Arthur E Dycke
Arthur E. Dycke is a longtime educator, author, and one of the foundational historians of the City of Palm Coast. After a career of more than three decades as a teacher, he retired to Palm Coast with his wife, Louise, in the early 1990s.
Soon after the city’s incorporation, Dycke began formally documenting its history and, in 2000, was appointed Co-Historian for the City of Palm Coast, a role he held for more than twenty years through his work with the Palm Coast Historical Society & Museum.
Starting Before It Was “History”
Over the course of his tenure, Dycke became a central figure in preserving and interpreting Palm Coast’s past. His work encompassed archival research, public presentations, written histories, and the collection of photographs and documents that helped establish the Society’s early research holdings and museum presence. Through newsletters, lectures, and community outreach, he recorded the stories, milestones, and people who shaped Palm Coast from its earliest development through its growth as a city.
Palm Coast was barely a city when this newsletter appeared. Instead of waiting for anniversaries and retrospectives, Dycke got to work early — documenting people, places, and decisions while they were still current.
Documenting the Firsts
Throughout his newsletters, Dycke showed a particular interest in everyday milestones: the first homeowner, the first child born, the first storefront to open. These markers were not treated as trivia, but as evidence of a community taking shape. By returning to them again and again, he emphasized that Palm Coast’s history was built not only through planning documents and corporate decisions, but through ordinary lives unfolding in unfinished surroundings.
Letters from early residents reinforced that point. Accounts of dirt roads, sparse infrastructure, and long trips for basic supplies appear frequently, not as complaints, but as context. Dycke’s attention to these details suggests an understanding that endurance itself — quiet, uncelebrated, and largely undocumented — was part of the city’s foundation.
Dycke is the author of two widely referenced books on local history. His first, Palm Coast (FL), published as part of Arcadia Publishing’s Images of America series, presents a photographic and narrative history of the area’s transformation from undeveloped land into a planned community.
His second book, Smolen: The Father of Palm Coast, focuses on the life and influence of ITT executive Al Smolen, whose vision and leadership were instrumental in the city’s creation and early development.
Preserving Voices That Might Have Been Lost
Together, these works remain key resources for residents, researchers, and anyone seeking an accessible introduction to Palm Coast’s origins. In 2024, Dycke retired from active service with the Historical Society, concluding more than two decades of formal historical stewardship while leaving behind a lasting foundation for future research and interpretation.
