Sister Cities - Part 5 - Lisbon

 

LISBON of Lake County

Sister City: Ozark, Alabama

 

 Town of Lisbon, Lake County, Florida

LISBON, the first “town” south of Emeralda Island on Emeralda Island Road, is a community formally settled in 1884. One Lisbon founder was Andrew J. CASSADY, one of three partners who acquired the Sellers family homestead on Emeralda Island in 1874 (See my prior Emeralda Island Post). Founded in 1884 as a one square-mile city having Emeralda Avenue as its main corridor, it appears as though this place had wanted to be town for a decade, maybe longer.

One-Square Mile Town Plat of Lisbon (1884)

Palatka Daily News of March 10, 1885 reported that: “a new town on the Leesburg Branch of the St. Johns & Lake Eustis Railroad now has a name – Lisbon.” Completion of rail service between Leesburg and Fort Mason, it seems, was the encouragement residents needed to finally establish their town. Still another Palatka Daily News article of March 28, 1886 stated: “Lisbon is on a boom. There are now eleven houses in course of erection, and there is some talk of a large store going up, which will be opened during the summer”.

On May 27, 1887, Lake County became official, while the Orange County Gazetteer of that year described Lisbon as home to 113 residents. A Lisbon Hotel had opened under management of Wiley Laine (1835-1918) of Georgia, who doubled as the town’s railroad agent. In describing the city, the Gazetteer added: “this place is sometimes called Alsobrook’s Ferry”.

A reporter traveling aboard the train to Fort Mason during the summer of 1887 speculated that Lisbon might be a possible candidate for location of the new County’s seat (Chapter 30 of my Tavares book). His article also described his journey from nearby Orange Bend: “All along the road to Lisbon the way is lined by trailing vines and wild morning glories. Back of these are huge thrifty orange trees.” The reporter added: “The train leaves Lake Griffin at Orange Bend, and makes off due east to Lisbon, crossing the Ocklawaha River on pile bridges. The river has two or three separate and distinct channels at this place, and all along these channels, both up stream and down, are boats filled with fishermen, busy catching fish of all kinds that frequent Florida steams”. SR 42 crosses over Haynes Creek today, “the Ocklawaha River” of 1887.

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Andrew J. Cassady, a native of Ozark, Dale County, Alabama, married Mary Jane Alsobrook, herself a native of Dale County, Alabama, in Orange County June 2, 1868. Five years later, on October 8, 1873, Andrew replaced his father-in-law, William J. Alsobrook (1814-1888), as the Postmaster of “Oak Bluff” Post Office.

The Alsobrook family had been among the earliest settlers at this place, likely attracted to this remote region in 1851 because of “The Narrows”, the name given the creek by surveyors. The creek was used by watercraft traveling between Lakes Griffin and Eustis. Now Haynes Creek, for namesake Volney V. Haynes, eldest son of Captain Melton Haynes of Lake Harris further south, Volney had homesteaded on the creek in the late 1870s, long after William & Mahala Alsobrook had arrived with their four sons and two daughters. 

1879 Survey of “Ferry” crossing Ocklawaha River

Buck Lake? More on that when this series continues

A creek-side town at this “place” progressed something like this: A Lake Griffin settlement was established in this area around 1851, and William J. Alsobrook was named Postmaster in 1858. By 1873 is became Oak Bluff; where Alsobrook’s Ferry carried folks across Haynes Creek as we know the waterway today. Finally, in 1884, Lisbon became the official town name. Zachariah T. Alsobrook, son of William & Mahala Alsobrook, was operating a Lisbon store in 1887.

What then really attracted the Alabama family of William J. Alsobrook to this specific location in 1851? State Road 44 crosses the creek today, and then continues all the way east to the 1850 town of New Smyrna Beach - now in Volusia County. A wilderness of 3,000 square miles with fewer than 600 citizens, something unique had attracted William & Mahala (Goolsby) Alsobrook to raise their family here alongside the Ocklawaha River!

Next Friday, this series continues with Buck Lake, an 1850 Howse, and an 1850 Schoolhouse!

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Holiday shopping made easy! Why not give a lasting gift for the history buff in your family - Tavares: Darling of Orange County, Birthplace of Lake County.

Perfect companions: First Road to Orlando; Beyond Gatlin; Orlando Lakes; The Rutland Mule Matter; CitrusLAND: Ghost Towns & Phantom Trains. Visit my CroninBooks.com website for details on each. 

Buy the Tavares book at Amazon by clicking on my book cover above.

 

Next week: Lake County's LISBON and its Sister City.

Sister Cities Part 4 - Emeralda Island

 Enchanting EMERALDA Island

Sister-City Brunswick, North Carolina

 

Looking west across Lake Griffin from Emeralda Island

Ghost Town of SLIGH on distant bluff across Lake Griffin (see below)

Among my Father’s leisurely Sunday afternoon drives in our 1955 Ford, had I been raised here in central Florida, one drive I am certain would have included a journey into Lake County’s rural northwestern countryside. Dad would have explored and then written of the charm of Emeralda Island especially, a little community chock full of history. So then, let us go there now!

Returning to Ghost Town Higley, my last post, drive west on ‘Em En El Grove Road’ a mile and cross County Road 452, where the name changes to ‘Emeralda Island Road’. Continue west until you come to a sharp left turn. At this point, Emeralda Island Road becomes a north-south artery, and at this point, it is visible to view 157 years of incredible central Florida history. The house at this turn in the road, says Lake County’s Property Appraiser, was built in 1863.

 1863 Sellers Residence on Emeralda Island

To fully appreciate the significance of home’s age, consider several facts: Neither Eustis, Mount Dora, Tavares, nor Lake County existed in 1863. This area was then Orange County, the county seat of which was Orlando, at that time a tiny four-acre village, itself only six years old. There were no railroads then, and the few dirt trails that existed were old military and Indian trails.

