, Carter recalled occasions of heavy rain when the men would awaken with water just a few inches from the tops of their cots. But they learned to live with the water; it was the mosquitoes and deerflies that proved to be the scourge of their existence.

Carter’s job in Indian River County (then part of St. Lucie County) became permanent in 1913 when he became an employee of Zeuch’s Indian River Farms Co. and homesteaded 80 acres west of Wabasso. Having planned and mapped out an extensive grid of canals and laterals, Carter undertook the daunting task of draining 55,000 acres of wetlands.

The digging of the canals was accomplished by building a device known as a “dipper dredge” onto a barge. One of the barges used had an interesting claim to fame: it had been used in the digging of the Panama Canal, disassembled, relocated, and reassembled in Vero.

All told, it took 17 years to bring the roads, ditches, and other infrastructure on those early maps to reality.

Engineering was not Carter’s only enterprise; he was also a farmer and family man. Over the years he increased his land holdings and, in addition to growing crops, especially citrus, also ventured into the dairy business. Around the time of World War II, when the law began to require pasteurization, he switched from dairy to beef cattle. He and Lillian had four children, of whom two survived to adulthood: Egerton Everett and Blanche, named for her paternal grandmother, who came to live with the family later in her life.

E.E., known as “Ed,” followed his father’s dual path of farming and engineering. He began working with R.D. at an early age but still found time to run track for Vero Beach High School. He graduated in the class of 1921 along with Horace Gifford, also a member of a local pioneer family.

E.E. attended the University of Florida but never obtained an engineering degree because the Great Depression cut his formal education short. But he did become a licensed surveyor and was appointed resident engineer for the state road

The original Indian River County Road and Bridge Department‘s fleet of dump trucks lines up outside the crew’s workshops.

department. He later became Indian River County Road and Bridge superintendent.

Like his father, E.E. was not afraid of hard work. For several years he would rise at 3 a.m. to initiate the farming operation for the day and then deliver milk to town. Arriving by 7 a.m. at the county barn to start the road and bridge crew for the day, he would appear at his office in the courthouse by 8. He worked side by side with his father on many projects, including State Road 60, McAnsh Park, and the wooden predecessors of our current bridges.

Have you ever gotten lost in McAnsh Park? Do you find the layout impossible to navigate, no matter how long you have lived in Vero Beach? Take heart: E.E. Carter himself, while delivering milk on foggy mornings, occasionally had to find his way out of McAnsh, regain his bearings, and reenter—and he had designed the neighborhood himself! The story goes that Andrew McAnsh, the developer, visualized a circular layout and conveyed this notion to E.E. Carter, who was perplexed until he looked out the window and saw a spider web. Even today, overhead views of McAnsh Park bear an uncanny resemblance to this natural engineering wonder.

R.D. Carter died in 1956. In his obituary he was remembered as a generous humanitarian and an

1925 “Vero” becomes “Vero Beach” and is designated county seat of the newly formed Indian River County.

1932 Nurse Garnett Lunsford Radin establishes a 21-bed hospital, which, after World War II, would become Indian River Memorial Hospital.

1942 The U.S. Navy selects Vero Beach’s airport to be commissioned as Naval Air Station Vero Beach and used as a training facility during the war.

1948 On the initiative of businessman and airport manager Bud Holman, Naval Air Station Vero Beach is transformed into Dodgertown, the spring training facility of the Brooklyn (and later Los Angeles) Dodgers.

1951 The Merrill P. Barber Bridge, connecting the mainland to the barrier island, is dedicated. A steel-and-concrete drawbridge, it replaces the wooden bridge in use since 1920.

1973 Riverside Theatre is built using funds from private donations. innovator who was “always seeking to apply new and improved methods of Florida agriculture to his farm.” E.E. took over the engineering firm, Carter Associates Inc. By this time, the next generation of Carters was already being groomed in the fields of agriculture and engineering.

E.E. Carter and his wife, Gertrude, known as “Shug,” had five children. The youngest, Mildred, would enter neither of these fields but would leave her own memorable mark on Vero Beach.

She grew up to be Millie Bunnell, an art therapist who worked with people of various walks of life, developing a special outreach to those in drug and alcohol rehabilitation programs. She was also a Red Cross water safety instructor who founded the Vero Beach Dolphinettes, a synchronized swimming team that became known internationally in the 1950s. Bunnell was heavily involved with the Indian River County Historical Society and was the county’s Woman of the Year in 1990. She was a true pillar of the local community until her death in 2000.

Growing up on the Carter family farm west of Wabasso, brothers Marvin Egerton and Everett Stanley learned much from their father and grandfather. They also had opportunities to experience the excitement of the pioneer

R.D. Carter was involved in many of our area’s early engineering projects, including the wooden precursors of our current bridges spanning the Indian River Lagoon.

life. In 1950, when Marvin was 14 and Stan 12, a 7-foot alligator took up residence in a fish pond on their property and proceeded to eat the family dog. The brothers showed that they were descended from true pioneer stock when they avenged their pet’s death with a .22 rifle.

R.D. Carter passed along more than the pioneer spirit to his grandsons. The pair also inherited his passion for civil engineering and agriculture. But instead of getting up at 3 a.m. as their father had done in order to pursue both careers, each would pursue one path: Marvin as a civil engineer, Stan as a farmer.

Marvin did obtain an agriculture degree from the University of Florida in 1959, but quickly added a second in civil engineering in 1961. After working for the state for a year, he returned to Vero Beach in 1962. Thus, he was poised to take over the family business when E.E. passed away in 1969.

