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St. John, U.S.V.I. - A surprise for our 10-year wedding anniversary

I surprised Jan with a trip "someplace nice" for our anniversary in 2000. She had no idea where we were going until the airplane left the ground...to lessen the chance of her backing out!

Though out the 1700's various European groups attempted to grow sugar cane and cotton on St. John, but the rocky terrain and poor soil prohibited it. In 1917 the United States bought St. John from Denmark. By the 1930's, news of the beautiful American island had spread to the United States and the tourism boom on St. John was established. By the mid-1050's, most of St. John was owned by the Rockefeller family. They donated most of the land to the U.S. National Park Service to create US Virgin Islands national park. This gave the Rockefeller family exactly what they wanted, an island retreat without neighbors, and without property taxes! Smart, those Rockefellers, very smart.