MOUNT DORA: Season 2 - The First Mount Dorans - Part 4

 

Part 4: The Thompson House

The Thompson House, Mount Dora

John Philip Donnelly, the individual I refer to as the ‘Second Mount Doran’, wrote in 1922 of several early Mount Dora pioneers, mentioning each by name in an address to fellow members of Mount Dora’s Yacht Club. “Wrote” is appropriate, for Donnelly declined the invitation to speak to the members and instead offered to write a speech for someone else to read. The presentation was then reprinted in the local newspaper at various times in later years.

The topic of John Donnelly’s ‘paper’ was the history of Mount Dora, but the speech, it was reported, drew numerous laughs when read at the Yacht Club Smoker of February 1922. These many years later, therefore, the challenge for a historian is to separate fact from fiction.  

Mount Dora: The Lure. The Founding. The Founders.

Donnelly began his version of the town’s founding by naming a few early pioneers important to the first days of Mount Dora, individuals such as John A. MacDonald and Alexander St. Clair-Abrams, prior to adding, “and a stumpy, corpulent old gentleman from East Liverpool, Ohio.”

Likely meant to draw a chuckle or two, Donnelly did not name the stumpy old gentleman from East Liverpool, Ohio. So, was he merely poking fun at an old friend in the audience, a Yacht club member perhaps, such as Commodore Thompson? His comment could have been directed at Sandie Porter, the East Liverpool merchant who, in 1881, had purchased the very first Mount Dora town parcel. Porter bought before Mount Dora had even been officially christened Mount Dora.

Perhaps though Donnelly was poking fun at William Gardner, the realtor from East Liverpool who had purchased the long-abandoned Willcox property, the land adjacent to Annie Stone’s historic citrus grove. Gardiner was developing the land near Coliseum Way, where the heirs of Annie Donnelly were likewise attempting to develop homesites. Donnelly may have meant the brother-in-law of William Gardner though, the East Liverpool, Ohio snowbird who assisted in building that magnificent Gardner lakeside home, the stately home that to this day continues to stand guard over Lake Dora.

So many Buckeyes from East Liverpool, Ohio to consider!

The C. C. Thompson Pottery Company, East Liverpool, Ohio

Commodore Thompson, a member during the 1920s of Mount Dora Yacht Club, tops the list of likely candidates in my view. I think Donnelly was poking at a friend, George C. Thompson, an annual Mount Dora winter resident who built the Thompson House on 5^th Avenue. President of an East Liverpool, Ohio company at the time, George Thompson had become the chief operating officer after the death of his father, Cassius C. Thompson, founder of C. C. Thompson Pottery Company. (The significance of pottery in the early 20^th century is easily lost today, but back then, as our Nation was developing, nearly every home in America had pottery dinnerware).

Pottery was a huge industry at the dawn of the 20^th century. C. C. Thompson Pottery Company of East Liverpool, Ohio was a major player in that industry.

Looking east on Simpson's Fashionable 5th Avenue from McDonald Street

Strolling west along Mount Dora’s Fashionable 5^th Avenue, Thompson House, as it is most often called today, is the impressive white residence trimmed in tropical palm green, hiding behind the white concrete block wall having tropical palm green gates. The Thompson House, bult in 1929, is indeed historical, but it was in fact the second home built in Block #58 of Mount Dora.

Another residence, still standing in 1929 when George Cassius Thompson built his home, had at one time occupied that entire city block plus the entire city block to the west.

Lyman Todd of Chicago bought Block 58 at the same time he acquired Block 57. He also bought an additional slice of shoreline of Lake Dora. Lyman Todd built a hilltop home overlooking Lake Dora, complete with its own free-standing bowling alley. Built during the first days of the 1890s, the Lyman Todd home was afforded an unobstructed view of Lake Dora.

One could write an entire chapter about the history of Blocks 57 and 58. And in fact, Chapter 28 of Mount Dora. The Lure. The Founding. The Founders., hot off the presses, does just that!

 

George C. Thompson purchased one-fourth of Block 58 from Miss Easter Armstrong, a Mount Doran who contributed greatly to developing the cultural aspect of the city. Active in the Mount Dora Woman’s Club, Miss Armstrong performed the first play reading by members of the club. Easter Armstrong helped found the Art League, Reading Circle, Book Club, and Garden Club.

The home of Lyman Todd passed to his sister, Mary (Todd) Armstrong, and then to the daughter of Mary Armstrong, Miss Easter Armstrong.

 

The Museum of Ceramics at East Liverpool, Ohio, occupies today the historic 5^th Street home of Cassius C. Thompson. This 5^th Street home was also the birthplace of George C. Thompson, or Commodore Thompson as known to those friends who visited him at his 5^th Avenue residence during each winter in downtown Mount Dora.

 Contents Page of my New Mount Dora Book

MOUNT DORA

The Lure. The Founding. The Founders.

Available NOW at AMAZON

"The new railroad intersects Mrs. Donnelly's grove, running close to the dwelling."

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OR: buy it now, then bring your book for signing on November 1^st.

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November 1, 2021, 5:30 to 7:30 PM

Baker Street in historic downtown Mount Dora

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