page_title: Charlie W. Pierce
section_title: Pioneer life
hierarchical_section_title: Charlie W. Pierce / Pioneer life
caption_attribution_description: English: The Pierce Family in Hypoluxo, Florida
context_page_description: Charles William "Charlie" Pierce was one of South Florida's most important pioneer citizens. Arriving in 1872, Pierce was a community leader in banking, seamanship, the postal service, and author of the sentinel book on early South Florida life.
context_section_description: After serving at the Jupiter Lighthouse for a year, Hannibal Pierce homesteaded a large portion of Hypoluxo Island, located in the Lake Worth Lagoon. At the time of their homestead claim, the island had no name. In conversations with the Seminole Indians, Hannibal Pierce learned that the name was Hypoluxo, which meant "water all around, no get out." Here the family built a house from driftwood and palmetto thatch. Hannibal Pierce became the keeper of the Orange Grove House of Refuge, in what would become Delray Beach. The United States federal government built five Houses of Refuge in Florida to care for shipwrecked sailors. It was at the House of Refuge that the first child of European descent was born, Lillie Pierce (Lillie Pierce Voss), in 1876. The Pierce family returned to its Hypoluxo Island homestead. Pierce led many expeditions through the Everglades on hunting and fishing trips, being one of the first to explore what would become Everglades National Park. 
   Pierce accompanied his boyhood friend Guy Bradley, Bradley's brother Louis and famed egret plume hunter Jean Chevalier aboard Pierce's boat the Bonton in 1885. The hunting party killed thousands of birds for their plumes, which were used to decorate women's hats. The egret plumes were worth more than their weight in gold.
caption: The Pierce Family in Hypoluxo, Florida
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