Black Gold and Silver Sands

Book excerpt: Abiding faith and dogged determination were the main motivators as a handful of hardscrabble farmers began transforming tracts of sand, saw grass, swamp and muck land into the agribusiness infrastructure that underpins Palm Beach County, Florida today. Black Gold and Silver Sands, with over 250 photographs from museums and family collections, tells the county’s dramatic history of farming from the days of the hardy pioneers who grew pumpkins and pineapples on the shores of Lake Worth. In this handsome coffee table book, you’ll read diaries, letters and personal interviews that describe the faith and fortitude of those who endured sun, spoilage, frost, floods, hurricanes and other hardships in building what would soon become one of the nation’s most agriculturally productive counties.