Sea Base, formerly known as Florida National High Adventure Sea Base, is a high adventure program base run by the Boy Scouts of America (BSA) in the Florida Keys. Its counterparts are the Philmont Scout Ranch in northern New Mexico, the Northern Tier National High Adventure Bases in Ely, Minnesota as well as Manitoba and Ontario in Canada, and The Summit Bechtel Family National Scout Reserve near the New River Gorge National Park in southern West Virginia.
The main Sea Base is located in Islamorada, Florida on the end of Lower Matecumbe Key. Other bases include the Brinton Environmental Center located on Summerland Key (which oversees Big Munson Island located 5.5 miles southeast of the center) the Bahamas Sea Base in Marsh Harbour, Abaco, Bahamas, and the USVI Sea Base with locations in St. Thomas.
The Florida Sea Base Conference Center has become an alternative training site to the Philmont Training Center and the Summit Bechtel Reserve. Most conferences it hosts are for professionals or national level committees, but it also hosts conferences for outside groups.
Early history
In 1928, the Sea Base property was the site for the first ferry terminal in the original overseas highway. Cars would board the boat and travel to No Name Key, where the road would continue. The Terminal Lunch stand, later called the Ferry Slip Cafe opened around the same time. In the Early 1930s, the property was known as WPA camp number 3. WPA workers were building a new highway parallel to the Overseas Railroad. The 1935 Labor Day Hurricane changed everything. The entire camp was destroyed in the storm. Most of the workers who lived at the camp were World War I veterans. Many of the workers were being evacuated to Homestead when their rescue train was washed off the tracks on Upper Matecumbe Key. Over 450 people died in the Islamorada area during the hurricane. The evidence of the workers' progress is still evident today. Veterans Key, in front of Sea Base's marina, is a man-made island made for a highway right-of-way. 8 bridge pilings protrude out of the water about a quarter of a mile west of veterans Key, for a bridge that was to connect Lower Matecumbe Key and Jewfish Bush Key and was never built.
The new Overseas Highway completed in 1938, included a toll house on the current location of Sea Base's commissary. The toll was removed in 1954. The Ferry Slip Cafe became the Toll Gate Inn and it was owned by local shark fisherman, Wynn Tyler. The Toll Gate Inn was a 10-room motel, a bar, restaurant, marina, and gas station. The marina was dredged in the early 1950s, at the same time that most of the canals in Lower Matecumbe Key were dredged out.
New beginning
In 1974 a handful of volunteers from Miami, Florida and Atlanta, Georgia came together to develop a high adventure program using the waters in and around the Florida Keys as their foundation. The BSA National High Adventure chairman, John R Donnell Sr, asked the then Camping Director of the South Florida Council, Sam Wampler, to coordinate trips to Freeport in The Bahamas. Sam, using his station wagon and a warehouse, operated this program until 1979. The original Florida Gateway High Adventure committee members were Paul Benedum, John R Donnell Sr., Spurgeon Gaskin, Ernie Jamison, and chairman Charlie Topmiller. In 1977 over 700 participants were in the program, urging the Florida Gateway committee to look for a permanent location for a camp. Under Wampler's leadership, the National Council received a 1.3-million-dollar grant from the Fleischmann Foundation. Following some extensive research, the Old Toll Gate Motel and Marina and was purchased in 1979 at a cost of $800,000. The remaining $500,000 was used to construct the sailing dorms, the quarterdeck, general manager's residence, to repair to the T-dock, purchase a SCUBA compressor, and renovate the restaurant to a dining hall and office.