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| © 1998-2010 ATC All Rights Reserved |
| McLarty
Treasure Museum 772-589-2147 Part Of The
Sebastian Inlet State Park McLarty Treasure Museum THIS IS A MUST SEE FOR ANYONE VISITING VERO BEACH AND SURROUNDING AREAS Special interpretive programs are provided to groups with reservation. IMPORTANT: Check with museum personnel for rules concerning archaeology, salvaging, and metal detecting.
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| Spanish Treasure In the 1500's, 1600's, and 1700's Spain dug vast quantities of silver, and smaller amounts of gold out of the mountains of Mexico and South America. Smelted into ingots and coins, the silver and gold crossed the Atlantic in wooden sailing vessels. Every summer, Spanish ships carrying a year's worth of diggings from throughout the New World met in Cuba. They also bore Oriental rarities that had been shipped across the Pacific to Mexico. From Cuba, the fleet made a perilous journey northwest along Florida's east coast, on the way back to Europe. Spain used warships and forts to protect the treasure ships from pirates. But she could not protect them from hurricanes.
Shipwreck |
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Mclarty Treasure Museum Foundation, Inc located on
North A1A in Vero Beach.
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| Ais Indians They also feared Indians for the natives of this region the Ais, had a reputation for hostility. However, they apparently treated these shipwreck victims well providing some food and other aid. Unlike most other Florida Indians of the time, the Ais were not farmers. They gathered wild plants, hunted deer and bear, and took birds, fish, turtles, shellfish, and manatees from the rivers and the sea. Their midden piles of clam and oysters are still evident along the coast. |
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| Salvage Within weeks, help came from Spanish headquarters at St. Augustine, and salvagers arrived from Havana. Over the next four years official Spanish salvors, Indians divers, English pirates, and privateers and river pirates of various nationalities flocked to the area to retrieve-or steal from each other-as much treasure as they could. But less than half the ships' manifest reached the Spanish treasury. The rest, so recently pried from the mountains, now lay buried in sand and silt of the shore.
Display inside museum depicting items left behind by the salvage crew.
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| Rediscovery
Not until 1928 was a wreck from the 1715 fleet rediscovered, the Urca
de Lima off Fort Pierce. The next clues appeared on the land, not in the
water. In the early 1940's Spanish colonial artifacts were uncovered at a site
south of Sebastian Inlet.
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Modern Treasure Hunters Wagner soon located El Capitana. By the mid 1960"s... he had brought up silver pieces of eight, gold doubloons, bars of gold and rare Chinese porcelain. Countless examples of everyday items used by seamen and passengers traveling in 1715. Wagner's finds opened the way for other searchers. With SCUBA gear and modern dredging equipment they coax from the sea bed what 18th century divers left behind. Major new discoveries are still made along the Treasure Coast. Wherever gold glitters and silver beckons...
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Any attempt to download and print these photographs will be a violation of the Copyright laws. |
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For Further information, Write Or Phone: Telephone (772) 589-2147 Located at 13180 North A1A between Melbourne and Vero
Beach, Florida
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Park Services Specialist Edward Perry IV with Kenny
Miller of Atocha Treasure Company.
My
First 1715 Fleet
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The history of the Sebastian Inlet area goes back to the end of the last ice age. The barrier islands were formed as sandbars off the coast of the mainland. As vegetation took hold on the sandbars, animals moved in, followed by the first human inhabitants, the Paleo hunters. The Ais Indians were more recent inhabitants of the barrier islands. They were a tribe of hunters and gatherers who lived off the bounty of the land and sea. The Ais captured the English Quaker Jonathan Dickinson after his ship wrecked in 1696. Dickinson’s descriptions of the Ais and their lifestyles is the best record we have of these people. By 1760, all of the Ais Indians were gone. Like the other natives of Florida, they succumbed to European diseases and mistreatment. In 1715 eleven Spanish treasure galleons sank along the east central Florida coast. One of the survivors’ campsites was located on the present day site of the McLarty Treasure Museum. Seven hundred people lost their lives in this disaster, while 1,500 people survived. THE INLET In 1872, Captain David P. Gibson promotes a movement to dig an inlet across a quarter mile strip of Barrier Island near present day Sebastian Inlet. The next attempt to dig an inlet was in 1881 by Thomas New. New’s Cut is listed on the United States geological map of 1880. It was not until 1895 that water flowed for the first time between the Atlantic Ocean and the Indian River Lagoon at Gibson’s Cut. This was a spot where the ocean frequently washed over the dunes. The inlet was quickly closed by a storm and the shifting sands the same year. 23 years later in 1918, Roy D. Couch spearheads a project using his own dredge to cut an inlet through the sandy banks and building a jetty to project the opening. This was the first time a dredge was used to cut through the Barrier Island. The cut is completed but a storm wrecks the project. The next attempt to open an inlet was organized by commercial fishermen in 1919 who wanted quick access to the ocean. Working with the Florida Legislatures the Sebastian Inlet Tax District is created. The purpose of this tax district is to build and maintain a permanent inlet. Roy Couch is elected as chairman and serves at this post for 32 years. In 1924, using funds from a $100,000.00 bond issue the Sebastian Inlet Tax District recuts the Sebastian Inlet 100 feet wide and 6 foot deep. A 400-foot long rock jetty is constructed to protect the new Sebastian Inlet. Between 1924 and 1941 the Sebastian Inlet is opened and closed as sand washes in from the ocean and men re-dig the narrow cut. In 1941, due to fear of German attack and wartime (WWII) lack of maintenance, a sandbar forms and closes the inlet. In 1947, after World War II is over Sebastian Inlet is moved a little south and reopened to a width of 100 feet and a depth of 8 feet. In just a few months a storm closes the inlet again. On October 28, 1948, the inlet is reopened and it has remained open ever since. The jetties are also strengthened and capped with concrete. In 1952, the north jetty is extended 300 feet. In 1955, the north jetty is extended another 250 feet. The south jetty is extended 175 feet. In 1959, Brevard and Indian River County residents vote to transfer three miles of Barrier Island South Of Sebastian Inlet. This is done in exchange for Indian River County building a bridge across Sebastian Inlet and making a paved road from Wabasso to the Inlet bridge. Revenue bonds backed by Indian River County’s share of the gasoline tax finance the project. The 1,548-foot bridge over Sebastian Inlet is opened on February 12, 1965 at a cost of $745,000. In 1966, Mr. Robert McLarty donated seven acres to the Florida Park Service. This was the site of the 1715 Spanish salvage camp. In 1970, The McLarty Treasure Museum is opened, displaying artifacts and telling the story of The 1715 Spanish Treasure Fleet’s disaster. Also in 1970, the north and south jetties are extended. In 1971, Sebastian Inlet State Recreation Area is opened with three miles of beachfront. In 1998, the Sebastian Fishing Museum is opened on the south side of the inlet. This museum tells the story of the early commercial fishing in the Sebastian area. In 2003, a new north jetty is constructed over the existing jetty with a larger area for fishing at the end of the jetty.
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Visit Our Other Great Atocha And Spanish Coin Sites
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