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Fisher Island, Florida

Fisher Island
CDP
View of Fisher Island; South Pointe and Government Cut foreground, Virginia Key background
View of Fisher Island; South Pointe and Government Cut foreground, Virginia Key background
Location of Fisher Island, Florida
Location of Fisher Island, Florida
U.S. Census Bureau map showing CDP boundaries
U.S. Census Bureau map showing CDP boundaries
Coordinates: 25°45′42″N 80°8′39″W / 25.76167°N 80.14417°W / 25.76167; -80.14417Coordinates: 25°45′42″N 80°8′39″W / 25.76167°N 80.14417°W / 25.76167; -80.14417
Country United States
State Florida
County Miami-Dade
Area
 • Total 0.3 sq mi (0.9 km2)
 • Land 0.3 sq mi (0.9 km2)
 • Water 0.0 sq mi (0.0 km2)
Elevation 10 ft (3 m)
Population (2010)
 • Total 132
Time zone Eastern (EST) (UTC-5)
 • Summer (DST) EDT (UTC-4)
ZIP codes 33109
Area code(s) 305
FIPS code 12-22375
GNIS feature ID 1853250

Fisher Island is a census-designated place of metropolitan Miami, Florida, located on a barrier island of the same name. As of the 2010 census, Fisher Island had the highest per capita income of any place in the United States. The CDP had only 226 households and a total population of 132 persons.

Named for automotive parts pioneer and beach real estate developer Carl G. Fisher, who once owned it, Fisher Island is three miles off shore of mainland South Florida. No road or causeway connects to the island, which is accessible by private boat or ferry. Once a one-family island home of the Vanderbilts, and later several other millionaires, it was sold for development in the 1960s. The property sat vacant for well over 15 years before development was begun for very limited and restrictive multi-family use.

The island was created in 1905 by a dredging and land reclamation projects in and around Miami Beach. Construction of Fisher Island began in 1919 when Carl G. Fisher, a land developer, purchased the property from businessman and real estate developer Dana A. Dorsey, southern Florida's first African-American millionaire. In 1925 William Kissam Vanderbilt II traded a luxury yacht to Fisher for ownership of the island.

After Vanderbilt's death in 1944, ownership of the island passed to U.S. Steel heir Edward Moore. Moore died in the early 1950s, and Gar Wood, the millionaire inventor of hydraulic construction equipment, bought it. Wood, a speedboat enthusiast, kept the island a one-family retreat. In 1963, Wood sold to a development group that included local Key Biscayne millionaire Bebe Rebozo, Miami native and United States Senator George Smathers and then former U.S. Vice President Richard Nixon, who had promised to leave politics. During his subsequent presidency from 1968–1973, and during the Watergate scandal, Nixon maintained a home on nearby Key Biscayne known as the "Key Biscayne Whitehouse" that was the former residence of Senator Smathers and next door to Rebozo, but none of the three ever resided on Fisher Island.


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