Written as published in "Tales of Sebastian" courtesy of the Sebastian Area Historical Society.
Those of you who live in the area between the St. Sebastian River and the Indian River Lagoon in north Indian River County are part of a region that is experiencing rapid growth and faced with all of the problems such growth entails.
If you are like most of us, you know very little of the history of the place.
This volume is a modest attempt to present some of the area’s early history. For like most places, it has a past, one that is rich and colorful, filled with interesting people and events.
It is a past worth remembering for its own sake and because it forms the repository out of which the present was constructed. What our community is today depends in part on the actions of men and women who came to a frontier and made it livable.
The history of the area has a richness that may surprise you. It is a history that began long before there was any thought of towns like Sebastian, Roseland, Wabasso and Fellsmere, a history that is a resource to be shared.
Perhaps by understanding its broad outlines, we can understand more of the community in which we live today.
Do you realize, if you live in the Sebastian area, you are living at the location of the site of an Indian Culture that was here for thousands of years before your ancestors came to the shores of this country?
Did you know that, not very far from where you are sitting, 1500 survivors of one of the most famous shipwrecks along the Florida coast had a camp, where they awaited transport back to Cuba, while, not far from them, salvage operation to recapture a fabulous treasure was under way?
Are you aware that directly across the Indian River Lagoon is a historical site where an amateur archaeologist from Micco found evidence of human occupation that was at least 3,000 years old?
Can you imagine that, not far from there, occurred one of the most celebrated pirate raids in history one that touched off a wave of piracy which lasted for a number of decades in the Caribbean? These are only some of the interesting facts about the history of the area. They are by no means exhaustive. For the story of the area around the Sebastian River and the Indian River Lagoon is a fascinating story.
This is the story of early Sebastian. Not the complete story you understand. There is much that is lost and much more that was never known.
(Tales of Sebastian , 1990)