One of the older steamboats plying the waters of what was then called the Florida East Coast Canal, the “Courtney” carried mostly passengers on short trips along the Florida East Coast in the 1890’s. Henry Flagler, then president of both the Florida East Coast Railway and the Florida canal company, cruised into Miami on the “Courtney” (also called the “Sweeney”) just before he arrived in Miami in one of his FEC Railway cars on April 13, 1896. Upon completion of the railway,Flagler liquidated his holdings in the Florida canal company and resigned as president. For the next thirty years, the Florida canal company and Flagler’s Florida East Coast Railway would compete for passengers and freight in providing transportation down the east coast of Florida. And both companies would compete for settlers buying the millions of acres of state land the Florida legislature promised these two companies for extending transportation into the southern tip of the Florida peninsula.
Florida’s Big Dig 