Sunday Favorites: It Takes a Fishing Village

One of the most historic and significant villages in the Tampa Bay area is the sleepy fishing community of Cortez; it's the last of its kind along the Florida Gulf coast. This weekend, the village hosted its 34th Annual Cortez Commercial Fishing Festival, but did you know the event has helped shape the historic district we know and love it today?

The Historic District of Cortez is a small parcel recognized on the National Register of Historic Places that spans approximately 25 square acres and boarded by Sarasota Bay to the south and Cortez Road to the north. The original settlers, who traveled here from the Carolinas, purchased large tracts of land that have since been subdivided mostly among family members.

When visitors turn onto the narrow streets of Cortez, which are lined with mature Royal palms, they are turning back time. The houses are small and historic, with clapboard exteriors and gable roofs, some of them even serving as stilt houses (houses located offshore where fishermen could rest and dry their nets) at one time.

Folks who live in Cortez decorate the outside of their homes with fishing gear and park their commercial vessels in their front yards. They sell their catch at one of the fish houses located along Sarasota Bay. It’s a scene from an old movie and a breath of fresh air for a Floridian like myself; it’s the real, authentic, old Florida, a place frozen in time, a break in a shoreline littered with high-rises and over-the-top mansions.

Cortez likely exists today because of the Florida Institute of Saltwater Heritage, or FISH, a non-profit dedicated to protecting and conserving the Florida fishing way of life. The people who established FISH in 1991 held the inaugural fishing festival in 1981. Since then the festival has expanded from a one-day event to all-weekend, attracting approximately 18,000 visitors. This year’s theme is appropriately called "it takes a fishing village," likely a subtle acclamation of the organization's accomplishments, but also a steadfast reminder what it takes to conquer the fight for preservation.


This year, FISH will debut the newest addition to its soon-to-be history tour, the Cortez Village Culture Center will host its grand opening. The 1946 wooden structure has been experiencing renovation more than a year now and sits on the same property, as does the Florida Maritime Museum.

Ohio native Basil Monroe, a plasterer, built the cottage from remnants of a military barracks at 304 Church St., in Bradenton Beach. He became a local celebrity after catching a 400-pound fish from a pier with a rope and hook.

Monroe died in 1954, and the cottage remained in the family through the 1990s, when city officials in Bradenton Beach acquired it. It was given to the historical society in 2009 and moved to Cortez.

FISH has been behind all this restoration and the fishing festival is one of their biggest funding tools. So if you didn't come to the festival on Saturday, be sure to stop by today and enjoy some fresh fish and stone crab and contribute to one of the most successful non-profit preservation organizations in the state!