Women's History Month - Day 19

 

Frontierswomen of Central Florida

Annie (McDonald) Stone - Donnelly

A Women’s History Month Tribute

By Richard Lee Cronin, CroninBooks.com

19 March 2022

 

Day 19

CitrusLAND is observing Women’s History Month by honoring extraordinary Central Florida frontierswomen. And as we celebrate Women’s History Month throughout March, we are also featuring 2022 each day a History Museum, listing their days and hours of operation.

See also our featured History Museum in this Post

 

Annie #McDonald Stone – Donnelly founded the town of Mount Dora!

Historians often credit John Philip Donnelly with founding Mount Dora. Others are convinced it was Ross Tremain who first founded the village as Royallieu or Royellou. But the real founder of Mount Dora was Annie, a fact easily proven today by deeds recorded at Orange County’s Clerk of Courts office at Orlando.

Annie became the first Mount Doran by subdividing her homestead into town lots in June 1881. This is not to say Annie. (McDonald) Stone-Donnelly created the lakeside city alone. Others most certainly played major roles, including John P. Donnelly, but it was Annie who first subdivided her homestead into city “blocks”, and it was Annie who first sold a town parcel. And doing so was indeed an amazing achievement - for frontierswoman at this time in our Nation’s history were not thought of as businesspersons or civic leaders – except of course here in central Florida.

Mount Dora has every reason to be proud of the fact that its original homesteader and town founder was a woman.

First known as Phoebe Ann McDonald, Annie, born in 1849, was the daughter of Clark and Keziah (Saffer) McDonald. Annie was born in Columbiana County, Ohio, a city in decline at the time of her birth. The canal which the city was founded on was faltering, so Annie’s father, Clark W. McDonald, a tavernkeeper, relocated the family to Weston, Ohio, south of Toledo, soon after her birth.

Annie’s mother died in 1858, and her father then remarried. Annie’s stepmother was Helen, as in Helen Street of Mount Dora, a street that has survived the ages.

Annie E. McDonald married, on 14 May 1866. She was 18 years of age when she married William M. Stone, and by 1870, William was employed at Louisville, Kentucky as a railroad clerk. Annie was mother to a newborn daughter, Nellie. Five years later, in 1875, a letter to the editor from land agent John A. MacDonald enticed William Stoen to relocate again, this time to stake a claim in land along the shore of Lake Dora.

The Stone family of three moved to a nearly uninhabited area on the east shore of Lake Dora in 1875. Two years later, William deserted his wife and child. Two courageous women, one merely a few years old, were left alone in the wilderness of Orange County.

 

1878 Annie (McDonald) Stone Homestead

Annie was awarded the 160 acres on Lake Dora as a divorce settlement in 1878, and for the next three years, Annie and her young daughter established themselves as true survivors in a strange land. Annie built a home along a high ridge overlooking Lake Dora, and, like most every other settler, she planted an orange grove. Then, in 1881, divorcee Annie (McDonald) Stone platted a village she first called “Glencoe”.

Within a few months, the name Glencoe was changed to Mount Dora.

[Further reading: Mount Dora. The Lure. The Founding. The Founders. By Richard Lee Cronin]

 

#Medary of Tangerine

Author Marjorie #Medary released Orange Winter in 1931. A Novel about a girl who lived in a Florida orange grove in 1880, her book, as Mount Dora Topic pointed out in its review of Miss Medary’s Novel, was based on the historic Tangerine, Florida homestead of Dudley W. Adams. Experiences of the young girl in Orange Winter were drawn largely from stories Miss Medary’s mother, a sister of the wife of Dudley W. Adams, had told to her daughter, the author, of visiting the Tangerine, Florida homesteads of Dudley W. Adams and Bessie Huestis.

 

Orange Winter by Marjorie Medary

Born 1890 at Allamakee, Iowa, home to Dudley Adams and the Huestis sisters, including Emily, mother of Marjorie, the young author had been educated at Cornell College before authoring no fewer than five Novels while also working as a New York book editor.

Although Marjorie Medary did not own land or live in Central Florida, her parents did, and the Novel written by Marjorie, inspired by her mother, recorded for history’s sake a moment in time of those who lived in a far corner of Orange County, Florida.

[Further reading: Mount Dora: The Lure. The Founding. The Founders. By Richard Lee Cronin].

 

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Ruth #Merrill Rehbaum

Born at Plymouth, Florida in 1897, Ruth Merrill was a Zellwood schoolteacher before marrying Alfred Rehbaum in 1916. As the groom had opened a Mount Dora hardware store in 1915, the Rehbaum’s settled at Mount Dora, where Ruth became involved with both the Woman’s Club and the Mount Dora Yacht Club. For 28 years, Alfred and Ruth Rehbaum were highly regarded Mount Dora citizens, a community status which led to Mrs. Ruth (Merrill) Rehbaum becoming a member of the first Mount Dora Park Commission.

Widower John P. Donnelly offered $2,500 to landscaping the park named in honor of his wife, Annie (McDonald) Stone – Donnelly, but he conditioned the donation on the Woman’s Club accepting the task of overseeing the landscaping. Ruth Rehbaum accepted the challenge and she is remembered for her active roll in organizing and landscaping Annie Donnelly Park.

Ruth, a graduate of Florida State College for Women, died on the morning of January 27, 1944, reported her obituary, “and was a shock to the entire community. Her life in Mount Dora was a busy one for she entered heartily into all community activities.”

[Further reading: Mount Dora: The Lure. The Founding. The Founders. By Richard Lee Cronin].

 

 

Our History Museum of the Day

 

Lake County Historical Society & Museum

The Lake County Historical Museum has been preserving and telling the stories of the people and places of Lake County, Florida since 1954. Our mission is to bring to the public the details of the lives, locations and businesses that have made Lake County unique. Our collection includes artifacts not only from Lake County, but indeed all of Florida and many parts of the world in an effort to give depth and context to Lake County’s story.

The museum is located in the beautiful Historic Lake County Courthouse at 317 W. Main St. in Tavares, Florida on the shores of Lake Dora and part of the thriving downtown. We are just 30 minutes from Orlando and the perfect spot to begin your explorations. Within walking distance are seaplane tours and boat excursions through beautiful, unspoiled Florida.

Tuesday – Friday 10 AM to 3 PM, phone ahead 352-343-9890

Questions? Comments? Rick@CroninBooks.com