James Deering was now looking for someone who would take care of the estate fully and he was looking for someone of a good ability, good habit, and someone who was good at growing things and had enough competence to keep the house in order mechanically. Chalfin and the others, they nominated Sturrock for the position. And so by December of that year, Sturrock was now brought on board as Vizcaya’s first superintendent. His responsibilities continued with the gardens and he would continue to dictate a lot of our paths and a lot of the plants, but he had a bit of a hand also with some of the buildings in the village, most notably the superintendent’s office of which he is its first resident.

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The superintendent’s office is a very nice building. It’s one of the fanciest houses here in the property outside the villa itself. It had a central loggia it, an office, a laundry room, kitchen and pantry. It had a servant’s quarters, three bedrooms. And on the south end it had a small garden, which is still in use today. Now, Sturrock would continue in this position up until September of 1917 when he would begin to train his successor, William McLean, and by the beginning of the following year, his duties were already set, his landscaping work was done, and he would move on to work at the Exotic Gardens Company.