A Magic Phone Company

Lured by the siren call of the Florida real estate boom in the early 1900s, a young entrepreneur named Otto Wettstein cashed out his Iowa telephone exchanges and moved to Sebring, Fla., hoping to make a killing in land speculation. Within a couple of years he had burned through his $400,000 nest egg and returned to his roots, taking a job at the Dade City telephone exchange. By 1915 he had saved up enough money to buy the company and by 1925 had added six more exchanges to form the Florida Telephone Corporation. By the start of World War II, Florida Telephone had grown to 18 exchanges and was the dominant telephone company in Central Florida.

Wettstein's Florida folly put him square in the path of progress when Walt Disney announced plans in 1965 to build Walt Disney World on 27,000 acres of swampland southwest of Orlando. Florida Telephone management convinced Disney officials they had the expertise to operate the independent telephone company envisioned by Disney and Vista-Florida Telephone System was formed with Disney owning 51 percent and Florida Telephone owning the balance of the stock.

The relationship proved profitable, but also served as a catalyst for innovation, with Disney constantly demanding and getting the latest telecommunications technologies. In 1971 the company installed the first 911 emergency response system in Florida and became the first telephone company in the country to be completely electronic and have 100% underground cabling.

Rapid growth created a need for more capital and in 1974 Florida Telephone Corporation was acquired by United Telecommunications (now Sprint Corp.), a New York Stock Exchange company. Increased capital provided Vista-United with the funds it needed to continue its history of innovation. In 1975 the company opened the first computer-controlled telephone operator center in the country. A few years later Vista-United completed the country's first commercial installation of a fiber optic network, followed by the first fiber optic distribution system. In 1985 Vista-United became the first all-digital telephone company in the United States.

Smart City acquired Vista United Telecommunications in March 2001. Keeping with the tradition of innovation, Smart City Telecom has introduced the nation's first WiFi/DSL network and completed the largest long-range Ethernet project in the world.