Hollywood

A coastal city of over 130,000 residents located in Broward County, Hollywood is nestled between Fort Lauderdale and Miami. Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport abuts the city, while Port Everglades, the second busiest cruise port in the world, is partially within its municipal boundaries. Interstate 95, the Florida Turnpike, Tri-County Commuter Rail, and two major railroads cut through the city in a north-south direction.

From its formal incorporation by adoption of a municipal charter on November 28, 1925, the City of Hollywood has transformed itself. Beginning as an undeveloped tract of pine forests, palmetto plants, and tangled undergrowth interspersed with tomato farms and low lying marshland, it has become the second-most populated city in Broward County and the ninth largest city in the State of Florida. Founded by the planning visionary Joseph Wesley Young, a Washington state native and former resident of California and Indiana, the original one square mile of farmland has grown to over 28.87 square miles with a gross taxable value of real and personal property in 1998 of over $5,408,266,000.

Joseph Young first arrived in South Florida in January 1920 to survey several parcels of land that would be suitable for the site of his "Dream City in Florida." His initial vision included a wide boulevard extending from the ocean westward to the edge of the Everglades with man-made lakes paralleling each side of the roadway. One end of each lake would empty into the Intracoastal Waterway and the other would serve as a twin turning basin for private yachts. Also included in Young's vision was the sectioning of Hollywood into districts, a precursor of present day zoning regulations, with a centrally located business district, large park spaces, a golf course, schools, and churches. Hollywood, in Joseph Young's vision, "will be a city for everyone - from the opulent at the top of the industrial and social ladder to the most humble of working people." Unique in Young's city plan was the incorporation of three large circles of land located along his planned principal boulevard. These circles became the sites of a ten-acre park (originally named Harding Circle and later renamed Young Circle), the City Hall complex (originally named City Hall Circle and later renamed Watson Circle), and a military academy (Academy Circle.) Academy Circle, now Presidential Circle, is the current site of a focal commercial structure. Having formerly lived in California, Young chose as the name of his "Dream City" the name of the Southern California town that had once been so attractive to him.

With the formation of the Hollywood Land and Water Company, composed of twenty-six departments covering every aspect of city-building, Joseph Young began earnestly bringing to reality his vision of Hollywood. In February 1921 Young purchased at approximately $175 per acre the first parcel of land that would evolve into present-day Hollywood. Young was successful in attracting numerous potential Hollywood residents to visit and eventually purchase property in Hollywood. By 1925, the Florida real estate market had reached all-time highs with speculators constantly bidding up Hollywood real estate in a frenzy of buying. Construction continued at a rapid pace with the building of the Hollywood Boulevard Bridge across the Intracoastal Waterway at the cost of $110,000. By January 1926, Hollywood numbered approximately 2,420 dwellings with approximately 18,000 people, thirty-six apartment buildings, 252 business buildings and nine hotels either completed or under construction. The city had grown to include 18,000 acres, six-and-a-half miles of oceanfront and an assessed value of $20,000,000. With this phenomenal growth, residents from the neighboring communities of Hallandale to the south and Dania to the north petitioned the legislature and the Hollywood City Commission to permit their annexation into Hollywood.