Munyon Island is located in the Lake Worth Lagoon Estuary in

North Palm Beach North Palm Beach is an incorporated village in Palm Beach County, Florida, United States. It is part of the Miami Metropolitan Area. The population was 13,162 at the 2020 census. The village won an award from the National Association of Home Bui ...

Florida Florida is a state located in the Southeastern region of the United States. Florida is bordered to the west by the Gulf of Mexico, to the northwest by Alabama, to the north by Georgia, to the east by the Bahamas and Atlantic Ocean, and to ...

. It is part of

John D. MacArthur Beach State Park John D. MacArthur Beach State Park, named for John D. MacArthur whose Foundation donated a portion of the land for its construction in the 1970s, is located on and just north of Singer Island, Florida in North Palm Beach, Florida. The park was fi ...

History

Munyon Island was originally called Nuctsachoo by the

Seminole The Seminole are a Native American people who developed in Florida in the 18th century. Today, they live in Oklahoma and Florida, and comprise three federally recognized tribes: the Seminole Nation of Oklahoma, the Seminole Tribe of Florida, an ...

s, which means Pelican Island. It reportedly supported one of the largest wading bird

rookeries A rookery is a colony of breeding animals, generally gregarious birds. Coming from the nesting habits of rooks, the term is used for corvids and the breeding grounds of colony-forming seabirds, marine mammals (true seals and sea lions), and ev ...

in South Florida. The first documented inhabitant of Munyon Island in 1884, was a man named Rodgers who was known to be an eccentric "

Robinson Crusoe ''Robinson Crusoe'' () is a novel by Daniel Defoe, first published on 25 April 1719. The first edition credited the work's protagonist Robinson Crusoe as its author, leading many readers to believe he was a real person and the book a tra ...

" type who lived in a tent and made his living by selling green sea turtles which he caught in Lake Worth. The next inhabitants were the Pitts family, who bought the island in 1892 and built a two-story house. In 1901, the Pitts sold the island to Dr. James M. Munyon. In 1903, Munyon completed construction of the Hotel

Hygeia Hygieia is a goddess from Greek, as well as Roman, mythology (also referred to as: Hygiea or Hygeia; ; grc, Ὑγιεία or , la, Hygēa or ). Hygieia is a goddess of health ( el, ὑγίεια – ''hugieia''), cleanliness and hygiene. Her ...

. Named after the Greek goddess of Health, the five story, twenty-one room, eight bath hotel catered to ailing, wealthy Northerners who came to Palm Beach to recuperate on the tropical Island and drink of "Dr. Munyon's Paw-Paw Elixir", consisting primarily of fermented

papaya The papaya (, ), papaw, () or pawpaw () is the plant species ''Carica papaya'', one of the 21 accepted species in the genus ''Carica'' of the family Caricaceae. It was first domesticated in Mesoamerica, within modern-day southern Mexico and ...

juice, which he bottled on the island. The hotel burned to the ground in 1917 and from that time the island has remained largely uninhabited. The island was acquired by

John D. MacArthur John Donald MacArthur (March 6, 1897 – January 6, 1978) was an American insurance magnate, real estate investor and philanthropist who established the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, benefactor in the MacArthur Fellowships. ...

in 1955 and by the State of Florida in 1981.

Kayaking

The shallow estuary around Munyon Island is frequented by kayakers. Kayaks can be rented in

and the park also has a kayak launch. The launch is no longer accessible from the west side due to lack of maintenance of wooden bridge and storm damage. Kayakers must be attentive to the tide, during low tide the estuary becomes an impassable

mud flat Mudflats or mud flats, also known as tidal flats or, in Ireland, slob or slobs, are coastal wetlands that form in intertidal areas where sediments have been deposited by tides or rivers. A global analysis published in 2019 suggested that tidal fl ...

. The island has no bathrooms, but it does have picnic tables and grills. Munyon Island Pano

Wildlife

Wildlife on and around Munyon Island includes blue

sea grass Seagrasses are the only flowering plants which grow in marine environments. There are about 60 species of fully marine seagrasses which belong to four families (Posidoniaceae, Zosteraceae, Hydrocharitaceae and Cymodoceaceae), all in the orde ...

great blue heron The great blue heron (''Ardea herodias'') is a large wading bird in the heron family Ardeidae, common near the shores of open water and in wetlands over most of North America and Central America, as well as the Caribbean and the Galápagos ...

, and

little blue heron The little blue heron (''Egretta caerulea'') is a small heron of the genus ''Egretta''. It is a small, darkly colored heron with a two-toned bill. Juveniles are entirely white, bearing resemblance to the snowy egret. During the breeding season ...

. The waters contain

mojarras The mojarras are a family, Gerreidae, of fish in the order Perciformes. The family includes about 53 species found worldwide in tropical and warm temperate regions. They mostly inhabit coastal salt and brackish waters, although some occur in fre ...

sardines "Sardine" and "pilchard" are common names for various species of small, oily forage fish in the herring family Clupeidae. The term "sardine" was first used in English during the early 15th century, a folk etymology says it comes from the I ...

, mullet,

pinfish ''Lagodon'' is a genus of saltwater fish in the family Sparidae, the breams and porgies. It is monotypic, being represented by the single species ''Lagodon rhomboides'', commonly known as pinfish.Masterson, J''Lagodon rhomboides''.Smithsonian Mar ...

, sting rays, nurse sharks, manate, turtles, blue crabs, hermit crabs, horseshoe crabs and snapper. The iguana has made a home here and is now prolific. The seagrasses surrounding Munyon Island should be treated with care, there can be fines levied if the grass is damaged.http://www.leg.state.fl.us/statutes/index.cfm?App_mode=Display_Statute&Search_String=&URL=0200-0299/0253/Sections/0253.04.html Florida Statute 253.04

References

External links

Palm Beach County Munyon Island website
{{authority control Islands of Florida Islands of Palm Beach County, Florida