The CRAWFORD HOUSE

A CRAWFORD HOUSE History

Pine Castle, Orange County, Florida

By Richard Lee Cronin, Author

(Not affiliated with Pine Castle Woman's Club, nor
Pine Castle Historical Society. Author is fully
responsible for the articles content.) 

Photo of Crawford House by Pine Castle Historical Society

Pine Castle Woman’s Club recently rescued a magnificent piece of south Florida history – a one-hundred year old residence now planned to be a History Center. To discover the origins of this structure was not easy, but to assist in researching its past were several helpful clues. A small town home relocated twice during its lifetime, the structure’s story, finally discovered, proves the Woman’s Club could not have selected a better facility to serve as a history center for this remarkable community.

The Crawford House story begins with the very homestead upon which the historic 1870 Pine Castle was built. And while it is a fact a Crawford family had possession of this home for five (5) decades, it’s also true the story of this home would not be complete with mentioning as well its role in the founding of an acclaimed engineering firm, a business that to this day is a vital member of the Pine Castle community.

As mentioned, clues about the house launched my research project: (1) it was the long-time home of a schoolteacher, Essie Crawford Johns; (2) the original address had been 909 Fairlane Avenue; and (3) the house dated to around 1919.

Once I began digging I located two Crawford schoolteachers. Ethel Crawford, born in 1888, lived in Conway and listed her occupation in 1920 as a ‘School Teacher’. A second young lady, S. E. Crawford, was born 1901 in Alabama, and by 1930 was a ‘teacher’ in the Pine Castle area. Having a 50% chance of selecting the correct ‘teacher’ to research, I started off with the wrong Crawford. I’ll return to her in a bit.

The correct Essie Crawford Johns was the 29 year old Miss S. E. Crawford in 1930, a teacher residing with her parents, William E. & Corosia Crawford. A sister, Virginia L., age 19, was also living with her parents. The son, James E. Crawford, had married and was living in Pine Castle as well.

I can assure you this is the Crawford House family for which the home gets its name, but arriving at that conclusion required a lot of convincing on my part. I assume the same will be of you, so allow me to begin.

Census pages seldom included street names, but many did for the year 1930, and this Crawford family was listed as living in Pine Castle on Tyner Road. Okay, so the street name doesn’t jive with clue #2, but a little history about this downtown area can make sense of the name discrepancy in short order.

The original town of Pine Castle, laid out in 1884 by Clement R. Tiner, had a dozen streets, half running north to south, the other half, east to west. The Crawford House did not exist in 1884, and the land upon which it would eventually be built was not part of Tiner’s Pine Castle. Twenty-five (25) years later, the Crawford House was built on land in James G. Tyner’s 1912 Pine Castle addition.  

Orange County Commissioners brought clarity to Pine Castle street names in August, 1955. Every original town street named by Clement in 1884 received a new name. An example is ‘Division Street,’ which was renamed ‘Fairlane Avenue’. Clement had originally laid out ‘Main Street’ to parallel the railroad tracks. You know that road today as Orange Avenue, but during the 1920s, it was going by ‘Dixie Highway’.

Clement Tiner’s Central Avenue ran north to south along his east property line. The same road is known today as Hansel Avenue. Clement Tiner’s Pine Castle was west of the centerline of Central (Hansel) Avenue. The homestead of Will Wallace Harney was east of Central (Hansel) Avenue.

During the summer of 1912, James G. TYNER, nephew of the 1884 town founder, recorded a subdivision described as part of the Will Wallace HARNEY homestead. That same year, August 21, 1912, James G. Tyner sold Lot 10 and 11, two adjoining lots fronting on an “unnamed street.”

J. G. TYNER Sub-division, Lots 10 & 11 facing unnamed ‘street’.

(See note left of arrow: unnamed street becomes Fairlane Ave.)

The 1912 buyer of the two lots were Florida natives. Paul MACY, born c 1870, was the son of William H. & Martha J. MACY. Martha J. Macy was proprietor of a Pine Castle Hotel in 1887. Paul’s wife, Alice Caroline PATRICK, born 1872, was the daughter of William Wright PATRICK, one of the earliest of Orange County settlers dating to the 1840s. The Patrick pioneer was buried west of Pine Castle - near the ‘Oak Ridge’.

Harney himself had begun the breakup of his homestead. He sold off several parcels in 1879 and 1880 but without filing a plat. One parcel sold became known later as Lot 9, Harney’s Homestead, and that parcel become property of James G. Tyner in 1912.

It appears the Macy’s did not build on these lots, and in June of 1919, they sold the land to W. E. BISHOP. One year later, Widower Bishop sold the lots to Hugh G. REDDITT. A $2,500.00 selling price, inclusive of a $2,000.00 mortgage dated 1 December, 1919, suggests a home had been built by this time. Clue #3 suggested the home dated to the year 1919.

