I am often reminded of those who have preceded me in the field of history. Some have national recognition, while others are known only locally. When I returned home from college with a degree in history, I realized that there was much that I did not know about my own county. I began searching for information and soon came across the writings of E. K. Hamilton. His information became the basis of my first published work in 2008. As this two-part story is the 99^th and 100^th articles in my weekly history series, I thought that perhaps it would be fitting to discuss a man who loved Suwannee County enough to write about its history for future generations to enjoy.

Edison Keith “Ham” Hamilton was born on April 28, 1905 in Coloma, Michigan. He was the only son of Mr. and Mrs. James Roswell Hamilton, although Mrs. Hamilton had a son and daughter from a previous marriage that had ended in the death of her husband. 

Hamilton’s parents were both photographers who lived in Coloma during the summers and St. Petersburg, Florida during the winters; many of their photographs were published in those locales. Ham suffered an early loss when his father died in 1906 from an attack of spinal meningitis. A week later, Ham’s half-sister died of pneumonia, and his half-brother nearly died as well. Mrs. Hamilton, now a two-time widow with two surviving children, earned a living by running a successful photography studio.

Hamilton graduated from Coloma High School in 1923. At the urging of his half-brother, he studied engineering-related classes at Albion College in Michigan for two years. In late 1925, Ham moved to Punta Gorda, Florida during the land boom that developed South Florida and began working on engineering projects there. He was present for the disastrous 1926 hurricane (usually called the “Great Miami Hurricane”) that was the costliest in U.S. history if adjusted for inflation, population and wealth normalization. It also killed more than 372 people (exact numbers are unknown because hundreds of bodies were swept into the morass of the Everglades) and crushed the Florida Land Boom just before the Great Depression wrecked the economy of the rest of the country. Ham and his colleagues spent hours in several feet of lake water to escape the worst of the storm.

Next, Ham worked on ice and power plant construction in South Florida and also began taking flying lessons. In 1930, he began building bridges for the State Road Department and worked in Punta Gorda. It was there that he met Miss Mae Winfield, the home demonstration agent in Charlotte County who was eight years older than him. They were married on Feb. 14, 1931.  Hamilton worked on a number of roads and bridges in Central and North Florida, and on July 1, 1933, began work on what is now called State Road 51 from Live Oak to Mayo and beyond; later he worked on the road to Dowling Park and many other local road projects. When the Road Department district office moved to Lake City, Ham moved with it and became interested in airfield engineering and design. He completed the flying lessons that he had started several years before and began designing airports, including the ones in Gainesville and Lake City.

Hamilton enlisted in the United States Army on April 9, 1942, only months after America entered World War II. He was assigned to an engineering detail in Fort Belvoir, Virginia, but after being commissioned as a second lieutenant was assigned to Spokane, Washington. In early 1943, Hamilton was sent to England to build bases for fighters and bombers that would be striking Nazi Germany, and his road experience was used to repair bombed airstrips. On June 6, 1944, he was among the tens of thousands of Allied troops who stormed ashore at Normandy, France to begin the invasion of Europe. Within hours of landing, he and his men began building the first American airstrip in France. As the Allies pushed back the Germans toward the their homeland, Hamilton was often behind enemy lines scouting suitable positions for airfields either on foot, by jeep, or in observation aircraft.

Hamilton received the Air Medal with two Oak Leaf clusters and five battle stars for his service in the war, but it came with a cost. He had been in one crash and bailed out of another aircraft behind enemy lines. In the fall of 1944, his out-of-fuel plane crashed on the runway, severely injuring him. In the hospital he was found to have a fractured skull, but the doctors did not notice that Ham’s back was also broken in two places. Despite suffering from chronic back pain, it would be years before this injury would be discovered and repaired. Ham ended the war as a captain with 220 combat hours of flying. He remained in Germany as a provost marshal, in charge of military police and emergency management while the Allies began to rebuild the demolished infrastructure of their former enemy.

Next week we’ll complete our discussion of the late local historian E. K. Hamilton.

Eric Musgrove can be reached at ericm@suwgov.org or 386.362.0564.