The Founders of Biscayne Bay

Born in Pinsk, Belarus in 1906, Shepard Broad saw his father die from starvation. In 1920 he joined mass migration to North America where he became a lawyer and a banker. After visiting Miami in the late 1930s, he decided to move to South Florida in 1940, founding the law firm Broad and Cassel after being admitted to the Florida Bar. He was also president of the Mercantile National Bank and created the American Savings and Loan. He became a real estate developer with the acquisition of 253 acres for $650,000 in Biscayne Bay, paving the way for the town of Bay Harbor Islands to be incorporated April 28, 1947. That same year the State Legislature authorized Shepard’s building of a causeway at 125th Street and Biscayne Boulevard. The $2.5 million road was to be financed by self-liquidating bonds without expense to taxpayers. It was completed in 1951 and aptly named Broad Causeway.

After Robert C. Graham and his two brothers founded Graham-Paige, an automobile manufacturer in Detroit in 1927, he then created Miami Beach Heights, a real estate development company based in Detroit. In partnership with Carl Fisher and Walter O. Briggs, he purchased 245 acres of undeveloped, partially swampy land in Biscayne Bay, from the bay to the Atlantic, north of what would become Surfside in 1935, crafting a new community. In 1930, Harland Bartholomew & Associates, one of the leading urban planning firms of the 20th Century, was hired to design the Bal Harbour Village. From the beginning, the village was envisioned as a modern community that would maintain exceptionally high standards, provide superior services and fosters civic pride. Following the war, on August 14, 1946, Bal Harbour Village was incorporated and development began. The Village was first called “Bay Harbour,” a name that was soon discarded as it did not properly define a community with oceanfront property. A new word was created, taking letters from “bay” and “Atlantic” to create “Bal.”

In 1900, Henry Levy’s family traded the anti-Semitism of France for the United States, settling in Cincinnati, Ohio, creating a successful movie chain by 1915. By 1922, married and father of a daughter named Clemence, he moved his family to Florida, purchasing a parcel (from 87th Terrace to 90th Street) from Carl Fisher two years later. He platted Normandy Beach which would become Surfside in 1935. One year later, for $250,000, Henry bought South Island, a mangrove patch west of 71st Street. After two years of dredging, the patch was renamed, Normandy Isle. In 1928, he had convinced state and local governments to complete a causeway to connect 79th Street on the Miami Side with what would become 71st Street on the beach side. The Causeway was completed and opened a year later.

Harvey Baker Graves started his career in the printing business but would go on to develop one of the largest furniture businesses in the northeast. In 1918, he purchased the 1,900-acres Graves tract, including more than nine miles of Biscayne Bay, Biscayne and Oleta rivers, and Dumfoundling Bay water frontage, along with Bella Vista. He referred to Sunny Isles as “a place in the sun in the ocean.” Between 1924 and 1925, Harvey started the filling of several islands of what is today Sunny Isles Beach. However, the devastating 1926 hurricane, followed by the Great Depression only a few years later, thwarted development until 1938 when the area saw its first motel, the Green Heron at 16801 Collins Avenue.