Even before a home was ever built the land was rich in history. Pioneers Harney, Macy, and Patrick had ties to land surveyed in 1912 by the celebrated county surveyor, John Otto Fries.

    

William E. & Corosia Crawford relocated from Dothan, Alabama, buying the home from Hugh & Evelyn Redditt, July 16, 1921. The street out front of their residence was not yet named Fairlane. Perhaps it was being referred to as ‘Tyner’s Road’.

The Crawford family bought the home in 1921, and would continue to have ties to this residence until the year 1980.

William E. Crawford together with son James Edward Crawford became involved in trucking, but the father dabbled some in land speculation too. Within a month of buying the family residence, William Crawford bought a rail-siding at the present day junction of Oak Ridge Road and the railroad track. He acquired two lots in Pine Castle, and five lots further south at Sphaler’s upcoming town of Prosper Colony at Taft.

2017 Orange County Property Appraiser of Fairlane Ave

Meanwhile, a schoolteacher in 1930, Miss Essie, more formerly, Siddie Emmaline Crawford, married Earl Johns December 26, 1937. Earl was of another Pine Castle area family with south Orange County roots dating to Post-Civil War days. The Johns family relatives included such names as Keene, Harris and Hansel.

The Crawford House remained in the family long after the 1953 death of William E. Crawford. In 1955, two months before an unnamed street became known as Fairlane, the next owners of Crawford House were married at Orlando, Florida. It was to be a few years though before the new owners signed on.

Born 1929 at Istanbul, Turkey, Mehmet Erdem Ardaman married Orlando native Mary Jo Fishback June 25, 1955. She was a graduate of Orlando High School and had gone on to become a lawyer, graduating from University of Florida in 1952.

As the sun was setting on the 50s, literally, Mehmet & Mary Jo Ardaman acquired, December 31, 1959, a Pine Castle parcel identified as 6015 Randolph St. The land was also identified as being part of Lot 10 of the Will Wallace Harney Homestead.

Much like that of 909 Fairlane, Ardaman’s street address on Randolph no longer exists says the Orange County Property Appraiser office, but for many years, 6015 Randolph was used as the business address of Ardaman & Associates.

The engineering firm now occupies a much large building south of town, but in 1959, Ardaman & Associates was located steps from the Crawford House. The number of steps between these two locations would become fewer over the years.

Earl Jones passed in 1961. Corosia Crawford died in 1968, and with her passing, three Crawford heirs took over the 50 year old family home at 909 Fairlane. As the Crawford family grew smaller over the years, Ardaman & Associates had grown in size and needed to expand. Ardaman bought the Crawford House in December, 1972, signing a mortgage with the Crawford heirs: Widow Essie Johns the schoolteacher; her sister, Virginia L. Caldwell, and their brother, James E. Crawford. The estate of Virginia L. Caldwell signed a satisfaction of mortgage with Ardaman in 1980.

Essie (Crawford) Johns passed in 1973, Virginia in 1979, and by this time Ardaman & Associates appeared ready to move on. Six (6) decades after the first occupant moved into the Crawford House, the home, together with lots 10, 11, 12 and 13, all of J. G. Tyner’s Subdivision, were conveyed to its neighbor, Pine Castle Methodist Church.

A long struggle to save a remarkable historic Pine Castle residence only then began. In fact, Crawford House the museum is not ready to accept visitors yet, although I am certain the Woman’s Club will gladly speak to anyone interested in assisting financially in their excellent cause.

History is best understood when you feel a part of it, a sense certain to welcome visitors to a museum that has been witness to the story of the Pine Castle area.

About that other school teacher.

The first Crawford schoolteacher I came across in the area was Ethel, a 33 year old unmarried gal residing with her parents, George W. & Sarah C. Crawford. George and his family had lived in the Fort Gatlin area since 1873. Sarah, a native of Florida, had been in the area even longer. The father had been a State Senator, the mother was a descendant of the Mizell family. And so this Crawford family has all the makings of a great history story too, but their story must wait, until FALL 2017.

Beyond Gatlin picks up where my 2015, First Road to Orlando book left off. The old forts trail started off as the first road to Gatlin, but then Orlando got in the way!

South Orange County, the land beyond Fort Gatlin, has a remarkable history, a story never really told – not until Beyond Gatlin. The history of South Orange County is coming this FALL!

BEYOND GATLIN

Reserve your signed, numbered copy today and pay NO money now!

Questions, comments, references and more…

VISIT MY WEBPAGE BELOW FOR DETAILS

http://www.croninbooks.com/Beyond-Gatlin.html