Spanish admiral Pedro Menéndez de Avilés founded St. Augustine, Florida, in 1565. The settlement was established for Spain on Florida’s Atlantic coast and became a lasting center of Spanish activity in North America.
Menéndez arrived in the region while Spain was competing with France for control of southeastern North America. He founded St. Augustine on September 8, 1565, and named it San Agustín because the fleet had sighted the Florida coast on the feast day of Saint Augustine.
St. Augustine is the oldest continuously occupied settlement of European origin in the contiguous United States. That distinction differs from claims about the oldest settlement anywhere in the broader United States, because San Juan, Puerto Rico, was founded earlier and Native American communities are far older.
The city also became a military stronghold. The Spanish built Castillo de San Marcos, a major masonry fort whose construction began in 1672. St. Augustine changed hands between European powers and the United States before becoming part of modern Florida.