THE 1715 FLEET SOCIETY

The 1715 Fleet Society has a rather comprehensive website at 1715fleetsociety.com Please visit it sometime. We were founded in 2008 for the purpose of planning a commemoration of the 300th Anniversary of the loss of the Fleet. It actually did take 7 years to pull it off. We had a week long program which included receptions in 3 Florida communities that were long associated with wreck site remains ...Sebastian, Vero Beach and Ft. Pierce. The 11 ships that were destroyed in the great hurricane of July 30-31, 1715 were scattered over a 35 mile stretch of beach from Sebastian to Ft. Pierce, on the east coast. So, logically, that is where the focus of our commemoration centered. We also had a major exhibit in January, 2015, 7 months before the actual commemoration to kick off the year. This exhibit was in Orlando at the FUN Show. The exhibit was in conjunction with a partner ship we formed with the State of Florida. The State arranged to send their collection of Fleet coins and artifacts to Orlando for the exhibit.

After the commemoration we changed our focus and became an educational organization engaged in research and the collection of documents regarding all things Fleet related, including numismatics. We scheduled a major conference on the 1715 Fleet during the commemoration. This took place in Vero Beach in July, 2015. The conference was such a success that we scheduled a second conference in 2017. This one was held at Flagler College in St. Augustine.

Following that success we scheduled a third conference which was to be held in Havana, Cuba in March, 2020. I actually went to Cuba in January to meet with my counterparts in Havana and to make sure that all of our arrangements were in order. Unfortunately, the pandemic forced us to cancel and reschedule the conference at a date to be determined after the Covid mess gets cleaned up. I am planning a conference in Key West next year to coincide with the 400th Anniversary of the loss of the Atocha.

Ben Costello is one of the original three directors (which included Ernie Richards and Phil Flemming) who started the 1715 Fleet Society in 2008. He is an attorney from Washington, Pa. whose passion for shipwreck coins in general and the 1715 Fleet, in particular, began as an offshoot of his interest in numismatics which dates back to his early childhood. As a collector of early American U.S. coppers, he gravitated toward shipwreck coins because as he likes to say, These are coins that talk. They have a story to tell. Unlike most collectible coins, you can hold a shipwreck coin in your hand and know exactly where it came from. You know its history and its story. This is what intrigues me the most about these coins. I feel a connection to its history.

To read the complete article, see:
Ben Costello (https://1715fleetsociety.com/ben-costello/)

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