St Lucie-Brevard County FlArchives Biographies.....Racey, Charles Henry 1861 - ************************************************ Copyright. All rights reserved. http://www.usgwarchives.net/copyright.htm http://www.usgwarchives.net/fl/flfiles.htm ************************************************ File contributed for use in USGenWeb Archives by: Joy Fisher sdgenweb@yahoo.com February 4, 2008, 3:56 pm Author: B. F. Johnson Charles Henry Racey "Racey Point," which juts into the waters of the majestic St. Johns river about thirty-five miles south of Jacksonville, has been a distinctive feature of all Florida maps for more than half a century. It was there that William Henry Racey, the father of the subject of this sketch, about 1852, established for himself one of the earliest winter homes founded in the State, on a beautiful tract of 5,000 acres extending for miles along the eastern shore of the great river and covered with broad savannas, open glades and primeval forests. Charles Racey, the father of William, was born October 26, 1779, at Clifton-on-Avon, England, and came to America about the year 1804, settling at Richmond, Staten Island, N. Y. His wife was Elizabeth Hiscox, and of their four children, William was the youngest son. William was a naturalist, explorer, artist, musician, author and inventor, and withal, an ardent sportsman, and although owning extensive plantations in Virginia, he spent much of his life in travel and exploration. Besides the Racey Point estate, he acquired during his periodical sojourns in Florida other valuable properties in St. Augustine and on the famous Indian river. His wife, the mother of Charles Henry, was Helen Catherine Lindsay, second daughter of David Lindsay, whose romantic elopement to this country from Scotland with Elizabeth Fotheringham of London England, was an interesting social episode of Colonial times. He was always alleged and believed to be, in fact, the Earl of Crawford, but on becoming an American citizen he adopted democratic principles and sentiments to such an extent that he would never refer to his family connections in the old country. He had an only son, who was drowned in early life, and the title and estates passed to a collateral branch of the family. The Racey coat of arms is described as follows: Quarterly or, and sa, on a bend gu, three martlets of the first. In chief a label of five points erm. The Lindsay arms is described as follows: Quarterly 1 and 4th, gu, a fesse chequey or, and az, (for Lindsay) 2d and 3d or, a lion ramp, gu, debruised of a ribbon in bend sa, (for Abernethy). Charles Henry Racey, of Jensen, St. Lucie county, Fla., was born in New York City, August 22, 1861. His education was acquired at Stratford Academy and Sedgwick Institute, Stratford, Conn., and at Yale Business College, New Haven, Conn., whence he graduated March 31, 1880. After a year or two of travel in the West, he adopted the profession of an optician, and spent several years in practice in New York City. In 1891 he removed to Florida, taking up his residence on one of his father's former pieces of property which he converted into a spacious and charming modern home, called Mt. Elizabeth, situated on the Indian river, near Jensen. He entered at once into all of the activities of his new home, helped to procure the establishment of a post office at Waveland; founded the Gilbert's Bar Yacht Club (1895), of which he was secretary and treasurer for several years, the meetings of which were held at his residence and the first races sailed from his private boat house; he helped to raise the funds required to insure the success of the Santa Lucia Inlet and was its first secretary and treasurer; he served as president of the East Coast Good Roads League, and of the Brevard County Good Roads Association (1900); he organized and raised money to equip the well-known Acme Base Ball Club, of Jensen (1903) and has recently (1908) succeeded, after several years of patient and persistent effort, in organizing the Mid-Rivers Country Club, and is a member of its board of governors. Mr. Racey, who has always been exceedingly fond of all harmless and legitimate amateur sports, as well as of fruit culture, and is an expert and successful grower of pineapples and citrus fruits, is a life member of the Florida Horticultural Society, a life member of the Mid River Country Club, his wife, two sons and daughter are also life members, a life member of the National Sportsmen of Boston, Mass., a life member of the League of American Sportsmen and is its local game warden for the Eastern District. In all of his various connections and experiences as a patron of sports, he has given freely of his time, skill, energies and means toward the encouragement of wholesome amateur sports without a thought of compensation beyond the satisfaction which accompanies success. He is a diligent reader of all books of travel and adventure, having inherited the predilection from his father. He is an ardent patron and advocate of good roads, and earnestly believes that Florida, with complete connecting systems of good roads, would lack absolutely nothing requisite to entire perfection. His enthusiasm on this topic, and as a sportsman, has led him to the contribution of a number of excellent articles in good roads periodicals and in Forest and Stream; and he cherishes an ambition to organize an interstate society devoted to the protection of game and fish, which is especially needed in Florida, where millions of fish are annually wantonly destroyed by seining, and where much game is killed out of season in open defiance of the laws. Both Mr. Racey and his excellent wife are devout Episcopalians and they united in the congenial task of raising the funds with which the handsome Church of All Saints at Waveland Jensen was erected, Mr. Racey donating the lot and acting as secretary and treasurer from 1898 to 1907. Mrs. Racey was Miss Mary Louise, daughter of Patrick Cregg and Katherine (Dundon) Dunn; and they have three children— Edith Helen Catherine Lindsay, born July 16, 1884, at Chapel Hill, Charles Harold born April 18,1886, and Ralph Ernest Patrick, born August 18, 1890, C. Harold going to the Univeristy of North Carolina, Ralph to John S. Stetson University of Fla., at DeLand, Fla. His eldest son, Charles Harold, is an all round athlete. A good baseball player, a number one pitcher and pitched for the University of North Carolina team in 1906. Ralph won the tennis championship at Stetson University by defeating the former champion who had been champion for five years. His daughter is a graduate of St. Joseph's Convent at St. Augustine which she attended five years. His boys were both personally popular at college. He has at his beautiful home on Indian river a perfectly appointed cement tennis court for the recreation of his children and their friends. Mr. Racey is a man of very diversified interests. For example, he is an enthusiastic stamp collector, and Doane, of New York, who is a recognized authority on philately, says that Mr. Racey has the finest collection of stamps in the South, worth many thousand dollars. In addition to one of the most beautiful homes on the Indian river, he has a fine pineapple plantation, an industry, which is now having a large development in that section, and will add greatly to the wealth of the State. He is an expert with the gun, fond of horses of which he keeps a number of fine animals, both for riding and driving, has a splendid collection of valuable guns adapted to all forms of hunting, and a collection of thoroughbred dogs in which he takes a profound interest, and spends much time in the hunting season with his dogs and guns. However, he is not selfish in these pursuits, but makes these occasions of much pleasure to his numerous friends. Mr. Racey is a fine example of that class of excellent citizens who, in the past twenty years, have come to Florida not primarily to make money, but to make homes. In the making of homes, they have added immensely to the prosperity of the State in a material way, and have been a most valuable acquisition in a moral and educational sense. Additional Comments: Extracted from: FLORIDA EDITION MAKERS OF AMERICA AN HISTORICAL AND BIOGRAPHICAL WORK BY AN ABLE CORPS OF WRITERS VOL. III. Published under the patronage of The Florida Historical Society, Jacksonville, Florida ADVISORY BOARD: HON. W. D. BLOXHAM COL. FRANK HARRIS HON. R. W. DAVIS SEN. H. H. McCREARY HON. F. P. FLEMING W. F. STOVALL C. A. CHOATE, SECRETARY 1909 A. B. CALDWELL ATLANTA, GA. COPYRIGHT 1909 B. F. 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