Flagler Beach Historical Museum

06/09/2026

Kids loved visiting us at First Friday too!

The sand pit continues to be a fun activity for kids of all ages- sharks teeth 🦈 shells 🐚 and gold coins 🪙 oh my!

Hands on learning about our coastal life for the win!

06/09/2026

06/09/2026

06/07/2026

Registration deadline for Week 1 of the Summer Adventure Series is extended to Monday, June 8, 5pm for BOTH sessions, Tuesday AND Thursday. Space is very limited.

Between our Discovery Station and hands-on activity, your kids/grandkids will bring coastal history alive.
Bonus: You get a couple hours to yourself!

Here's the link to register: https://givebutter.com/summeradventureseries

🚩🌊 Calling all young explorers!

Join us for the first week of our Summer Adventure Series at the Flagler Beach Historical Museum:

June 9 (Ages 6-9) & 11 (Ages 10-12)

Flag Detectives: Cracking the Code of Colors & Symbols

Kids will discover how beach safety flags and boating signal flags help communicate important messages on the water and along the shore. We’re excited to welcome a special guest speaker from Ocean Rescue, who will share how lifeguards use flags to help keep beachgoers safe.

The highlight of the adventure? Each child will design and create their very own flag to take home! 🎨🚩

This hands-on program is perfect for creative, curious kids who love the beach, boating, and learning through fun activities.

📍 Flagler Beach Historical Museum
🎟️ Space is limited — reserve your spot today!
• A minimum of four registered participants by June 5 is required to hold the session.

Register here: https://givebutter.com/summeradventureseries

06/07/2026

Set your Wayback Machine to the turn of the 20th century along the west side of the Florida East Coast Canal, today’s Atlantic Intracoastal Waterway, near the future Ocean City, Florida. There, you will find a Palmetto House with members of the Stuckey family, shown in this colorized photo. The original black-and-white photo follows. Early Florida settlers built these temporary thatched shelters to provide immediate protection from the harsh sun and rain while they cleared land and built permanent structures. The technique was informed by the chickees (houses) that the Seminoles and Miccosukees abandoned during the Seminole Wars.

Though no given names are annotated on the photo, there is little doubt that the individuals are from the large pioneering Stuckey family, headed by Pinkney Stuckey (1848-1924). They settled in this area circa 1904, when it was undeveloped, except for remnants of the plantation era and vestiges of the indigenous peoples that once tread the locale. Settling here with Pinkney was his second wife, the former Emma Jones (1872-1931), with their six sons, Willie (1894-1985), Ivey (1898-1924), Dewey (1898-1959), Jesse (1899-1963), Louis (1902-1973), and Harry (1904-1934). Pinkney married Emma at St. Augustine in 1893, after his first wife, the former Mary Adeline Groover (1853-1892) of Ormond, passed away the year before. He had married Adeline in 1870 in Volusia County. They shared at least four daughters and three sons together, Nora (1872-1962), Adeline “Addie” (1875-1924), Martha (1877-?), Charles (1879-?), Leo (1882-1949), Arthur (1887-1956), and Bertha (1891-1971). The third image is a photo of Pinkney Stuckey’s second wife, Emma Jones, as a child, courtesy of Ancestry.com.

In the last twenty years of his life, Pinkney Stuckey amassed considerable property in the part of St. Johns County that, in 1917, became northeast Flagler County. He acquired that land from David Leslie “D. L.” Gage (1858-1933), as noted on page 18 of John A. Clegg’s 1976 book, The History of Flagler County: “D. L. Gage of Illinois acquired large tracts of land west of the canal in this area in 1899. He sold some to Mr. Pinkney who lived at the site of the sugar mill.” Clegg’s “Mr. Pinkney” was Pinkney Stuckey. On that land, Pinkney had citrus groves, sugar cane, and livestock. It included 500 acres of the former St. Joseph’s Plantation and Sugar Mill, established in 1816 by Joseph Marion Hernández (1788-1857), burned in 1836 during the Second Seminole War, and abandoned by 1850. The ruins have since been developed and paved over as part of Palm Coast. But Pinkney did his part in erasing history there ahead of Palm Coast. As a patriotic American, he dismantled the old St. Joseph’s sugar mill on his property and turned over the steel, iron, and engines to the U.S. Government when the call came for this material during World War I. Pinkney also owned 50 acres at Fox’s Cut, 60 acres on the west side of the canal north of Ocean City, where he had a three-story home, and 30 acres planted in citrus fruits and vegetables at Port Orange in Volusia County.

