David Levy Yulee

David Levy Yulee
United States Senator from Florida
In office July 1, 1845 – March 3, 1851 March 4, 1855 – January 21, 1861
Preceded by	(none) Jackson Morton
Succeeded by	Stephen Mallory Thomas W. Osborn
Personal details
Political party	Democratic
Spouse	Nannie C. Wickliffe Yulee
Profession	Politician, Lawyer

David Levy Yulee (June 12, 1810 – October 10, 1886) was an American politician and the first member of the United States Senate to have been, at one time, a practicing Jew.

Yulee was born David Levy in Charlotte Amalie, on the island of St. Thomas, during the British occupation of the Danish West Indies, now the United States Virgin Islands.

After studying and practicing law in St. Augustine, Levy was the delegate to United States Congress for the Florida Territory and was elected as a Democrat to the United States Senate when Florida was admitted to the Union in 1845. In 1846, he officially changed his name to David Levy Yulee (adding his father's ancestral Sephardic surname) and was married to Nannie C. Wickliffe, the daughter of Charles A. Wickliffe, former governor of Kentucky and Postmaster General under President John Tyler. After serving one term, Yulee was defeated for re-election in 1850.

The next year, he founded a 5,000-acre (20 km²) sugar plantation along the Homosassa River. The remains of his plantation are found at the Yulee Sugar Mill Ruins State Historic Site.

While living in Fernandina, he began to follow his dream to build a railroad across Florida. He had originally planned to build a state-owned system as far back as 1837, but in 1851, he became the first southerner to utilize federal grants by drawing up an "Internal Improvement Act". Using federal and state land grants and public stock. The Florida Railroad was chartered in 1853. The terminals would be the deep water ports, Fernandina on Amelia Island on the Atlantic side and Cedar Key on the Gulf. Construction began in 1855 and on March 1, 1861, the first train arrived in Cedar Key, just weeks before the beginning of the Civil War.

Elected to the Senate again in 1855, he served until January 21, 1861, when he withdrew from the Senate after Florida seceded to join the Congress of the Confederacy. In 1865 he was imprisoned in Fort Pulaski due to his support for the Confederacy.

After his release from confinement, he rebuilt the Yulee Railroad, which had been destroyed during the war. Yulee held a number of executive positions in Florida railroads and hosted President Ulysess Grant in 1870 in Fernandina. He moved to Washington, D.C. in 1880 and died six years later while in New York. Yulee was buried at Oak Hill Cemetery in Washington, D.C.

Both the town of Yulee, Florida and Levy County, Florida are named for him. He was designated a Great Floridian by the Florida Department of State in the Great Floridians 2000 Program. Plaques attesting to the honor are found at both the Fernandina Chamber of Commerce and the Yulee Sugar Mill Ruins State Historic Site in Homosassa.

External links

• Detailed biography at Yulee Railroad Days website
• Guide to the David L. Yulee Papers at the University of Florida
• United States Congress. "David Levy Yulee (id: Y000061)". Biographical Directory of the United States Congress.
• Biography at Jewish Virtual Library