First train to ACTON of Polk County

ACTON: Sister city of Mackinnon of Orange County & Sarasota, Florida

“For a short time,” according to Lakelandgov.net, the city of “Lakeland had a rival town on the south side of Lake Parker, the largest lake in the city. That town was called ACTON. It had a church before Lakeland did, and more importantly, a railroad depot.” The railroad depot was a stop the South Florida Railroad line.

Origins of three sister Citrus-Belt cities: Sarasota, Mackinnon and ACTON, date to the four (4) million acres Philadelphian Hamilton Disston acquired in the early 1880s. That land deal allowed the State to settle its pre-Civil War debt, thereby freeing up public lands for use in encouraging investors to build railroads. The Disston investment resolved the Vose injunction which had been in place since 1870, and immediately increased the desirability and value of South Florida land.

With the court injunction settled, Hamilton Disston recovered a portion of his large investment in Florida by selling chunks of his 4 million acres to other land speculators. An English consortium became one of the speculators, a group who organized themselves as The Florida Mortgage & Investment Company Limited. Two of the named English officers of that company were Robert W. Hanbury and Piers Eliot Warburton.

Hanbury and Warburton appeared in Orange County by April 1883. That August, a one-square mile town of Mackinnon was laid out in South Orange County, north of Kissimmee. A depot on the South Florida Railroad line was built at Mackinnon, where Florida Mortgage & Investment Company began selling lots in their new Town of Mackinnon.

Sir William MacKinnon, namesake of

Town of Mackinnon is featured in my 2017 book;

Beyond Gatlin: A history of South Orange County

Visit CroninBooks.com for details

Meanwhile, Piers Eliot Warburton represented Florida Mortgage & Investment Company at Sarasota. A historic marker at the Five Points intersection in downtown Sarasota tells of how, in the spring of 1885, a surveyor for Florida Mortgage & Investment Company laid out the town. Piers Warburton however didn’t concentrate only on Sarasote. That very same year, Webb’s Historical, Biographical & Industrial magazine reported that Acton, Florida, in Polk County, had a railroad depot at city center as well as two hotels – Acton House & Lake House on Lake Parker. The land agent at Acton, said Webb’s, was Piers E. Warburton.

John Dalberg-Acton (1834-1902), aka Lord Acton of England, as described by the Acton Institute of Grand Rapids, Michigan, was “the magistrate of history.” Among the well-known personalities of the 19^th century, says the Institute, one of Lord Acton’s quotes attributed to the man is the oft used: “power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely.”

Lord Acton was the grandson of Sir John Acton (1736-1811), celebrated commander of the British Naval forces. Piers Eliot Warburton had been a Lieutenant in the Royal Navy prior to crossing the big pond to represent English investors in the United States.

Winifred Hodgeon arrived at New York a single gal August 23, 1886. Leaving England with her mother at the age of 19, Winifred settled first at Orange County, where she began acquiring land. In 1889, Winifred married Piers Eliot Warburton, and the newlyweds settled at Acton, the new city in Polk County developed by English investors.

Piers Eliot Warburton, Winifred Ann (Hodgeon) and sons

“To show what ladies can do in Florida,” reported Weekly Floridian on June 7, 1888, “Mrs. Logan, of Acton, has growing on her place oranges, lemons, figs, guavas, peaches, bananas, grapes, pineapples, strawberries, citrons, Brazilian papaws and Scuppernongs.” The town founder by Piers Warburton made the news again August 6, 1889: “Sir Francis Osbourne, a genuine English nobleman who has more title than money, is working in a sawmill at Acton at the rate of one dollar a day.”

The merger through marriage of Piers Warburton and Winifred Hodgeon consolidated large landholdings that stretched from South Orange County and Polk County. Winifred had acquired scattered parcels west of Mackinnon, including a large parcel that is now part of Disney’s Magic Kingdom.

Piers Eliot & Winifred Anne (Hodgeon) Warburton returned to England after Florida’s Great Freeze of 1894-95. Like so many other central Florida pioneers of the 19^th century, their land became worthless as dead citrus trees littered the route of South Florida Railroad. Eventually their long-abandoned property was sold for unpaid taxes to the next generation of speculators, firm such as Munger Land Company of Missouri.

Piers Warburton at England died in 1927. His Florida bride of 1889 survived him, living in England until her death in 1954.

South Florida Railroad in Polk County before towns Acton & Lakeland

The Acton railroad depot, says Lakelandgov.net, burned down “under mysterious circumstances, and a new depot was built in Lakeland. Acton began to decline and was gone by 1906.” But Acton was not the only South Florida Railroad ghost town. Mackinnon of Orange County also fell to ghost town status. One of the three sister cities in which Piers Warburton played a role in developing however did survive and flourish. And today, Sarasota’s Five Points remains the hub of Sarasota, Florida.

This blog series resumes next Friday as the South Florida Railroad inches further west - to that next depot beyond Warburton’s town of Acton. Next Friday, August 23, 2019, Lakeland, Florida.

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