Miami history

Miami has long been a premier tourist destination, acclaimed for its physical beauty and its excellent climate.

Surprisingly, however, it had more humble beginnings. Located on the far south coast of Florida, between a mangrove swamp and a barrier reef, the city was founded 100 years ago, when a tycoon called Henry Flagler extended his railroad to carry citrus fruits from the frost-free south.

After WWII and Fidel Castro's seizing of Cuban power in 1959, waves of Cuban refugees arrived and established Miami as the Latin capital of the USA. This cultural climate inspired residents of other Latin American countries to emigrate, and now Spanish is spoken as pervasively here as English.