PORT ST. LUCIE PEOPLE
The PIONEER
At the age of 10, Nancy Fleming Cartee moved away
from the circle of loving family she knew in the
Miami area and became one of the early settlers in
the City of Port St. Lucie. Cartee grew up as Nancy
Hanna. She and her family arrived in Port St. Lucie in August
of 1959, just as she was to start sixth grade.
Cartee explained that her father, George Hanna, owned
a tile business in Miami and had done a lot of work for the
Mackle Co. in South Florida. As development spread across
South Florida, her father ended up doing a lot of traveling,
which took him away from his beloved wife, Rose, and his
little girls. In the late ‘50s, the Mackle brothers turned their
focus to a large development in southern St. Lucie County.
A small strip of homes — about four blocks long, according
to Cartee — was built once the North Fork of the St. Lucie
River had been bridged. The Hanna family moved into one
of these homes on Prima Vista Boulevard, stretching from
Floresta Boulevard to Sandia Drive. According to Cartee, this
row of homes was mostly occupied by the group of subcontractors
(of which her father was one) and salesmen gathered
for the upcoming development, which was named Port St.
Lucie. “There was just that small line of homes and woods all
around us,” Cartee said.
The Hanna girls, Nancy and Carol, were enrolled at St.
Anastasia Catholic School in Fort Pierce. A school bus would
pick them up at the Port St. Lucie Marina on Prima Vista
Boulevard for the long bus ride to Fort Pierce. Cartee said as
more homes were being built on the south side of Prima Vista
Boulevard, other students joined the Hanna girls on the bus
ride to St. Anastasia.
Surrounded by undeveloped land, Cartee remembered
a time when she and classmate, Mary Steele, went into the
woods on the north side of Prima Vista Boulevard to cut
down a small, scrawny Florida pine tree. They took it on the
bus and brought it to school as a Christmas decoration.
The third Hanna sister, Diane, was born in Port St. Lucie
and the older Hanna girls went on to the area’s Catholic high
school, where Cartee was a member of the first graduating
class of the newly completed John Carroll High School in 1966.
As seniors, the class was looking forward to the privilege of
leaving campus for lunch, a policy established at the former
school, Central Catholic High School, which was on Orange
Avenue at 10th Street in Fort Pierce. Cartee noted that the
students were disappointed because the new high school was
out in what was then a very rural area and the lunch policy
was abandoned.
A strong Catholic family, the Hannas had to drive into Fort
Pierce on Sundays to attend Mass. But as Port St. Lucie grew
just a bit, the George Pettit family set up a room in their Celestia
Court home where Msgr. Michael Beerhalter, pastor of
St. Anastasia Parish, could come to say Mass on Sundays. As
a youngster, Cartee was able to cut through a few backyards
and get to Mass.
By late 1961, the number of Catholic residents had grown
and Mass was offered at the marina. Cartee’s parents were
founding members of St. Lucie Catholic Church, where the
first Mass was held on Easter Sunday in 1965.
After graduation, Cartee took off for Bryant College in
38 Port St. Lucie Magazine
JOHN BIONDO
One of the earliest residents of the City of Port St. Lucie, Nancy Cartee returned to serve this same community.
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BY PATTIE DURHAM