The patriarch of the family, Pinkney Stuckey, passed away on September 9, 1924, at the age of 76. If you want to understand a bit of how he was viewed in the community, look at the heading of his obituary in the Florida Times-Union of Jacksonville on September 12, 1924, appearing here as the fourth image: “Pinkney Stuckey dead, was East Coast pioneer and true friend to all”. Note that the article's dateline stated “Flagler Beach”, which would, as an incorporated town, in the future expand to include Ocean City. The obituary continued: “Mr. Stuckey spent the last twenty years at his home on the F.E.C. Canal, there he enjoyed the company of his wife and children, and where he was known as an hospitable and genial friend to the captains and other officers plying the canal in cargo and pleasure craft; to his many friends in this and nearby counties, who came to spend pleasant Sundays and were afforded the hospitality of a true southern gentleman.” In his last will and testament, Pinkney directed that his wife Emma, serving as executrix, sell the St. Joseph’s and Port Orange properties, with the proceeds going to his children and grandchildren.

Ivey Stuckey, a son of Pinkney Stuckey, served under William Cookman at the Bulow Coast Guard Station, later renamed to the Flagler Beach Coast Guard Station, from 1918 to 1921. The station was located where the beachside campground of Gamble Rogers Memorial State Recreation Area is today. Ivey’s U.S. Coast Guard War Service Certificate is the final image here. When the station closed in 1921 (it would reopen three years later), Ivey left the Coast Guard to become the local fish warden, according to The Flagler Tribune. He later served as a Flagler County Deputy Sheriff and unexpectedly died on December 27, 1924, from what was stated to be apoplexy. That would today be known as a stroke. Ivey was only 28 years old. He now rests with his parents and other family members at the Pilgrims Rest Cemetery in Ormond Beach.

Palmetto House photo credit: Flagler Beach Historical Museum

Emma Jones portrait credit: Ancestry.com

Ivey Stuckey’s War Service Certificate credit: Flagler County Historical Society

06/07/2026

New addition to our Gift Shop Childrens Books

06/04/2026

Here is a 1984 color photo of the Golden Sands Apartments on South Second Street, between Central and Daytona Avenues. The photo was taken by beloved Flagler professional photographer Theodore Carl “Theo” Hein (1918-2001). The Golden Sands Apartments building was constructed in 1948 by Palmer Lamar “Pal” Parker Sr (1894-1962). He was a World War I veteran of the U.S. Navy submarine force. His portrait photo follows, courtesy of Ancestry.com.

Pal Parker and his wife, the former Irma Arminda Green (1903-1988), and their three sons, Pal Jr., Pat, and Bob, moved to Flagler Beach in 1947 from Atlanta, Georgia, where Pal had a plumbing, heating, and appliance sales business. The Parker family stayed at the Flagler Beach Hotel until completion of their home at what would become known as the Golden Sands Apartments across Eighth Street (today’s South 2nd Street) from the hotel. Irma Parker’s older brother and his wife, John Walter Green (1895-1976) and the former Mabel Alberta McClain (1898-1985), owned the Flagler Beach Hotel at the time. Walter and Mabel Green had purchased the Flagler Beach Hotel in 1945, after it had been unused as a hotel since the late 1930s. After restoration and repairs, they reopened it in 1946. They would own it for 27 years, selling it in 1972 for $165,000 to two families, who immediately demolished it to make way for new development that did not materialize until 2023, when construction began on the Compass Hotel by Margaritaville.

With construction complete by April 1948 on his new building across the street from the hotel, Pal Parker moved his family from the Flagler Beach Hotel to an upstairs apartment. Then he prepared to open his new business downstairs, offering appliance sales, installation, and home construction and remodeling services. An ad announcing the opening appeared in The Flagler Tribune on July 29, 1948, and is included here as the third image. But this is not what the Parkers are primarily remembered for. The two of them, Pal and Irma, became legendary real estate brokers specializing in residential property sales between the Atlantic Ocean and Intracoastal Waterway at the southern end of Flagler Beach. In the late 1940s and 1950s, when few homes were being built here, they bought all the property they could in that area, developing a substantial part of it as the Morningside Subdivision, named after a pleasant residential section of Atlanta. They always financed their lot sales. Old timers of the area will recall all the roadside signs reading “Home sites, $25 down. $10 a month. Pal Parker.” In 1949, they sold lots fronting A1A for $400.

