The Tampa Bay area has a rich and fascinating history. Truly an international city, Tampa attracted its residents from all over the world, and the city's natural deep-water port and proximity to the Panama Canal encouraged significant growth around the turn of the twentieth century. Visionary
pioneers came together with Henry B. Plant's railroad, the construction of the Tampa Bay Hotel, and Tampa's five "C's" (climate, cattle, citrus, cigars, and cheap labor) to build the city that became the "Gem of Florida's Gulf Coast." During this same period in Tampa's history, from the 1890s through...