Ponte Vedra Beach is known for its rich and unique history with a mix of cultures ranging from early Spanish settlers in the 1500's to the golfers of today.  Ponce de Leon, a Spanish explores best known for his pursuit of the Fountain of Youth landed on what would later become Ponte Vedra Beach in 1513.  Seeing no suitable harbor, he sailed south and landed in what would later be founded in 1565 as St. Augustine.

 

For the rest of the century, Ponte Vedra Beach and the surrounding area was the scene of many conflicts between native Timucuan Indians, the Spanish, the French and the English.  For several decades during the 1700's the area was the subject of raids that destroyed many haciendas and the Indian population.  In 1821, Spain sold Florida to the United States and the state became a territory.  Ponte Vedra Beach blossomed with new settlers, plantations and sugar cane.

 

Florida's first governor, General Andrew Jackson, later divided the territory into two counties - Escambia and St. Johns.  The peaceful life of of the area changed with the start of the seven-year Seminole War in 1835 and continued with the four-year Civil War in 1861, striking a final blow to the old plantation culture.

 

In 1914, two young chemical engineers, Henry Holland Buckman and George A. Pritchard, discover that Ponte Vedra's beautiful beaches contained over a dozen industrial minerals, including rutile and ilmenite, components necessary for the production of titanium or zirconium.  By 1916, the National Lead Company has bought out Pritchard & Buckman and the mining settlement was dubbed Mineral City.  Mineral City played a crucial role in World War I, as titanium was a key component in the manufacture of poison gas and Germany controlled much of the world's titanium supply.  Therefore, the US government ordered as much titanium as Mineral City mines could produce.

 

The National Lead Company built the first 9-hole golf course in Ponte Vedra for its employees along with a log clubhouse and polo field in 1922, which in 1937 became the world famous Ponte Vedra Inn & Club.  With the postwar mineral market dried up and the production at a standstill, National Lead used its clubhouse and golf course as the base from which to launch a resort community.  But the old Mineral City tag would never do.  In one account, one of the developers reads a newspaper story claiming Christopher Columbus was born in Pontevedra, Spain, which was total fiction because Columbus was born in Genoa, Italy.  Nevertheless, the National Lead Company rechristens Mineral City as Ponte Vedra in 1928.

 

The state began work on a road along the shoreline from Ponte Vedra Beach to St. Augustine in 1929, hence State Road A1A was born which helped to speed up development of the resort community.  Development marched on right through the Great Depression.  Despite all this effort, however, the area remained relatively unknown.  It did not match the development pace of South Florida as a tourist destination.  Just as the country began to emerge from the depression, Ponte Vedra's development picked up speed, then World War II erupted in 1941.

 

Blackout curtains were required to deceive the German submarines patrolling off the Atlantic Coast.  Ponte Vedra residents are among the very few stateside Americans to actually witness acts of war firsthand as German submarines sank ships within sight of the Ponte Vedra shore and oil from torpedoed tankers blackened the beaches.  On the night of June 16, 1942, four Nazi saboteurs from a German submarine paddled ashore to Ponte Vedra Beach in a small rubber boat, carrying explosives and a cache of US currency and embarked on a mission which they dubbed "Operation Pastorious."  They frolicked on the beach like tourists to disguise their intentions.  Fortunately, before any damage was done, two of the Germans tipped off federal authorities about the plot and all were captured.

 

As America's economy boomed following the war, Ponte Vedra Beach resumed its evolution in the 1950's as a resort community centered around golf.  The grand course designer Robert Trent Jones was commissioned to expand the existing Ponte Vedra Inn & Club golf course to 27 holes.  By 1966, a bypass was created and State Road A1A rerouted to the west, eliminating Ponte Vedra Boulevard as the main north-south road and opening up western Ponte Vedra and Palm Valley to development.  Developer James Stockton Jr. broke ground in 1972 on the 1,100-acre development known as Sawgrass.  Stockton will later say he chose the name after "tossing and turning" one night.  The name exercise, he says was "growing wild - like that sawgrass on the property."

 

Today, Sawgrass is home to THE PLAYERS Championship golf tournament and is world headquarters for the PGA Tour, thanks to a now-legendary 1978 deal in which developers Jerome and Paul Fletcher "sold" PGA Tour Commissioner Deane Beman 415 densely wooded acres.  The purchase price?  One dollar.  In addition, the Association of Tennis Professionals (ATP Tour) also calls Ponte Vedra Beach home, bringing even more national and international attention to the area as a recreational Mecca.

 

Between 1980 and 1990, Ponte Vedra Beach's population more than doubled to 14,727, according to US Census date.  Between 1990 and 2000 the population nearly doubles again to approximately 28,500.  Today, this thriving community has come to be considered one of the most luxurious and prestigious recreational and residential destinations in Florida, if not the entire country.

 

Ponte Vedra Beach has been voted Money Magazine's "Best Place to Live in Florida" and among the Top 50 places to live in the United states.  With our above average income, low crime rate and top-performing schools ... this is a great place to live and work!