Frontierswomen
of Central Florida
Lake Sybelia, Maitland, Florida
A
Women’s History Month Tribute
By
Richard Lee Cronin, CroninBooks.com
12 March 2022
Day 12
CitrusLAND is celebrating Women’s History Month by
honoring extraordinary central Florida frontierswomen. And as we celebrate
Women’s History Month throughout March, we are also promoting each day a
History Museum, listing its days and hours of operations.
See History Museum of the day in this Post
Frances Elizabeth #Hewlett,
born 1860 in England, came to Washington, DC where, in 1880, she worked as a
“Clerk in the U. S. Treasury Department”. By 1884, while still single, Frances invested
in 40 remote West Orange County acres, following a growing trend by “DC Clerks”
in acquiring grove land in various parts of Central Florida. Buying forty acres
however was just the start of Miss Hewlett’s prolonged presence in Orange
County.
Retiring from the Clerk’s office in June 1890, Frances
married James M. Alden, a widower, who for the previous 25 years had served in
Washington, DC as Secretary to Navy Admiral David Porter. So, as Mrs. Alden, Frances
came to Orlando that year and acquired the historic residence of Francis Wayles
Eppes, the grandson of President Thomas Jefferson. Eppes had begun building his
residence in 1871.
The timely appearance of Frances Hewlett Alden in
central Florida during the last two decades of the 19th century paralleled
a fascinating time in this region’s Citrus-Belt history. She was chosen by this
author to be one of his true-life characters in the historic Novel, The
Rutland Mule Matter, both for being a DC Clerk investor in central Florida
and her later involvement at Lake Pineloch as Mrs. James M. Alden. Her husband
James Alden, already a nationally acclaimed artist prior to relocating to
Florida, painted the Council Oak, and by doing so, unwittingly saved an
important part of pre-Orange County history. The Council Oak near Lake Pineloch
and Fort Gatlin was said to be a meeting place of the Seminole Indians.
Francis
W. Eppes home acquired by Frances (Hewlett) Alden
James Madison Alden died at Orlando in 1922. His wife,
Frances Elizabeth (Hewlett) Alden, passed 16 April 1930. She was buried alongside
her husband in Arlington National Cemetery.
[Further reading: Beyond Gatlin: A History of South
Orange County; The Rutland Mule Matter; and CitrusLAND, DC,
each by Richard Lee Cronin.
Anna Sybelia #Hill Marks
died 6 April 1873 following a strenuous childbirth. Maitland’s Lake Sybelia was
then named by her husband in her honor.
Anna’s obituary tells of both her suffering after
giving birth as well as provides insight into the subsequent naming of one of Orange
County’s much-loved lakes. “At Maitland, Orange County, Florida, of general exhaustion,
terminating in a chill and congestion of the brain. Three days and four nights
of intense suffering closed her mortal career, at 8 PM, on the Sabbath
following her attack. She had nursed, with that sleepless diligence and patient
watchfulness springing only from a mother’s love, her little daughter Jessie,
through a protracted illness.”
Anna Sybelia Hill married central Florida land agent
Matthew R. Marks in January 1870. The newlyweds settled lakeside in a new
startup town of Maitland, where Matthew planned to plat his property and sell
town lots. Anna died the day after her baby Jessie passed. Lake Sybelia was
named by Matthew Marks in honor of his beloved wife.
Lake Sybelia, Maitland, Florida
Childbirth was one of many dangers women faced by living
in the wilderness of our developing 19th Central Florida.
[Further reading, Orlando Lakes: Homesteaders &
Namesakes; and First Road to Orlando, both books by Richard Lee
Cronin].
Angelia Myrtle #Hitchcock
Sawin-Foster was a Mount Dora mystery writer named
Myrtle in 1882. Her published account of visiting Mount Dora that year provides
one of the best eye-witness sources of the earliest days of a developing
village called Mount Dora.
On her one-day visit, Myrtle
told of meeting Annie & John Donnelly at their lakeside home, and of visiting
a Dr. Sawin, the town’s local doctor and builder. Myrtle wrote of having lunch
at the Reverend Guller’s boardinghouse with the financial partner of Mount
Dora’s historic Lakeside Inn, and of also viewing three lakes from atop a hill
– a grand view from what is now Grandview Avenue.
Lakeside Inn, Mount Dora, Florida
Myrtle experienced all the
above prior to sailing the channel into Lake Beauclair at sunset. She did not
mention it by name, but she would have sailed passed Deer Island as they entered
the channel, the island where Ross C. Tremain and Isaac Mabbett had only recently
been hired to be “resident managers”.
Thanks to Myrtle, a
mind’s eye can picture today what Mount Dora was like during its earliest days.
Who was Myrtle?
Her name was Angelia
Myrtle (Hitchcock) Sawin-Foster. Myrtle’s husband, James H. Foster, also wrote
of the Tangerine region one year prior. His first article appeared in Florida
Agriculturalist under the name J. H. Foster, but he may have also been the
“Traveler” of an earlier article dated September 1881. The earlier article mentioned the town of
Tangerine, pioneer M. M. Simpson, minister Dr. Sawin, and the marriage of “J.
Heron Foster to A. Myrtle Hitchcock, a sudden affair.”
The “Traveler” added to
his article, “Rumor has it, however, that they were united several years ago,
but that on some technical grounds their union had been pronounced illegal, and
that now the legal quibble having been removed they were again united according
to the laws of Florida.”
Myrtle, James H. Foster,
Dr. Sanford Sawin, and Colonel Alexander, financer of the Lakeside Inn, were all
Kansas transplants, New Englanders who had first “Gone West, Young Man”, prior
to veering south to relocate again in Florida, and thereby contribute to the earliest
days of settlement of towns Round Lake, Tangerine, Sorrento, and Mount Dora.
[Further reading: For
more on each of the individuals and places mentioned above: Mount Dora: The
Lure. The Founding. The Founders. by Richard Lee Cronin].
MUSEUM
OF THE DAY
Maitland Railroad Station
Maitland
Art & History Museum
231
W. Packwood Avenue, Maitland, FL
Wednesday
thru Sunday 11 AM to 4 PM (Admission Fee)
HAVE
YOU CONSIDERED BEING A MUSEUM HOST?
Today,
Saturday, March 12, 2022, this author will be hosting at Central Florida
Railroad Museum. Serving as a host is one of the many benefits that comes with
being a member of this premier museum. Hosting is not a member requirement but serving
one-day per month as a host at any area museum offers you the opportunity to
meet and talk with individuals from around the world. One need not be a
historian or even know the technicalities of railroading. So, if you have a
little free-time each month and want to become involved in preserving local
history – check out the Central Florida Railroad Museum in Winter Garden or any
of our featured History Museums posted this month.
Questions?
Comments? Email me: Rick@CroninBooks.com
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