Sigsbee Park Elementary schoolers gather around the American Red Cross Emergency Response Vehicle.

The American Red Cross is celebrating 93 years in the Florida Keys from 1 p.m. to 5 p.m. on April 30 at the Key West branch office, 5450 MacDonald Ave., Suite 11 on Stock Island.

Light refreshments will be served and guests can enter to win a Home and Travel First Aid Kit, tour the Emergency Response Vehicle (pictured above with Sigsbee Elementary School students), experience CPR demonstrations, and learn how to keep family members including pets prepared for any emergency.

Ninety-three years ago on that very day Florence Spottswood and other community leaders founded the American Red Cross in Key West.

Mrs. Spottswood knew that Key West needed a Red Cross. In April 1917, she gathered leading citizens including businessment Francisco Fleitas, George Allen, W.S. Cash, Milton W. Curry, George Waite, attorney W. Vining Harris, doctor Joseph Y. Porter; and women leaders Mrs. William R. Warren, Miss Lilla Allen, Mrs. E.M. Phillips, Miss Mamie Wardlow and Mrs. Roy L. McKillip for an organizational meeting. Because Dade County had formed a Red Cross Chapter that included Monroe County, they initially worked within that organization. But the Key Westers wanted to strike out on their own… President William Howard Taft signed the charter establishing the Key West Chapter of the American Red Cross.
From Crosslinked A History of the Red Cross and South Florida
By Laura Pincus and Arva Moore Parks, © 1997

Today, the Key West Branch is part of the American Red Cross Greater Miami & The Keys.