James Canfield and Art Dycke honored at 51st Palm Coast Founders Day celebration

Palm Coast Observer
Your Town

Years before the city was incorporated, the man who would one day become mayor, James Canfield, received a gift, of sorts. ITT, the company that envisioned and created the community in 1970, was now leaving town and wanted to unload a bunch of boxes with founding documents and artifacts.

Soon, Canfield’s garage was full of the ITT boxes. “My wife was getting annoyed,” Canfield said during his speech on Oct. 29, as the city celebrated Founders Day. He explained that when the city was later founded, on Dec. 31, 1999, the boxes were finally transferred out of his garage and into one makeshift City Hall after another, until they landed at the Palm Coast Historical Society at Holland Park.

In the early days ...

Mayor David Alfin shared a history of the city during his Oct. 29 speech, at the Palm Coast Historical Society. Here is an excerpt:

A quick snapshot of the launch of Palm Coast began 51 years ago when International Telephone and Telegraph forever changed the pace of life in Flagler County. ITT had purchased 68,000 acres in this rural county with the intention of building a 20,000-acre planned residential community.

Buyers who came to take a look at this new community were escorted to a Welcome Center Observation Tower that opened to the public on Oct. 29, 1970, a date that has since been known to us all as Founders Day. Visitors listened to a Beatles recording of “Here Comes the Sun” and were provided with a panoramic view of the ocean and the largely unpopulated swamp and pine forest below. There they would also see that construction was underway to transform the landscape.

Affordable waterfront lots and the recreational amenities of golf, tennis, swimming and boating were to become the main attractions for future residents seeking a carefree lifestyle in a warm climate. Five hundred miles of canals, roads, and drainage systems would eventually be built.

At that time, ITT/Levitt Corp. implemented 53 different projects, including nine model homes, a golf course, and a dredging operation needed to create the main canal that would one day connect with the Intracoastal Waterway. The first homes were built on the corner of Club House and Casper Drives, with pre-construction land and home packages beginning at $13,000. Reportedly 8,000 home sites were sold the first year. Four months later the first residents moved into their homes in the “core area,” with the promise of “A Better Place, A Better Life, A Better Way."

It was fitting, then, after the speeches commemorating the 51st anniversary of the city’s founding, that the building was renamed the James V. Canfield Museum. The room next door to the museum was also given an official name: the Arthur E. Dycke Research Center, after the man who has been the city’s historian since 2000.

Founding City Council member Bill Venne also spoke to the crowd of a few dozen dignitaries and residents on a bright fall day, Oct. 29, 2021. He recalled Palm Coast’s “country club atmosphere” from the early days. Ultimately, though, “people started to feel that we needed a little sovereignty.” He credited Canfied for leading the way to incorporation and for setting the tone of the city.

“If he was there with his tie and jacket, we had to be there in our tie and jacket, too. He ran a tight ship,” Venne said. “ … It was a great experience working with that bunch, getting the city off the ground.”

Joining Canfield and Venne on the original City Council were Ralph Carter, Jerry Full and James Holland. Carter and Holland both have city parks named for them.

More than 60% of the 12,000 voters opted for incorporation, according to Dycke’s book on the history of the city.

Fanny Herrera spoke after Venne at the Oct. 29, 2021, celebration. Her family moved to Palm Coast in 1976; her husband, Eddie, has a field named after him at the Indian Trails Sports Complex. She explained that, in an attempt to organize an international celebration, she flipped through the skinny phone book at the time and found all the names that seemed to be Polish or Hungarian, etc. About 13 people showed up. Eventually, the event would draw thousands.

The city asked her one day how much money she would need to throw the celebration, and she recalls saying, “I don’t need any money. I give you the bills, and you pay it all.”

The late Jon Netts was the city’s second mayor, from 2008 to 2016, and he was succeeded by Mayor Milissa Holland, who also spoke at the event on Oct. 29, 2021. She recalled that, as a young woman, before the city’s incorporation, her father told her that Canfield would make a good mayor because he had an understanding of the city’s history, a love for the community and a vision for the future.

“He led by example each and every day,” Milissa Holland said of Canfield. “ … Thank you for your incredible service.”

Like Venne, James Holland was not as excited about Canfield’s dress code in the early days of Palm Coast government. He ended up wearing clip-on ties to council meetings, Milissa Holland said, and he took them off as soon as the meetings were over.

“If he was there with his tie and jacket, we had to be there in our tie and jacket, too. He ran a tight ship. … It was a great experience working with that bunch, getting the city off the ground.”

— BILL VENNE, on serving on the first City Council, with Mayor James Canfield

Dave Studnicki, a member of a group of golfers known as the Sludgehammers, which included some of the city’s founders, announced to the audience that the group had disbanded after 70 years of revolving membership. He donated a check to the Palm Coast Historical Society for the amount of the club’s leftover dues, $527.

Dave’s wife, Elaine Studnicki, is the society’s president. She unveiled the names of the museum and research center, as well as a mural-in-progress that will be dedicated to Netts’ memory.

Current Mayor David Alfin, the city’s fourth, praised each previous mayor’s leadership; he also praised Dycke’s efforts to record the city’s history, calling him a “sweet, humble gentleman.” Dycke has written a third book, available at the Canfield Museum.

Alfin noted how far the city had come since those first 8,000 homes were sold in the first year. In 2021, the city has an Innovation District and 90,000 residents.

“Today, our Palm Coast Historical Society is paying tribute to five decades of the memories, leadership, triumphs and challenges that have shaped the foundation of our city,” Alfin said. “This is not just an anniversary, but an observance of our history and the people who’ve helped make it the wonderful place where we all live, work and play.”