After her husband passed away in 1962, Irma Parker continued to grow the business. In 1969-1970, she purchased the land known as the Atlanta Beach Subdivision. At one time or another, either alone or with Pal, she recalled owning almost all of the land in Flagler Beach south of today’s South 23rd Street, between the ocean and the waterway, and north of Gamble Rogers Memorial State Recreation Area.

Today, you can still find the building that was once the Golden Sands Apartments, just across South 2nd Street from the Compass Hotel. It stands at 209 South 2nd Street, formerly 2846 Eighth Street at the time of its build. A Google Street View of it from February 2025 appears here as the fourth image. The final image is a photograph of it from last month, inviting you to enjoy an Italian ice or ice cream at Uncle Louie G’s business located within.

Golden Sands Apartments photo credit: Flagler Beach Historical Museum, Theo C. Hein Collection

Pal Parker Sr portrait credit: Ancestry.com

Uncle Louie G Building photo credit: Tom Duncan

06/02/2026

Coming Soon...

The History Closet

As part of the museum’s ongoing commitment to create engaging opportunities for our youngest explorers, The History Closet is coming this month. Filled with clothes and props from decades past, youth visitors can make history come alive through interactive play and dress up.

(The History Closet is also part of our Summer Adventure Series, which starts next week. Are your kids and grandkids signed up yet?)

06/02/2026

Did you know?? You can also follow on Instagram!

06/01/2026

Ever wonder what downtown Flagler Beach, Florida, looked like 100 years ago? Here is a colorized photo showing just that, for that part of downtown south of Moody Boulevard and east of Central Avenue. The photo was taken from the top floor of the 1925 Flagler Beach Hotel, looking southeast. The unretouched original photo follows. This was the year before the construction of Ocean Shore Boulevard (today’s SR-A1A) in 1927. It was two years before our municipal Pier and Pier House opened in 1928. Not shown is the block between Moody Boulevard and Eighth Street (today’s South 2nd Street), east of Central Avenue. That entire block was the Flagler Beach Hotel oceanfront park. In 1940, the Fuquay family, owners of the Flagler Beach Hotel, gave it to the Town of Flagler Beach, provided the town maintained it as a recreational park. It is today’s Veterans Park.

Many of the buildings in the colorized photo are identified with red text and arrows. At the southmost end along the ocean dune line is the Frank Owen Bungalow. It was constructed in 1922 by Frank Owen Sr (1871-1955), who was the superintendent of logging for the Wilson Cyprus Company of Palatka, Florida. He immigrated to the United States in 1889 from Glasgow, Scotland, where he was born. After 35 years at Wilson Cyprus Company, he retired and moved permanently to his beach bungalow at Flagler Beach in 1926, the same year that he was hired by the town commission to be the town clerk. Frank served as the Flagler Beach town clerk from 1926 to 1943. A portrait photo of Frank is posted here, courtesy of Ancestry.com. His beach bungalow stands today at 404 South Ocean Shore Boulevard, where, until recently, it hosted the Z-Wave Surf Shop. It is now undergoing a remodel to become the new home of the Craeft Surf Studio by Will and Clarissa Tant.

North of the Frank Owen Bungalow along the dune line is the Moody Hotel, undergoing construction at the time of this photo by Flagler Beach Mayor George Moody (1879-1967). It was at the south corner of Ninth Street (today’s South 3rd Street) and the future Ocean Shore Boulevard. As recently posted, the hotel opened in 1927 as the Luna Vista Hotel, though it was generally known as the Moody Hotel. It was sold to Walter Richard Landers (1908-1978) and his wife, the former Mildred Marie Steele (1905-1996), in 1946. They extensively remodeled the Moody Hotel and renamed it the Milland Hotel, presumably from a contraction of Mildred Landers’ name. The former Milland Hotel was put up for sale around 1975. After standing nearly 31 years, it was demolished on December 12, 1977, to make way for a bank. The defunct Bank of America building stands today where it once was.

