Vero Beach, FL

In 1715 a fleet of Spanish ships carrying treasure wrecked along the Treasure Coast, not far from Vero Beach. Eleven of these twelve ships fell victim to a hurricane. What remained of the tons of silver these ships were carrying attracted pirates, and in their first act of piracy English privateers led by Henry Jennings stole the equivalent of $119,175 of silver.

After settling in the area in 1870, Captain Allen W. Estes officially established the very first land patent between the Indian River Lagoon and the Atlantic Ocean. Vero Beach officially began as a town named Vero, which was chartered on June 13, 1919. Twelve years later on June 1925 Vero would be renamed to Vero Beach and also transferred from being a part of St. Lucie County to becoming the county seat of Indian River County. Many theories arise about the actual origin of the city name of Vero Beach, but there is no general consensus.

In 1942 the U.S. Navy chose 1,500 acres of land surrounding the Vero Beach Municipal Airport as the headquarters of the Fort Pierce Naval Amphibious Training Base. Bombing practices were conducted during the time of World War II at this site, and since 2014 Army Corps officials have conducted multiple searches for many buried explosives.

In 1965 and 1979 respectively, the A1A Bridge and the 17th Street Bridge were constructed to give travelers access from the Vero Beach mainland to the nearby barrier islands.