Pompano Beach is nearing the 100th anniversary of its
incorporation. It is the second oldest city in Broward County,
and the fifth oldest in all of South Florida. Only Key West,
West Palm Beach, Miami and Dania Beach became municipalities
earlier than Pompano (the “Beach” came later). Other than Key
West, which by the 1820s was already an important port and city,
the towns of southeast Florida came into being because of the
railroad. In 1896 Henry Flagler decided to extend his Florida
East Coast Railway south from West Palm Beach to Miami, opening
up land that heretofore had been a virtual wilderness. All along
the rail line small settlements were established; most of them
were farming communities. In the Pompano Beach area, the few
hardy individuals who had arrived before the railroad, and who
had settled around what is today known as Lake Santa Barbara,
eventually moved farther inland where the town was growing.
Local legend has it that the name for the settlement, “Pompano,”
came about from a notation made