Punta Gorda's Brief Time as the Southern Most Point of the American Rail System

 

The first train arrived in what is now Punta Gorda in August of 1886, making the town of Trabue the  southern-most terminus of the American railroad system.  It was founder, Isaac Trabue, who convinced the Florida Southern Railway to take the railroad they were building south to his town rather than across the Peace River to Charlotte Harbor.

   

Later in 1886, the Florida Southern began construction of the "Long Dock," a pier located near where the Isles Yacht Club is today.  The pier was forty-two hundred feet long and extended to a channel 14 feet deep, with tracks on the dock that gave the railroad access to seagoing-vessels, for shipment of merchandise and travel by passengers to New Orleans, Fort Myers, Cuba and other points north.

In 1894 the Florida Southern fell into bankrupcy and the line was sold to Henry Plant.  Plant not wanting Punta Gorda to be the major seaport on the southwest coast, but Tampa, had the track that extended to the long dock torn up and Punta Gorda lost it moment in time as a major seaport.  Soon thereafter, in 1902 the Atlantic Coast Line bought the Plant Line and began extending the railroad furtther south.  By 1904, the railroad reached  Fort Myers and Punta Gorda was no longer the southern most point of the American system.