When most people think of the start of the Great Depression, they think of the stock market crash of October 1929. For most of the country that may be true but in Sarasota it could be said that it started in 1926-1927 with the end of the great Florida Land Boom.

The land boom had peaked during 1926 and the economic tide had turned. People were no longer making money off of real estate and land values were dropping. Many people were heavily in debt, building construction came to a halt and three of the leading hotels had gone into receivership. Businesses were going bankrupt and the 1926-1927 winter tourist season proved to be a disappointment.

By mid 1928, several of Sarasota's banks were on the verge of failing. The first to close it doors was the American National Bank on May 15, 1928. Although the bank hoped that it would pay 100 cents on the dollar to the depositors, it eventually paid out 18 1/4 cents on the dollar. The First Bank and Trust Company was the next, closing on July 17, 1929. Their depositors fared only slightly better, getting 18 1/2 cents on the dollar. The Bank of Sarasota managed to hang on until August of 1932. With its closing the bank eventually paid 42 1/4 cents on the dollar.

The Ringling Bank and Trust Co., started by Charles Ringling, went into voluntary liquidation in 1933. According to Karl Grismer's "The Story of Sarasota," Edith Ringling, the widow of Charles Ringling, paid off the depositors in full, at a loss to herself of a reported $250,000.

Both the cities of Venice and Sarasota were suffering financial problems. By 1928, the Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers had run into money problems and halted construction in Venice. In Sarasota, the city had issued municipal bonds for road construction and other improvements.

The city had built roads and water mains to subdivisions that had been laid out. However, many of these subdivisions were never built and the city was stuck with the upkeep of these roads that went out to nowhere. The city even had to close the Ringling Causeway in 1932 because some of the wooden planks had rotted and they did not have the money to replace them.

The county had also issued bonds and had trouble keeping up with the cost of road upkeep, bridges and schools. They could not make payments on the principal of these bonds or even the interest. Eventually the State of Florida had to step in to work out a plan for repayments for all the bonds issued.

Sarasota did not have the bread lines that many northern cities did in the early 1930s, but they did have an unemployment problem. According to an article by Ruthmary Bauer, "the Sarasota Chamber of Commerce urged companies, particularly Palmer Farms, to hire Sarasotans for labor and not people from Manatee County. The Sarasota Merchants Association encouraged people to buy local goods like produce and bread instead of from other cities, where the labor employed in its production spends its payroll in those other cities."

The Chamber and other organizations tried to provide temporary relief jobs, but most were short lived. Although the city and county were struggling with payrolls, taxes and other issues, tourism continued to a certain degree, providing the governments with some revenue in the early 1930s until federal relief would appear.
