Civil War History Of Cedar Key, Florida Plus Photo Essay

Thanks for mentioning Cedar Key. We want to drive there next time we in Florida.
Donna,if you plan to go to Cedar Key,do not go on a Monday as just about everything is closed.for your food choices "Annie's Cafe" is your best choice for breakfast and a decent lunch,this is where all the locals go.Tony's Seafood Restaurant is a good lunch spot.the best restaurant there is the "Island Room" which is listed as fine dining and pricey for Cedar Key,but dinner upstairs on the balcony is worth the price.
Remember this is Cedar Key,you are in the middle of nowhere and the food is not as good as Crackers in Crystal River.
 
We did go to Crackers when last in Florida. Found another great restaurant call Stumpknockers. It is right on River. I forgot name of river but address is Dunnellon, Florida. It is not far from were we live. I had the best fried trio of catfish, shrimp and crab cake. They also had salad, baked potato and corn on cob with the meal. it is a very popular place.
 
Cedar Key Lighthouse which is located on SeahorseKey in the Cedar Key National Wildlife Refuge was built by the design of Geroge Meade who later became general in the Civil War. He was an engineer and actually built several lighthouses. This one was done in 1854.
Meade also designed the lighthouse at Jupiter inlet.
 
I love Cedar Key! It might have turned into Tampa North if the cross-state railroad had ended there but it didn't (thank goodness) and it remains small and quiet. There are a couple of little history museums in the town with (if I remember correctly) a few Civil War items. I think salt-making was important there during the war.
 
I wanted to get back to this thread. When we went to the state museum there learned some information on John Muir. He was the noted naturalist and conservation leader. He especially known in California. He came to Cedar Key in October 1867. He had been on trip from Indiana for a "thousand mile walk to the Gulf". In Muir's Journal account of his adventure which was published in 1916 ( two years after his death), he includes interesting glimpses of the quality of life in the post war South. He writes "the traces of war are not only apparent on the broken fields, mills, and woods ruthlessly slaughtered, but also on the countenances of the people".

Florida deeply impressed the 29 year old Muir. He remembered the "watery and vine-tied" land where "the streams are still young". which he had seen and sampled on his way from Fernandina. It was while recovering from a bout with malaria in Cedar Key that Muir first expressed his belief that nature was valuable for its own sake, not only because it was useful to man. This principle guided John Muir throughout his life.

In early 1868 he left Cedar Key and eventually settled in California, where he helped establish Yosemite National Park and in 1892 the Sierra Club.
 
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