set aside as commercial, residential or recreational and he wanted the divisions to be clear. In three years, Merrick spent over $20 million to build a thousand Mediterranean style houses, which complemented the Biltmore Hotel, the country clubs, and the other community buildings that Merrick had also designed and overseen the construction of. In a 1925 interview with the New York Times, Merrick commented: "Just how I came to utilize the Spanish type of architecture in Coral Gables, I can hardly say, except that it always seemed to me to be the only way houses should be built down there in those tropical surroundings." Once he was done building the core of Coral Gables, Merrick decided to branch out creatively. Many people who did not like the Mediterranean Revival Style rejected Coral Gables because its lack of variety. Merrick therefore decided to design small communities, or villages, within Coral Gables with different international influences. Merrick is credited with the establishment of the University of Miami in Coral Gables in 1925 with a donation of of land and a pledge of $5 million. The following year, just weeks before the start of the inaugural school year, a devastating hurricane on September 17–18, 1926, followed by the Great Depression, ended Merrick's dreams of further developing Coral Gables. With time, Merrick fell into heavy debt and by 1928 he was asked to leave the Coral Gables Commission. At this point, he left Coral Gables and moved to Upper Matecumbe Key, where he opened his Caribee Club, not far from the famous Long Key Fishing Camp, on nearby Long Key, an upscale fishing resort, with his wife. Merrick returned to Gables only when he became the postmaster for the county, two years before his death. The monstrous Labor Day Hurricane of 1935, called the "Storm of the Century", destroyed almost everything on the Middle Keys, including Merrick's Caribee Club, which was never rebuilt. George Merrick's former home in Coral Gables, Coral Gables House, is maintained as a historic house museum. The Solomon G. Merrick Building at the University of Miami at Coral Gables was built in honor of Merrick's father, who was a Congregational minister and abolitionist. Poetry In 1920, Merrick published a book of poetry titled, "Songs of the Wind on a Southern Shore, and other Poems of Florida," with The Four Seas Publishing Company. Controversy In May 2021, the University of Miami