SPACE COAST HISTORY
JASON HOOK
FALL 2022: 1 7
Statues of lions stand at each corner of the Art Deco style swimming pool built in the late 1920s by James and Ella Goodrich.
Alittle-known island sanctuary for birds in Brevard
County is finally getting some recognition, thanks
to the efforts of a history researcher who learned
about it recently, quite by accident.
Pam Cooper was doing research about the Roseland community
just south of the Brevard County line, when she
happened upon a mention of a 4.7-acre spit of land in the
Sebastian River called Goodrich Island, which is owned by the
Audubon Society of Florida.
Cooper learned that unlike the iconic Pelican Island bird
preserve in the Indian River Lagoon, Goodrich Island used to
be privately owned. It was part of a grand estate built near
the river in the late 1920s by Connecticut residents James
and Ella Goodrich.
Attracted to Roseland because of its abundance of birds, the
couple first visited in 1919, the Orlando Sentinel newspaper
noted in a 1966 report. They stayed at the Bay View Hotel on
the north side of the river, which gave them a magnificent
view of the waterway and of the land on the south side, where
they would eventually build. The property they bought in
1925 included the 4.7-acre island. Ella Goodrich, described by
the newspaper as an ardent conservationist, wanted to set the
The Goodriches, who came from Weathersfield, Connecticut, first visited Roseland
in 1919 and were so captivated by the abundance of birds that they built their winter
home a few years later on the southern banks of the Sebastian River.
>>