David Levy Yulee
(1810-1886)

Died aged c. 76

David Levy Yulee was born David Levy in 1810 on St. Thomas, British West Indies. He was admitted to the bar in 1836 and later helped lead Florida into statehood, first as a delegate to the state constitutional convention in 1838 and then as territorial delegate to Congress from 1841 to 1845. David Levy was elected to the United States Senate in 1845. The next year he added the name of his father’s Sephardic ancestry, Yulee. In 1851, he established a 5,000-acre sugar plantation on the Homosassa River, and was among the first in Florida to grow sweet oranges budded from sour orange stock. A resident of Fernandina, he became the first southerner to utilize federal grants by drawing up an "Internal Improvement Act." He used the land to build an extensive system of railroads. Yulee completed the east-west railroad from Fernandina to Cedar Key, June 12, 1860 and had the first telegraph line extended from Georgia to Fernandina. When civil war broke out, Yulee resigned from the Senate and served in the Confederate Congress. Following the war, he rebuilt his railroad, which had been destroyed. Yulee entertained President Ulysess Grant in 1870 in Fernandina. That year, he moved to Washington, D.C. where he died six years later.

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