The Commodore's Story

Commodore Ralph M. Munroe

was born April 3, 1851 in Manhattan, NY during the American Civil War. Far from any active warfare, in 1954, Munroe and his family relocated to Clifton, Staten Island, which at the time was a much more rural place, only accessible by boat and was 'more a part of the sea than the land.' As it goes with life on an island, small boats were the primary mode by which people and goods were transported to and fro. It was on Staten Island that Munroe got his first experience with boats and sailing, and what began a lifelong fascination and passion for them. The New York Yacht Club America's Cup Race was held close to Munroe's home in Clifton, and during his youth he was known to dutifully sail out to see the races live and in person.

Sailing remained a mainstay fascination of Munroe's throughout his adolescence into early adulthood, and it was not long before he began designing boats as a hobby. He was also known to have a strong affinity for self-reliance, the love of nature and devotion to the simple life--qualities which he strongly carried throughout his life. Munroe spent the winter of 1972 on an extremely isolated, mostly unpopulated barrier beach called Fire Island. Of the experience Munroe wrote: “The experience with cold, ice, snow and surf, and escapes from disaster, hardened my body, and taught me things of the sea ever useful afterward.” He also remarked that the whole experience was, 'all a grand 'vacation',' and exhibits his innate enjoyment in living in challenging, 'primitive' circumstances.

After briefly attending Columbia University in New York City, Munroe participated in a number of lucrative business ventures as well as yachting adventures--spending all his free time sailing and designing sailboats. In 1874, he encountered William Brickell off of the coast of Staten Island, a meeting that changed his life. It was from him that Munroe learned of Biscayne Bay and Florida, an untamed wilderness and legendary sailor's paradise--America's last frontier. Munroe first visited Biscane Bay in 1877. At this time in history, Florida had no railways or roads and the only way to traverse it was by boat--a grand opportunity for someone of Munroe's stock.

Southern Migration

"With the country moving west, discovering the Grand Canyon, new inventions, new towns formed by the railroad stops, gold prospectors, massive buffalo herds, wild Indians on the warpath and new states in the union, the country was bursting with enthusiasm. There were no limits to the sky. (1)"

"Munroe fell in love with Biscayne Bay but returned to New York after a brief visit. In 1879 he married Eva Hewitt, built an octagonal house for her on the waterfront at Great Kills, and embarked on a successful oyster planting business. He planned to spend the rest of his life at Great Kills with his wife and new daughter who was born in 1881, until tragedy struck and changed his plans. Eva Munroe contracted tuberculosis.

Remembering the healing warmth of the tropical frontier of South Florida, Munroe sold his business and took his wife to Biscayne Bay, This would not be a happy journey. Soon after their departure, their daughter, Edith, who had been left with her grandmother became ill and died, poor Eva fared no better. She died at their camp on the Miami River on April 2, 1882 and was buried nearby. (Note: Eva Munroe's gravesite is the oldest in Miami)

Cast adrift by this dramatic change in his life’s direction, Munroe soon lost interest in his northern affairs. He wrote to Charles Peacock, whom he had met while in South Florida, and suggested that he build a hotel south of the Miami River in what is now Coconut Grove, now visitors would have a place to stay. When Munroe arrived in late 1882, the “Bay View House,” which was located in what is now Peacock Park was almost completed. (2)"

PRESTO

"At age 23, with no formal training he began to design sailboats for himself and his friends. His Florida experience made him aware of the need for a new type of shoal-draft boat that would be able to cruise along shallow shores and be equally secure in a heavy sea. Thus in 1885 he designed “Presto,” the first of his famous and innovative shoal-draft centerboarders that were immortalized by Vincent Gilpin in The Good Little Ship. (2)"

PRESTO's were a series of round-bilged, gaff ketch-rigged yachts that performed outstandingly in their time--many have stated that the PRESTO design was many years ahead of its time.

"The only way to travel around Biscayne Bay and south Florida at that time was by boat, and Munroe’s talents as an amateur designer were thus in some demand. He specialized in creating shoal-draft vessels that were also comfortable in a seaway. He was, in his day, recognized as something of genius in this regard. (4)"

Interestingly, Munroe designed and built his round-bilged PRESTO boats, a more complex hull-shape/build, before he introduced the simple flat-bottomed sharpies for which he's more commonly known.

Sharpies

"Sharpies are a type of hard chined sailboat with a flat bottom, extremely shallow draft, centerboards and straight, flaring sides. They are believed to have originated in the New Haven, Conneticut region of Long Island Sound, United States. They were traditional fishing boats used for oystering, and later appeared in other areas. With centerboards and shallow balanced rudders they are well suited to sailing in shallow tidal waters. (5)"

The exact origins of the sharpie are unknown, but they are a quintessentially American development that came into use as a successor to the dugout log canoe. It's early uses developed out of the needs of working-class fisherman in various regions of the U.S.; however, it's unique sailing capabilities soon saw them being built for racing, and yachting soon thereafter.