Across Ninth Street (today’s South 3rd Street) from the Moody Hotel is the Samuel S. Browning Beach Cottage. Formerly, on the lot where this sits was the First House to be occupied in what would become Flagler Beach. That First House is also shown, but in the location where it was moved to the rear of the lot to serve as servants’ quarters and a garage for the beach cottage. The First House was one of three adjacent houses constructed along the dune line by George Moody on his 1913 homestead grant. William Harrison “Uncle Bill” Lewis (1862-1940) and his wife, Mary Ann Miller Lewis (1860-1946), occupied the house in December 1913, making them the very first beachside residents of the future Flagler Beach. Uncle Bill, with John McLeod, constructed those first three houses for George Moody. Moody’s homestead house was completed and ready for occupancy in February 1914. It is off-camera to the left of the Isaac I. Moody Beach Home, the center home of those first three houses. More on the Isaac I. Moody Beach Home follows later.

Samuel Stanton “S. S.” Browning (1861-1953) bought the lot with the First House from architect and builder Dana Fellows Fuquay (1881-1970) in 1923. Dana Fuquay was a pioneering developer of Flagler Beach. Browning then contracted with Fuquay to build his beach cottage. After moving the First House to the rear of the lot in 1924, Fuquay subcontracted with Luther Orlando “L. O.” Upson (1872-1941) for the foundation and concrete work. Upson, another pioneering developer of Flagler Beach, served on the first town commission after incorporation. He followed George Moody as mayor in 1931. Fuquay subcontracted the framing and carpentry work on Browning’s beach cottage with Daniel Edward Lowe (1869-1973). In addition to being a skilled carpenter, Lowe served as one of the first marshals in the Seabreeze area and, as marshal, had the second telephone, after John D. Rockefeller. He worked with Fuquay on many of the large, older buildings and hotels in the Daytona Beach area. Mr. Browning’s beach cottage was completed in 1924. He owned the Browning Lumber Company in East Palatka, Florida, and had a beautiful primary home on the St. Johns River there. Today, the Atlantic Ocean Realty building at 212 South Ocean Shore Boulevard stands where Browning’s beach cottage once was.

Adjacent and just north along the dune line from the Samuel S. Browning Beach Cottage is the Isaac I. Moody Beach Home, built in 1914 as one of the first three homes in the future Flagler Beach by George Moody for his older brother, Isaac Isham “I. I.” Moody Jr (1874-1918). A circa 1912 family photo is posted as the fourth image. On the porch of his Bunnell home are Isaac, seated in a rocking chair, his wife Dora Lee Moody (1881-1959) standing on the right, and their three daughters (left to right), Leona (1908-1999), Dorothy Marguret (1910-1980), and Gladys (1906-1973). I. I. Moody was most notably the driving force behind the creation of Flagler County in 1917, from what then was mostly St. Johns County and a small portion of Volusia County. He was president of the Bunnell Development Company, the developer of Ocean City, the small community west of the Florida East Coast Canal (today’s Atlantic Intracoastal Waterway) along Lambert Avenue that later became a part of the growing Flagler Beach. Moody Boulevard, the portion of today’s State Road 100 between Bunnell and Flagler Beach, is named after him. Not long after Flagler County's creation, I. I. Moody passed away from the Spanish Flu on December 17, 1918, at the age of 44. His beach home survived into recent times as the oldest structure in Flagler Beach, long after the other two original homes were no more. A fifth photo from the late 1930s shows the home as the Pilot Wheel Inn, a bed-and-breakfast inn owned by Alla James Perry (1874-1955). That is George Moody’s homestead home, partially appearing on the right of the photo. I. I. Moody’s beach home was most recently King’s Oceanshore Café. Hurricane Charley on August 13-14, 2004, tore the roof off, and later that same month, it was condemned. Demolition followed in March 2005. The site it once occupied is the vacant parking lot just north of the Atlantic Ocean Realty building, across A1A from the Funky Pelican Restaurant.

At the southeast corner of Eighth Street (today’s South 2nd Street) and Central Avenue is the Southland Hotel, a large, once open building constructed in the early days of Ocean City Beach by George Moody as a convenience for beachgoers. According to Catherine Wilson, it was later acquired by the Sorgs, who converted it to a rooming house. Robert Stuart “R. S.” Tolan (1870-1944), a local real estate broker, then purchased it and further remodeled it into seven small apartments marketed as the Southland Hotel. Tolan was a town commissioner at the time of the 1926 photo. Catherine Wilson states in her 1998 book, A New Beginning – A Picturesque History of Flagler Beach, Florida, that “During the early 1960s, the city acquired the property and opened it up for a large recreation room. The Methodist Church and the Woman’s Club staffed the center with volunteers to operate a summer program for the young people. There were games and record players and every Saturday night there was a dance.” It was demolished by 1964 to make way for the current City Hall building at 105 South Second Street, completed in 1965.

