1513

Ponce De Leon explores Ponce Inlet area

1565

Spanish establish St. Augustine, and gain control of Florida, driving out the French.

1763

Spain loses Florida to English at end of French and Indian War.

1768

Dr Turnbbull settles a group of Greeks, Italians and Minorcans in the largest British colonial attempt in North America at New Smyrna.

1783

Turnbull County deserted by indentured settlers who go to St. Augustine.

1790

Spain attempts to settle outlands from St. Augustine, by use of land grants.

1803

Antonio Pons (Ponz or Ponce), a New Smyrna Minorcan, is granted 175 acres on the point where the lighthouse now stands, which he had been farming for 20 years.

1806

Antonio Pons is driven off by the Indians and moves to St. Augustine.

1812

Antonio Pons is killed while serving the King of Spain during the Patriots War, started by the Americans.

1820

Pons' widow recieves an additional grant of 230 acres in return for her husband's service to Spain.

1821

Florida ceded to United States by Spain. Live oak lumbering began at Los Mosquitoes (Ponce de Leon Inlet).

1834

First lighthouse built on New Smyrna side of Inlet was destroyed by Indians and a storm.

1842

Bartola Pacetti, descendant of an Italian settler at New Smyrna builds a house of driftwood on fifty acres of Turnbull Grant of the north side of the Inlet.

1860

Mercedes Pacetti gains Ponce Grant from heirs through a tax sale.

1867

Florida Land and Lumber Company establishes the Village of Port Orange near the Ponce Grant . Postal stamp moved to Dunlawton Plantation, present site of that city.

1870

Congress appropriates $60,000 to secure a site and build a lighthouse.

1883

Ten acres purchased from Bartola Pacetti for $400 for lighthouse reservation site.

1884

Major ( fromerly Brigadier General ) Orville Babcock, appointed engineer for building the lighthouse and who named the community Ponce ( Pons ) Park, drowns in the Inlet.

1887

Lighouse goes into service on November 1st of this year.

1890

Nathaniel Hasty files Ponce Park subdivision plat. La Ponce Hotel built on the river shore.

1903

Bert Pacetti, son of Bartola, named Bird Preservation Warden of the Mosquitoe Inlet Sanctuary by President Theodore Roosevelt.

1926

Collapse of Florida Land Boom and work stops on Robert Pacetti's dream . . . "The Inlet Terrace Hotel and Subdivision."

1928

Name of Mosquitoe Inlet changed to Ponce de Leon Inlet.

1937

Coast Guard takes over U.S. Lighthouse Service and the lighthouse here.

1941

Families moved off lighthouse property with the outbreak of World War II.

1946

Electric power run to Inlet

1960

Hurricane Donna rips through Volusia County and Ponce Inlet with winds up to 100 mph. Electricity went out for 24 hours.

1963

Town of Ponce Inlet incorporated August 20th. First Town Council sworn in at the lighthouse office.

1964

Town leases lighthouse property for $1.00 per year from U.S. Government for a Town Hall.

1969

Water service brought to inlet by the Town.

1970

Light turned off and re-established in New Smyrna Beach across from the Inlet.

1971

First Ponce Inlet police car rolls into service on Good Friday night.

1972

Interior Department, U.S. Government, deeds lighthouse reservation to Ponce Inlet.

1975

Lighthouse open to public daily by preservation society.

1980

Ponce Inlet Government moves into new Town Hall.

1982

New light returned to tower and new balcony opened for public at top.