1916
the land boom
Aviation pioneer Glenn H. Curtiss and his partner, James H. Bright, purchase 17,000 acres of land, encompassing areas that would later become Miami Springs, Hialeah, and Opa-locka, during what was called the "land boom".
The Bright Brothers Ranch was owned by James and J.W. Bright. In 1918 Glenn Curtiss bought our J.W. Bright's share of the Bright Brothers Ranch and formed the Curtiss Bright Ranch with James Bright. Curtiss and Bright bought more acreage, expanding the Curtiss Bright Ranch. It may have reached 17,000 acres.
Picture: James Bright, Glenn Curtiss and resident Art Stanton (the secretary-treasurer of the Curtiss Bright Company)
1919
Shaping the Land
This remarkable 1919 aerial photo captures the early transformation of South Florida, specifically the dredging of the Miami Canal at the Curtiss-Bright Ranch, between what would become downtown Hialeah and Miami Springs.
At the time, Palm Avenue and NW 54th Street (Hialeah Drive) were little more than unpaved paths, with no bridges yet spanning the canal. In the lower right, a large cleared area marks the former site of the Curtiss Flying Field, which had been relocated in March 1917. This land would soon become Deer Park, a neighborhood in Hialeah where both Glenn Curtiss and James Bright built their homes.
To the center right of the image, buildings along Hialeah Drive show the original headquarters of Bright’s Dairy Farm, which was later moved to Palm Avenue near West 28th Street. On the left side of the canal, the cleared space was destined to become the turning basin and zoo in the visionary Country Club Estates, known today as Miami Springs.
Just above that area, another clearing would become the start of The Parkway, what we now know as Curtiss Parkway, a signature roadway in Glenn Curtiss’s garden city plan.
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