Next door to the Southland Hotel is the Robert S. Tolan Store Building. In 1928, the town commission moved its regular meeting place from the Atlantic Shores Company Building on the northeast corner of Moody Boulevard and Central Avenue to this building. The town commission moved again in 1929, this time from this building to the Moody Hotel. The Flagler Beach City Hall stands today where both it and the Southland Hotel once were.

Across the street from the Southland Hotel on the southwest corner of Eighth Street (today’s South 2nd Street) and Central Avenue is the unfinished realty office building of Ida Arcadia Fuquay Upson (1879-1961). It was constructed by her husband, L. O. Upson. When finished later in 1926, it would carry a sign on the side reading “Flagler Beach Realty Co. – Ida A. Upson – Real Estate + Insurance”. Ida is the older sister of Dana F. Fuquay, who built the Flagler Beach Hotel across the street. An adept organizer and businesswoman, Ida operated a merchandise store in the early years of Flagler Beach, then known as Ocean City Beach. With the Florida land boom, she expanded her repertoire to include real estate and insurance. Ida would go on to handle many of the early real estate transactions in Flagler Beach. In 1926, her brother Dana Fuquay persuaded her to take on the management of the Flagler Beach Hotel as well. Ida was in charge of the hotel when Col. Charles A. Lindbergh stayed there over the weekend after landing at the Flagler Beach Airport in November 1931. A later photo of Ida standing outside the hotel is the final image posted here. You can visit Ida’s former 1926 real estate office today. All you need to do is order a smoothie in the Raw Juice Café at 200 South Central Avenue across from City Hall Commission Chambers.

Next door to Ida Upson’s real estate office is the home that L. O. Upson built for them in the early 1920s. That home still stands, though you would never recognize it, for Marge and Ted Barnhill extensively remodeled it and wrapped it in lovely wood decks and dining areas to create Barnhill’s Café, Bar & Grill at 202 South Central Avenue. Lurking beneath it all is an early 1920’s historic building.

Moving south along Central Avenue, the Holden Pharmacy building is at the southeast corner with Ninth Street (today’s South 3rd Street). George Moody and Oscar Jay Gude Jr (1890-1944) built the two-story pharmacy building in 1925 for Tom Edward Holden (1892-1974). It was Flagler Beach’s first pharmacy and Tom Holden’s second, as he already operated one in Bunnell. After the Moody Hotel opened in 1927, Holden moved his pharmacy to the northeast corner on the ground floor of the hotel. From 1939 to 1957, Mariel Marie Ranger Mosby (1907-1994) and her husband Richard Randall “Dick” Mosby (1898-1980) operated a grocery store in the former 1925 Holden’s Pharmacy building. They lived in the apartment above. For many years, it was the only grocery store in Flagler Beach. The building still stands today as the law offices of Flagler Beach City Commissioner Scott W. Spradley at 301 South Central Avenue.

On the next block south along Central Avenue at the southeast corner of Tenth Street (today’s South 4th Street) is the Wickline Store & U.S. Post Office. Austin VanBuren Wickline (1859-1942) purchased the land from George Moody in July 1921. Then he bought a cement block-making machine from Montgomery Ward & Company that he and his son, George Edwin Wickline (1903-1987), used to make the concrete blocks for the building. They finished constructing it in late 1924. Then Austin and his wife, Esther Adda “Etta” Chaffee Wickline (1868-1952), moved their home in Ocean City to the upstairs apartment and their mercantile store to downstairs at the south end of the building. Etta Wickline retired as the Flagler Beach postmaster in 1926. The Wickline family lived upstairs here until the late 1940s. Catherine Wilson noted that after the Wicklines closed their store on the south end of the building, that space was used for city business until the current city hall building was completed in 1965. The old Wickline store building, extensively remodeled, still stands at 411 South Central Avenue, where you can find Southeast Jewelry today.

Downtown photo credit: Flagler Beach Historical Museum

Frank Owen photo credit: Ancestry.com

Isaac Moody Family photo credit: Find a Grave, www.findagrave.com

Pilot Wheel Inn photo credit: Shill Family (Eleanor Shill and Carol Shill Pike)

Ida Upson photo credit: Ancestry.com