Stan attended the University of Florida for one year, subsequently transferring to Florida Southern College in Lakeland. He then returned to his home county of Indian River, which happened to be the citrus capital of the United States. He has applied his skills here ever since, with the exception of a stint in Brevard County during the ’80s. “My love is growing citrus, but I’ve worked in every area of the citrus industry,” he explains. Marvin, with obvious pride in his brother’s accomplishments, adds, “He pioneered topping and hedging, as well as other practices still in use today.”

R.D. and E.E. Carter were ahead of their time in their concern for environmental issues, and Stan has honored that heritage in many ways. In 1999, when the Florida Legislature enacted the Florida Watershed Restoration Act, the state commissioner of agriculture appointed Stan to the committee that would develop the “BMPs” (best management practices).

BMPs were the regulations that Indian River citrus growers would implement to minimize the deleterious effects of their operations on the environment. In this five-year process, Stan and his colleagues undertook the herculean task of bringing together the government, the environmentalists, and the growers to agree on a body of feasible and efficacious measures.

Stan has also served on the Florida Citrus Commission, which is involved in the marketing and promotion of Florida citrus. One of the major objectives of the FCC is securing research funds in the fight against canker and huanglongbing, also known as citrus greening—a serious bacterial citrus tree disease for which there is no cure. In all of his pursuits, he summarizes his attitude by referring to himself as “an active environmentalist, not an environmental activist.”

1978 Indian River Memorial Hospital moves into its newest facility, which would, in 2019, become Cleveland Clinic Indian River Hospital.

1986 Vero Beach Center for the Arts, later Vero Beach Museum of Art, is established.

2008 The Los Angeles Dodgers play their last spring training game in Vero Beach.

2019 “First Lady of Vero Beach” Alma Lee Loy serves as grand marshal of the city’s October 2019 Centennial Parade, six months before her passing.

Stan and Marvin represent the third generation of Carters in Vero Beach.

While Stan has been grounded in the Carter family’s agricultural roots, older brother Marvin has continued to run Carter Associates civil engineering firm. Though several partners have come and gone over the years, the company remains the oldest ongoing business in Vero Beach. In fact, it has created much of its own competition, as some of the partners have moved on to launch their own companies.

Marvin has fond memories of Vero Beach’s simpler days. Puffing on his pipe, he reflects that “when we were growing up here, there were 7 or 8,000 people in the county, and we pretty much knew all of them—and most of their dogs.”

But times have changed, and these days young people enjoy a wider array of career options, so the next generation of Carters are pursuing paths other than engineering and agriculture. When the time comes for Marvin to retire, the business will most likely be handed on to some of the younger engineers who have been with the company for a number of years.

Time must march on, but there are always reminders of Vero Beach’s pioneers. In the case of the Carters, the dry land we build on, the roads we drive on, and much of our basic infrastructure whisper to us of the family’s impressive legacy.

Note: Carter Associates was indeed handed on to other engineers within the company, though Marvin stayed on as a consultant. Sadly, Stan passed away in 2013 at age 74.

Museums & More

Sebastian Inlet Fishing Museum

Gifford Historical Museum and Cultural Center 2880 45th St. 772-985-7573 giffordhistoricalmuseumand culturalcenter.org Housed in the historic Old Macedonia Church, the museum preserves and celebrates the rich history of Gifford.

Hallstrom House 1723 Old Dixie Hwy. SW 772-778-3435 irchistorical.org This historic home was built in 1909 by Axel Hallstrom, a Swedish horticulturist who emigrated to the United States in 1898, relocating to Vero Beach after initially settling in Minnesota.

KELLY ROGERS

Heritage Center and Indian River Citrus Museum 2140 14th Ave. 772-770-2263 veroheritage.org Itself a landmark, the 1935 Heritage Center houses a museum that explores the history of Indian River County’s far-reaching citrus industry.

Indian River County Historical Society 2336 14th Ave. 772-778-3435 irchistorical.org Housed in the restored 1903 Vero Beach train station, the IRCHS headquarters contains a variety of local historical exhibits. Laura (Riding) Jackson Historic Home 6155 College Lane 772-569-6718 lauraridingjackson.org The turn-of-the-century cracker house of the poet Laura (Riding) Jackson has been preserved and is situated on the Mueller Campus of Indian River State College.

McKee Botanical Garden 350 U.S. Hwy. 1 772-794-0601 mckeegarden.org Established in 1932, the garden is an 18-acre subtropical jungle hammock filled with rich landscapes and historic architectural treasures.

McLarty Treasure Museum 13180 Hwy. A1A Southern boundary of Sebastian Inlet State Park 772-589-2147 floridastateparks.org/ sebastian-inlet This state-operated museum lies on the site of the camp established by the survivors of the 1715 shipwreck of Spanish treasure galleons while they awaited rescue.

Mel Fisher Treasure Museum 1322 U.S. Hwy. 1, Sebastian 772-589-9875 melfisher.com/sebastian The museum is home to the legacy of America’s famed marine treasure hunter Mel Fisher. National Navy UDT–SEAL Museum 3300 N. Hwy. A1A, Fort Pierce 772-595-5845 navysealmuseum.org The birthplace of the Navy Frogman program is the site of the only museum devoted solely to documenting and honoring the history of the U.S. Navy SEALs.

Sebastian Area Historical Museum 1235 Main St., Sebastian 772-581-1380 sebastianareahistoricalmuseum. com The museum, located in the 1927 historic Sebastian Grammar and Junior High School, has exhibits related to Indigenous inhabitants, pioneer life, and more.

Sebastian Inlet Fishing Museum 14251 Hwy. A1A Inside south entrance of Sebastian Inlet State Park 772-589-9659 floridastateparks.org/ sebastian-inlet The museum tells the story of the culturally significant local fishing industry.