A MYSTERY
MAN, Really?
Orlando, Florida
forefathers could relate to Comedian Rodney Dangerfield’s signature punch line,
for much like the comedian, “they don’t
get no respect!”
Simply stated, Orlando, the 158
year old county seat, would not exist today had it not been for the efforts of three
special individuals: Benjamin F. Caldwell; Robert W. Broome; and Robert R. Reid III. Each man provided an
essential role in not only establishing Orlando as a city, but preventing the
village from becoming a Ghost Town as well.
The role each forefather played is evidenced by hundreds of Orange
County recorded documents, hand written transactions providing us a plethora of
information, yet the town of Orlando has yet to appropriately embrace either man
as a city founder.
Of all three, Reid
was the major contributor in terms of keeping one family’s dream of a place
called Orlando alive. There are 130 official
documents tracking Reid’s 33 years of involvement, an Orlando founding father
relationship that began November 7, 1859,
and then continued through to his final transaction, December 16, 1892.
Orange County documents authenticate Robert R. Reid’s
identity, his place of residence throughout his entire Orlando relationship, and
serves as evidence of the man’s rescue of this puzzling county seat of
government. Still, to fully appreciate why the man was even interested in
Orlando in the first place, genealogy must be added to the mix.
One must trace the family
to discover the history, an
intriguing true-life story that is
focused on a man named REID, not REED! The distinction between
the two spellings is crucial, for there was also an English REED family
involved in the early Central Florida story.
His first envisioned city failed!
Historians have long known of Robert R. Reid, although the man’s interest in Orlando of Orange
County never really made much sense. One fable, for example, claims residents had requested
Mr. Reid, a total stranger, to resolve a land dispute. In return, as the fable goes,
he was rewarded by receiving a portion of the land that had been in dispute.
There was indeed a complicated land dispute, and Robert R.
Reid was in fact the man who resolved that dispute, but Reid was by no means a
stranger to Orlando.
The ‘dispute’ reached a boiling point in July, 1879. On the 3rd of that
month, according to historian and Rollins Professor William F. Blackman, the
Orlando Town Council voted to discontinue all existing streets with the
exception of four located in the “original
four acre Town of Orlando”. The action appeared, said Blackman, to delete every
Orlando street with the exception of: Main, Central, Court and Oak Street.
Meeting again July 24, 1879,
the Town Council then determined Orlando’s charter to be invalid. After the
meeting, Mayor Charles H. Munger
issued a proclamation stating the Town of Orlando had been “dissolved by a majority vote of its citizens”.
Minutes of the meeting did not say why the town was dissolved.
Nor did Blackman give a reason for the Town Council’s action, only that by
October of 1879, Orlando appears to
have been reinstated, mysteriously rescued by a stranger from Palatka, a fellow
by the name of Robert R. Reid III. (I have added the title III for clarification.)
A Putnam County merchant, Orlando
had not been the man’s first attempt at founding a new town. 28 years earlier, in 1851, Robert R. Reid III had purchased, for $5,000, a site along St. John
River, land upon which he planned to plat the city of Palatka. Reid however went bust, and later formed a partnership with his
brother-in-law, a general merchandise firm known as Teasdale and Reid.
No
stranger to CitrusLAND!
Robert R. Reid recorded a plat of Orlando in 1880, a town site 80 acres in size and surrounding the original village of Orlando, the 4
acre site donated to Orange County in 1857 by Benjamin F. Caldwell. Simultaneous to recording his 1880
plat, Reid also conveyed 40 acres to William A. Patrick, the son of John
& Lenny Patrick.
Orlando’s ‘dispute’ was all about land ownership. A hand drawn
sketch, attached to the 1880 agreement
between Reid and Patrick, shows the Patrick family residence as being adjacent
to the original 4 acre Village of
Orlando. A second Patrick parcel is shown to be located on the north boundary
of the original village.
1880 sketch from Reid Agreement with Patrick
Patrick’s residence today, according to the 1880 sketch, would
occupy the southeast corner of Central and Orange Avenues, while the Orange County History Center now sits
on Patrick’s second parcel. This land however was owned by Robert R. Reid, or
so he thought, because land records showed a deed issued to Benjamin F.
Caldwell.
Smack dab in the middle of this land ownership fiasco sat the
tiny Village of Orlando, and a solution was desperately needed if the Orange
County Seat was ever to survive! On August 14th, Robert R. Reid III – Part II
will walk you through the man’s 1880 Rescue of Orlando.
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ABOUT TEASDALE
& REID
“Our Company was divided
into two detachments, one located to the right, up the river on a bluff, under
the command of our Captain, J. J.
Dickison. The other, in which I was, was under First Lieutenant Mc Cardle and located in a ditch down
the river, back of Teasdale & Reid’s
wharf and warehouse.” Source: Memoirs of James M. Dancy of his service during the Civil War. Genealogy note: James
M. Dancy was the son of Francis L. &
Florida F. (REID) Dancy. Florida
F. Reid was the sister of Palatka’s Robert R. Reid III. Robert and Florida were
children of Florida’s Territorial Governor, Robert R. Reid II.
About
this Blog’s Author
FIRST
ROAD TO ORLANDO details the history of the original Fort Mellon
to Fort Gatlin, a 28 mile dirt trail that evolved into the Mellonville to Orlando
Road, simply visit www.croninbooks.com/FIRST-ROAD.html for details, AND;
THE
RUTLAND MULE MATTER is a Novel based upon true-life historical
figures, the story of a son and daughter searching for their father, a Florida
Senator, a soldier who vanished during the Civil War. What the man’s siblings
find, changes everything! Visit www.croninbooks.com/MULE.html
for details.
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