Description

After a career as a founding partner with John D. Rockefeller in Standard Oil, Henry Morrison Flagler’s interests turned to developing Florida. Eventually, Flagler’s Florida East Coast Railway and the luxury hotels he built along the way, linked the entire east coast of Florida, establishing agriculture and tourism as Florida’s leading industries and Palm Beach as one of the great winter resorts.

When it was completed in 1902, Whitehall, Flagler’s Gilded Age estate in Palm Beach, was hailed by the New York Herald as “more wonderful than any palace in Europe, grander and more magnificent than any other private dwelling in the world.” Today, Whitehall is open to the public as the Flagler Museum. Flagler’s private railcar is displayed in the Flagler Kenan Pavilion.