The Sharpie Comes to Florida: SKIPEREE

"The widely held notion that Commodore Ralph M. Munroe introduced the sharpie Egret to Florida in the late 1870's is erroneous. The truth is that Munroe brought the first sharpie to Florida in the fall of 1881. Following is Munroe's account, from The Commodore's Story, by Munroe and Gilpin:

With us on the steamer's deck went a 30-foot sharpie sailboat, which was a complete novelty in Key West waters, and excited much comment. The general opinion was that owing to her excessively light draft (8 inches) she would be useless except in running before the wind, and their astonishment was great when they found none among the native craft able to beat her to windward. They dubbed her Skiperee, and the name stuck. (3)"

KINGFISH

"During the summer of 1883 Munroe designed a 33-foot sharpie, which was built by Brown of Staten Island, and which Munroe subsequently brought to St. Augustine, Florida, in December of that year on board the schooner W. H. Van Brunt. The sharpie, named Kingfish, was rigged as a gaff ketch with sprit booms. Munroe and a companion sailed her south to Coconut Grove through a wide variety of weather conditions. (3)"

"Munroe Used Kingfish regularly to go offshore regularly from Miami, meet the New York liners rounding Cape Florida, collect mail, small cargoes, and periodicals, and distribute them to the lighthouse keepers and inhabitants of the bay. He also transported passengers, sick patients, food and cargo, captured giant crocodiles, made rescues, and salvaged wrecks. (3)"

Views of Florida

"Munroe was interested in everything especially the new world he found in the tropics. Unlike many other pioneers he was not interested in what it might become, but in what it was at that moment. He wanted to share his discoveries with others. In 1883 he brought a camera with him and captured forever the beauty of the virgin wilderness he loved. These “views” as photographs were called in that day, were more than a priceless historical record, they were artistically composed and demonstrated his considerable skill as a photographer – at a time when amateur photography itself was blazing new frontiers. He became the friend of botanist Charles Sargent and together they discovered the first known Royal Palm growing in the wild near little river. It too made the scientific journals. (2)"

It's worth noting that all of the earliest and only photos of the Miami-Dade area during that time were taken by Munroe--they've been widely featured in books, magazines and articles.

EGRET

"In the summer of 1886 Munroe designed the double-ended 28-foot sharpie Egret, specifically for running the shallow Florida inlets and handling the rough Gulf Stream offshore waters in almost any weather. Egret had a deep, narrow bottom and very flaring topsides, and might be considered to combine some of the best qualities of the dory with those of the sharpie. She was built at Brown's on Staten Island, and brought by Mallory Boat to Key West, where she distinguished herself in many ways, including transporting the mail from Palm Beach to Miami in all seasons. (3)"

"Munroe referred to Egret as a "sharpie-lifeboat. . . very strongly but lightly constructed. She drew eight inches, and had only fifty to seventy-five bricks, laid under her floor, for ballast. She was fitted with all the appurtenances needed to keep the sea in almost any weather, and if necessary to be put on the beach without harm." (3)"

Coconut Grove: The Barnacle

"In 1886 Ralph Munroe bought forty-one-acres of land from John Frow for four-hundred-dollars and his Sharpie “Kingfish.” It included almost all of the bay front from 100 feet south of Peacock Park to what is now Royal Road. Of this forty acres, he choose approximately five acres for his own home, The Barnacle, and eventually sold the other thirty-five acres. Monroe picked the five acre tract for his home because the land there had already been improved. (2)"

The Barnacle and its accompanying buildings still stand today and exist as a Historic State Park and monument(s).

Raising the Roof: Florida's Oldest House

"Ralph Munroe had many talents, his reputation in the sailing world is well known, but few realize that he also had unusual intuitive ability as an architect. The Barnacle, which he built in 1891, is the best example of his work. The original structure was a square, hipped roof building with each point of the square pointing due north, south, east and west. Built high off the ground, the four corner rooms were built around an octagonal center room, which was the dinning room. The center room was open to an attic and the peak of which was a glass clerestory which opened on the south and east to pick up the prevailing South Florida winds. The front and sides of the house were covered with a wide veranda. He was so pleased with his design that in 1908 when he needed to enlarge his house to accommodate his growing children. Patty and Wirth, who were born after his marriage to Jessie Wirth in 1895, he jacked the entire house up on stilts and built a new first floor underneath. (2)"

The Boat House

"After that Munroe returned to South Florida each winter and brought many of his northern friends with him. In 1889 he built a boathouse on the property he had purchased from John Frow and made the decision to “cast his lot” permanently with South Florida. (2)"

"Before he built The Barnacle, Ralph Munroe lived and worked in his Boathouse on the shore of Biscayne Bay. The first floor contained an enclosed space for boatbuilding while the second floor included living quarters plus an area for drafting new boat designs and cabinets to store the plans. He painted the outside Flagler yellow and decorated it with nameboards and figureheads from two shipwrecks he had salvaged, the Ingrid and the Haroldine.

