the position of Fort Myers Beach as a tired beach community contradicts its original roots as home to Indians and a number of adventurers. Some of its noisy history involves the unlikely mixture of pirates, homesteaders, and mosquitoes. Today, Estero Island and its sister island, San Carlos, make up the community of Fort Myers Beach.

Estero Island was once the centre of the Caloosa Indian heartland. This geologically young barrier island was formed well after the Earth's last ice age. Prior to the appearance of the white man, the Caloosa Indians used plenty of the Florida West Coast islands as their hunting and fishing grounds. 'Shell Mounds,' or the remains of their meals and community waste, mark Estero Island and other key landmarks around Fort Myers Beach.

Historians agree that Juan Ponce de Leon and his men were the first to see Florida and gave the lush state its name in the early 1500s. They were followed by a number of other EU explorers looking for their fortune. The Caloosas bitterly resisted these arrivals. In 1566, a fortune hunter named Menendez landed near their hunting grounds on the beach and killed King Carlos, the Chief of the Caloosas, and 20 of his men. It is from this event the name'Carlos' dominates lots of the West Coast nomenclature, including Carlos Bay, Carlos Pass, and San Carlos Island. The Caloosas' origins remain shrouded in mystery but some students believe they may have traveled by rafts from Mexico's Yucatan Peninsula. Ultimately, they met their passing from lots of the diseases the european explorers brought with them, including measles.

Explorers were not the sole sailors frequenting the Western Coast. During the 1870s, pirates dominated along the shores of Black Island. After defeat by the US Navy, a famous pirate by the name of Black Augustus ( for whom the island was later named ), took his loot and settled on the island. The family of John Butterfield squatted on Mound Key in Estero Bay during that time, providing the ageing pirate with sugar, coffee and other luxuries in exchange for vegetables. When the pirate eventually died, legend has it he paid back the Butterfield family by showing them where to dig for treasure. Rumors of forgotten and still-buried treasures abound.

The Sam Ellis family was the first white family to stay on Estero Island on the Shell Mound on the Bay in the late 1870s. Instead of settling permanently, they later moved to Sanibel where they homesteaded a tract of land at the head of Tarpon Bay. Plenty of the'homesteaders' who filed the first patents did not settle permanently thanks to the difficulties in fighting storms and ensuing crop issues. In fact, in 1899, a freeze hit Florida with temperatures as low as 2 below zero in Tallahassee, murdering trees, oranges and other fledgling crops. It became so cold in the Western part of Florida, legend has it, that thousands of chilled migratory birds slid out of the sky to freeze on the ground.

The last homesteader to stake his claim on Estero Island in 1914 was Leroy Lemoreaux, who cleared his land and survived by growing veg and fishing. In a few historic tracts, Lemoreaux muses over which was the worst predator - the bears and panthers who stalked the island -- or the lethal mosquitoes messing up the air. In the 1890s, the sole weapon against marauding mosquitoes was smoke. This was all before the time when a bridge linked the island to the mainland of the Fort Myers area. In 1921, the 1st bridge built was a wooden swing bridge which charged 50 cents for five folks. The 1926 hurricane washed it way and detached the neck of land attaching San Carlos to the mainland, rendering it an island. Today it's still known as Hurricane Pass.

during the World War II years, the expansion all over Florida flattened, but by the early 50's, the area'caught on' again.Fort Myers Beach grew as more of an enduring destination than a visitors' stop. Visitors were slow to find out Fort Myers Beach as it was at the end of the road, and not particularly well lit. There were no motels although hotels existed and a couple of cottage courts did very well. It's only been recently the Beach has been'rediscovered' as gentrification projects and new shopping and dining sites open. A useful source of pride to the area are the deeply rooted 4th of July and Blessing of the Shrimp Fleet parties. For a period of years, the Beach was the site of the sole major fireworks show in the county. In cooler weather in March, the community celebrates the blessing of the fleet with a week long Shrimp festival, including many special dishes based totally on the popular'pink gold' shrimp.