Date: February 28, 2003

Miami Beach Dedicates and Renames Park in Honor of 
Marjory Stoneman Douglas

Miami Beach, FL – On Friday, February 28, 2003, the City of Miami Beach held a renaming and dedication ceremony of Marjory Stoneman Douglas Ocean Beach Park, in honor of the preservationist that is known for her efforts to protect the natural resources of Florida.

Conservationist Marjory Stoneman Douglas, then 98 years old, joined Miami Beach neighborhood activists in 1989 in a demonstration at Ocean Beach Park, successfully pressuring City of Miami Beach officials at the time to not proceed with a plan to turn the park at Third Street and Ocean Drive into a parking lot. She returned in 1990 and 1991 for meeting in the park to ensure that the promise was kept.

"We can’t prevent growth. We cannot keep all the growth down and we wouldn’t want to… But we need, above all, to protect our natural resources from the growth we have here," said Marjory Stoneman Douglas during a preservation demonstration at the Ocean Beach Park in 1989.

Ten years later in 1999, Miami Beach voters passed a referendum to rename Ocean Beach Park to Marjory Stoneman Douglas Ocean Beach Park in her honor. Since 1999, the City has worked to preserve the area as a park that includes a playground, passive grounds, and restroom facility.

Marjory Stoneman Douglas spent most of her life in South Florida and even lived in a little hotel in Miami Beach’s South Shore area (later known as South Pointe) in 1916. Stoneman Douglas died in 1998 at the age of 108 years old.

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