Munroe celebrated the Boathouse’s completion in 1887 by organizing the first Washington’s Birthday Regatta. After the boat races, participants began meeting in the Boathouse and formed the Biscayne Bay Yacht Club. Members elected Munroe the Club’s first Commodore, a position he held for twenty-two years. The Boathouse was an important gathering place for other members of the community as well, and Munroe photographed a number of Coconut Grove’s black, white, and Native American residents and visitors there. (6)"

The Commodore and The Wizard

Nathaniel Greene Herreshoff, born March 18, 1848 (Munroe's peer in age and generation) was a prolific American naval architect, mechanical engineer, and yacht designer. He produced a succession of undefeated America's Cup defenders between 1893 and 1920. He is regarded by many as the preeminent yacht designer of that time, if not of all time. His contemporaries called him The Wizard of Bristol (RI).

"In 1918 Nathaniel Herreshoff came to see Munroe at the Barnacle. Starting in 1922, and for the next eight winters Herreshoff was at the Barnacle in a cottage that Munroe had built for him there. Munroe and Herreshoff had a strong friendship, built on mutual respect for the other’s ability. Herreshoff’s son Francis wrote in his biography of his father that “it is doubtful if anyone but Commodore Munroe ever influenced him.” (his father).

In 1928 it was reported in the New York Herald Tribune that the newly formed Cruising Club of America made” two of the most famous figures in American yacht designing…honorary members. One was N.G. Herreshoff, the other Commodore Ralph Munroe M. Monroe, leading exponent of the shoal-draft yacht for offshore work. (2)”

"In 1923 Munroe had designed his last yacht, the Sunset, for himself. He lived 10 more years, in relative seclusion with many guests at the Barnacle, where he lived, including Alexander Graham Bell. Herreshoff spent his years after 1900 designing small boats for himself, including Coquina and the 30 footer, Pleasure.

This centerboarder was his winter boat from 1925-27. It was ballasted outside the hull, as was his 14 footer, Biscayne Bay. Pleasure was first rigged as a sloop but then changed to a gunter main and yawl rig. Munroe's heavier cruisers could not race with Herreshoff's lighter yachts, so Sunset was designed to race against Pleasure. (1)"

The two men were alike in talent but not personality. Munroe was an extrovert, orgainzing a yacht club among other things. Herreshoff was an engineering genuis, living a life very much to himself. There was no designer with his knowledge of scantlings, strength of material and innovations. He had no peer, and therefore few friends outside his family. He did have a great family, a close one in which none of his relatives have complained of the life they inherited. Herreshoff paid his men at the shipyard unusually well during the Depression, and they were quite loyal to him.

Herreshoff spent each of his last winters in Florida until he died in 1938, back in Bristol, RI. (1)"

Sailing On

"Munroe was a true Renaissance Man. But like so many such men, few of his creative ventures were economically profitable. Of all his passions and interests, making money was not one of them. One of his few successful ventures was Camp Biscayne that he opened in 1903 as a haven for those who shared his ideas about the wilderness. He operated it until the 1920’s when due to his advancing age, he found it difficult to continue.

After that he retreated more and more into the Barnacle which he was now more than ever determined to preserve as it was. Driven by a desire to document the Era of the Bay before the railroad, he began working on his book, The Commodore’s Story, co-authored by Vincent Gilpin, which was published in 1933 when he was seventy-nine years old. (2)" It is one of the few first-hand accounts existing of pioneer days in Miami-Dade County.

"Ralph Munroe died August 20, 1933 at age 82, fifty-six years after he first saw the bay. While often controversial and frequently misunderstood he was cited in his obituary as “among the most honored and highly esteemed citizens of Dade County.

He left his mark on the community he helped found. David Fairchild, the famous naturalist, probably explained this best when he wrote:

"Coconut Grove will never be the same without him. His marvelous personality and historical background made him a kind of cornerstone in the community, and when cornerstones are gone, society loses a great deal more than it usually appreciates.” (2)"