Broward Marine: Honoring Legacy

The original site of Broward Marine to be commemorated with a State of Florida Heritage Site marker.
As told by Ken Denison.

This article was written by Ken Denison. Photography courtesy of Safe Harbor Lauderdale Marine Center and Denison Yachting.

I’m proud to report that a State of Florida Heritage Site marker will be placed at 1601 SW 20th Street (Denison Way) at the original location of Broward Marine as well as the “Denison family homesite” shortly after the Fort Lauderdale boat show this year. This is significant because only a handful of these sites have been designated in Broward County and none, until now, have paid homage to the pioneers of the yachting industry in Fort Lauderdale.

The importance of this marker is not so much about the family who lived there but rather the fact that so many lives were impacted and so many careers started there. The former 18-acre site that was Broward Marine is now Safe Harbor Lauderdale Marine Center. Their expansion encompasses two other boat yards and now has become the largest marine center in South Florida. 

Every time I visit the yard I try to figure out where our backyard was and where, long ago, we took our family portrait at our home on the westernmost corner of the yard. And while Mom and Dad are gone and Broward Marine is no longer in business, the impact on the lives of those who worked there remains. This marker will hopefully speak to the gratitude we all should consider that we owe this young couple, “who on their honeymoon…decided to buy a boat yard.”

Last summer I was invited to a gathering of some of the guys who worked at the Saugatuck, Michigan Broward facility. They’ve been meeting after the yard closed in 2002 and we spoke about the “glory days” of Broward. I sensed, even now, that they missed their time at the company when they were a part of a team of craftsman who used their talents to create something unique and beautiful. 

They call themselves the “Broward Marines.” I love that. 

While there were only a handful at this particular summer gathering, there are hundreds more who worked at that yard over its 25-year existence and thousands who worked at the Fort Lauderdale plant during its 50 year history. I suspect if a similar gathering was held down here we’d fill Hard Rock stadium. It would be hard to find someone working in our industry today, who, at some point, didn’t have some kind of connection to Broward Marine or in some way to “Mr. and Mrs. D.” 

This marker suggests that Broward Marine was the epicenter of the yacht building industry here in Fort Lauderdale. It is also speaks to the notion that all of this was brought into being by the sheer willpower and guts of yet another group of men and women of the “greatest generation”, who, along with the Denison’s, took an extreme risk to do something that easily, by its outrageous scale and scope, could have easily failed, which in reality, it almost did. 

Consider this.

From the very beginning, the contracts with the U.S. Navy, obligated Broward to launch seven, 144-foot-long, and four, 172-foot-long ships every 45 and 90 days! “Franks Folly” indeed. When these contracts were signed there were only 25 men working at the plant and none were experienced ship builders. There was no time to purchase and deliver the laminated keels and frames to meet this aggressive schedule so a complete laminating plant had to be built on the southeast corner of the property as well. 

There was so much lumber, machinery, wiring and necessary materials required that a railroad spur from the Florida East Coast Railroad was built to be run directly into the yard. When they signed this contract, the New River was too shallow and required congressional approval to dredge it as well as several bridges that had to be widened as well. 

To top it off, when they signed these agreements on August 10, 1951, Gertrude was raising two young boys and was three months pregnant with her third (me) by the time the first minesweeper was launched on November 6th, 1952. 

So, it wasn’t a big stretch when John Wells, one of the US preeminent yacht designers and naval architects showed up at the yard shortly after this first minesweeper launch, to propose to Frank the building of a 96-foot motor yacht, Alisa V. On September 23, 1956, in the middle of the minesweeper program, the front page headlines for the Miami Herald proclaimed, “Fort Lauderdale Launches Florida’s Largest Yacht.” It would also be the largest yacht built in America since World War II. 

While the Navy program ended in the late 1950’s the yacht business grew from these beginnings as did the various businesses that were required to support it. The company grew from the people who started at this place, at this boat yard and where this marker will rest. It is also a quiet reminder of the legacy that has been left to all of us in the yachting industry, in whatever role we may play within it and to acknowledge those who had the courage to follow their dreams.

Request A Copy

 

Special Thanks to Our Partners