There was little development in Shalimar until very recent years. In the early 1930's there were grand plans for the area. The Port Dixie Harbor and Terminal Company envisioned a port, steamship lines, a railroad, a shipbuilding plant, a tire plant, a town site, and much more on the shores of Garnier’s Bayou. It went so far as to plat a one-mile-square town with streets 100-feet wide. Although the project attracted much attention and some investment, the plans fell through. They depended upon both the dredging of East Pass to accommodate deep-water vessels and a railroad, and neither materialized.
In the early 40's, the area was still mostly nothing but woods, with a small stand of scuppernong grapes, a winery across the road from the vineyard, and very few inhabitants. With Eglin Field not very far north and nothing in between, Clifford Meigs, who had owned most of the land that is now Shalimar since 1937, saw an opportunity. He constructed 160 small homes to rent to base personnel, and it is said they consistently stayed rented. Somewhat later, the air base arranged for other homes to be built for officers and enlisted personnel who couldn't be housed on base.
By the mid-40's Okaloosa County became known in Florida as a center for liquor smuggling and gambling. There was a popular club in Fort Walton Beach and it was joined in 1947 by the Shalimar Club, close to Richbourg Avenue in the north. The new club depended heavily on gambling revenue, and Roger Clary, the club's owner, was concerned that the Sheriff might start to enforce the state law that prohibited gambling on weekends in unincorporated areas. Clary suggested to Meigs that Shalimar incorporate, and Meigs agreed. As he put it in a newspaper interview, "With only about three other freeholders in the area, it was a simple matter to get incorporated." And so the town was born.
Clifford Meigs served as Mayor from the town's incorporation in 1947 until his death in 1960. His brother Clyde took over for a short while followed by Clifford's widow Sara. Sara later married Jim Tras, who became the town's first elected Mayor in 1965. The Meigs family is still a prime player in the town. The post office, courthouse annex, and middle school are all on land donated by the family for government use. Each of these properties reverts to the family trust if no longer used for its original purpose
|
