Florida was the first part of the American mainland visited by European explorers in the sixteenth century. The Spanish arrived first, led by Juan Ponce de León, who named the region after the Spanish Easter festival Pascua Florida, or “Festival of Flowers,” during which he landed. Spain later found itself squeezed by French expansion from Louisiana and British settlements in Georgia, eventually ceding Florida to Britain in exchange for Havana, Cuba.

The colony prospered through plantations producing sugar cane, oranges, and later cotton. During Spanish rule, Florida served as a refuge for escaped slaves. In fact, America’s first legally sanctioned free Black settlement, Fort Mose, was established near St. Augustine. Under British rule, however, enslaved Africans were brought in to work the plantations.

Florida remained loyal to the British Crown during the American Revolution, but after the war it was returned to Spain. By 1821, however, the United States had acquired the territory, and the first half of the nineteenth century was marked by a series of conflicts known as the Seminole Wars, fought between the U.S. Army and an alliance of the Seminole people and free African Americans. Eventually, U.S. control was secured, and most Seminoles were forced to relocate to present-day Oklahoma.