PERDIDO WHAT? PERDIDO KEY?

Oh.... Well, I remember when...

By Baker Holman

Writer's note: The following is a disjointed account of recollections and perceptions not carefully researched facts of the Perdido Bay, Florida area. I am not a historian, so please kindly overlook inaccuracies caused by the fallible memory of myself or others. Sincere appreciation is due Captain Harry MacGill, USN, Retired. Captain Macgill is a several generations native descendant who, as a child, lived in a two-story log cabin at Spanish Bluffs on the Alabama side of Perdido Bay. His phenomenal memory and his ability as a raconteur, provided a basis for anecdotes of Perdido Bay in the nineteen twenties. Credit is also due George R. Kee and the Kee families, whose roots in the Perdido Bay area run deep. Further appreciation is due James C. Coleman and the Pensacola Historical Society.

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I remember when Perdido Key wasn't Perdido Key. The Key, as it is now called, is a stretch of land from Pensacola Bay Pass to Perdido Bay Pass, near Pensacola, Florida. Only in the last few decades was it named "Perdido Key," possibly after the road from Johnson Beach to Perdido Bay Pass was completed. Prior to that it was called "Gulf Beach"~ Gulf Beach Highway still testifies to this name. Today, Vista Del Mar, Sandy Key, and other condominiums occupy the site of what was formerly Gulf Beach.

Was Perdido Key ever a natural key? The word "key" is a corruption of the Spanish word "cayo," defined in Spanish as a "rocky islet." Mr. Webster in his venerable dictionary defines "key" as a rocky island (South Florida's coral keys are given as an example), a coral reef, or a low island. Perdido Key is certainly not a rocky island. If there's a rock on the Key it had to have been either left there by a tourist, or thrown from Alabama by someone who had a powerful pitching arm.

However, the Key is low. A question arises then, was it ever a natural island? This is difficult to ascertain due to the shifting sands of barrier islands. For example, the original Fort McRee, on the eastern tip of Perdido Key, was planned in the early eighteen hundreds to be located on a shoal, called Foster's Bank, in the Pensacola Bay Pass. Before construction even began, however, shifting sands closed the gap so that Foster's Bank was joined to Foster's Island, as it was named at that time, a part of present Perdido Key.

An island is defined as a tract of land surrounded by a body of water. Because of the Intercoastal Waterway canal, Perdido Key is surrounded by water, and therefore presumably a low island.

My love affair with our magnificent beaches began at Innerarity Point. As a child I had impetigo, a skin problem common then with children. Lacking the miracles of modern medicine, our doctor advised my mother to take me to the Gulf and let me bathe frequently in salt water.