Anyone who compares 1940s and 50s photos with today's will notice a big difference: trees! And former City Commissioner Merili McCoy (1930-2005) had a huge hand in that by starting the Tree Commission.

McCoy was the niece of Conrad Hilton, founder of the hotel chain, and the wife of the late Sonny McCoy, who served as a county commissioner as well as mayor of Key West. But Merili was not lost in the shadows of the powerful men around her. She was active in the community, a member of Zonta and its one-time president.

But her passion was to preserve the island's heritage and its trees. In a 2005 interview by Alyson Crean in the Keynoter, Merili remembered growing up with the Hemingway boys and climbing the lighthouse to bomb tourists with Spanish limes.