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European Exploration and Colonization. Written records about life in Florida began with the arrival of the Spanish explorer and adventurer Juan Ponce de León in 1513. Sometime between April 2 and April 8, Ponce de León waded ashore on the northeast coast of Florida, possibly near present-day St. Augustine.
The history of Florida can be traced to when the first Paleo-Indians began to inhabit the peninsula as early as 14,000 years ago. They left behind artifacts and archeological evidence. Florida's written history begins with the arrival of Europeans; the Spanish explorer Juan Ponce de León in 1513 made the first textual records.
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While exploring the Bahamas in 1513, Juan Ponce de León landed somewhere near Cape Canaveral, named the landmass “La Florida” and claimed it for Spain. This was only 21 years after Columbus first set foot in the Bahamas and initiated Spanish colonization of the Americas.
- Spanish Colonists, Outnumbered, Get Lucky
- Matanzas Inlet Named For Slaughter
- St. Augustine Becomes Center For Spanish Power in Florida
Menéndez almost didn’t succeed. Philip wanted him to destroy the French colony before France could send military forces to Florida to protect it. But by the time Menéndez arrived in Florida in August 1565, he discovered that a force of French reinforcements had arrived before him, according toDavid Arbesú, an associate professor of Spanish at the U...
When Menéndez got back to his encampment at St. Augustine, local Indians told him about seeing white men walking on the beach south of St. Augustine. “Pedro Menéndez realizes that these are the Frenchmen who had been blown away in the storm,” Arbesú explains. Menéndez rushed to the location and found some shipwreck survivors, who had lost their wea...
Instead, after the slaughter, the Spanish stayed in St. Augustine to establish a permanent colony to deter more French from settling. “Philip's support for the effort and successfully establishing a lasting settlement were in large part due to the French presence,” saysShane Mountjoy, provost of York College in Nebraska and author of St. Augustine,...
Juan Ponce de León was the first Spanish explorer to arrive in Florida. Early Spanish explorers were known as conquistadors (kahn-KEYS-ta-dawrz) or "conquerors." While there are no official records, historians believe that Ponce de León was born in 1460 in San Tervas de Campos, Spain.
St. Augustine, Florida, the oldest continuously occupied settlement of European origin in the continental United States, was founded in 1565 by Spanish admiral Pedro Menéndez de Avilés.
Apr 4, 2013 · In 1535 a history of the West Indies by Gonzalo Fernández de Oviedo y Valdés said that Ponce de León had been hoping to find the rejuvenating waters of Bimini when he landed in Florida. The tale was repeated by later authors and the tradition developed that the Indians in the Saint Augustine area enjoyed unusual longevity and that they ...