When build in 1863, the Reverend Willets D. and wife Sarah (Stanaland) Sellers had owned the land for 14 years. The Reverend died in 1858, so by 1863 Widow Sarah was living with son Jesse and family. 11 years after the house was built, Widow Sarah, in 1874, sold the land that had been the family’s homestead for 25 years.

Reverend & Sarah Sellers came to Florida from Brunswick, North Carolina, where generations of Sellers had lived since before the days of America’s Revolution. Florida had yet to celebrate its 5^th Anniversary of Statehood when the Sellers family settled on land that was only steps from the Marion County line. So close in fact, the family was listed in the Marion County census of 1850 and 1860.

Land transactions and homestead deeds however were recorded at Orange County, establishing too the 1874 buyers were a consortium of investors from a small settlement to the south, a city that could not settle on a formal name until 1887. But EMERALDA Island had an identity crisis as well though, for it was at times referred to as ESMERALDA Island.

 1850 Government survey of present day Emeralda Island

(Red Star is location of 1863 Sellers Residence, Blue Star was Sligh Landing of 1885)

Although cluttered with trees and debris in the early 1860s, the spooky Ocklawaha had become a gateway to Lake Griffin and today’s Lake County region in the 1870s, before the first railroad arrived. (Ocklawaha – The River Gateway is Chapter 27 in my “Tavares: Darling of Orange County, Birthplace of Lake County).

Webb’s Historical of 1885 did not mention Emeralda Island as a city, but while describing the riverport town of SLIGH, Webb’s said this of its neighbor across the river: “Esmeralda Island, two miles east, is nearly one solid orange grove. From the foot of the lake during the winter of 1883-4 were shipped ten thousand boxes of oranges, which amount will be materially increased each season as the trees come into bearing.”

The Sellers family had sold their home 10 years before Webb’s publication. Georgia’s Savannah Morning News also wrote of Emeralda Island in May of 1885, telling of a proposal to build a railroad from Silver Springs “to the new town of Lisbon”, adding that the route, as projected, “is to run through Emeralda Island.” And in December 1885, Weekly Floridian told of the planned ‘Leesburg, Esmeralda and Lake George Railway’, adding that growers were offering a bonus of $6,000 if the railroad established a depot at Emeralda Island.

Emeralda Island as one big orange grove likely came about by the consortium of investors who purchased the Sellers homestead in 1874. Those new landowners, Andrew J. Cassady and Drs. Leffers and Hopson, were also participants in the 1886 “boom town of Lisbon”.

Leaving Emeralda Island southbound, the next sign of civilization today is Lisbon. Known in earlier times as OAK BLUFF and ALSOBROOK’S FERRY, Lisbon is our next stop when this Lake County series continues next Friday.

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Holiday shopping made easy! Why not give a lasting gift for the history buff in your family - Tavares: Darling of Orange County, Birthplace of Lake County.

Perfect companions: First Road to Orlando; Beyond Gatlin; Orlando Lakes; The Rutland Mule Matter; CitrusLAND: Ghost Towns & Phantom Trains. Visit my CroninBooks.com website for details on each. 

Buy the Tavares book at Amazon by clicking on my book cover above.

 

Next week: Lake County's LISBON and its Sister City.

Sister Cities Part 3 - Town of Higley, Florida

HAUNTS of a Town of HIGLEY

Sister-City: Cedar Rapids, Iowa

 

 Higley, Florida Advertisement - March 18, 1885

The HIGLEY HOUSE Hotel fronted on “the Boulevard, principal street of Town of Higley”, at a Citrus-Belt settlement founded in 1883 by Edward Emery Higley and his mother Hannah. Each formerly of Cedar Rapids, Iowa, the Higley’s 21 room, three story hotel was said to be “situated in the midst of 8,000 acres of the finest high, rolling pine land’. When opened March 1, 1885, the hotel’s guests arrived via stagecoach - from either Lisbon or Fort Mason, and the hotel offered a barn that could accommodate up to a dozen horses and three buggies.

Opening a hotel was no doubt a proud moment for Edward, for two decades earlier, as a young tyke, he stood helplessly and watched as his father’s Cedar Rapids hotel burned to the ground. He and mother buried Edward’s father at Cedar Rapids, Iowa soon thereafter, and in 1880, began making plans for a move to Florida.

George & Julia Webb lived at Higley House Hotel in 1885 while building their own residence, and while George assisted in establishing Webb & Higley Real Estate, a land agency offering choice lots in the far northwest reaches of Orange County. Located north of Lake Yale’s shore, Higley’s development became part of a new Lake County in May of 1887.

A precise whereabouts of Town of Higley had long remained a mystery – yet hints do exist that can once and for all resolve the mystery. For starters, an 1884 Georgia newspaper described the town as “situated within less than a mile of the northern end of Lake Yale”. That article also told of Webb & Higley’s plan to place a steamboat on Lake Yale to connect with a railroad landing at Fort Mason. (That railroad was the St. Johns & Lake Eustis (Chapter 25 in my Tavares book). 

Town of Higley (1 being City Center, see descriptions below)

 

Town of Higley was divided into "Blocks" and "lots", with lot sizes becoming larger as they moved away from city center – location of the Higley House Hotel. The settlement included acreage that is now used as a Lake Yale boat launch (A on Map) on Thomas Boat Landing Road (E on Map). Today, Holiday Lake Subdivision is adjacent to and west of the ramp, and when platted, was described as bordering the ‘East line of Block 60 of Higley.

Little more than a grassy path now, Sunset Drive (#1 on Map) began as part of a 1990 Mayfield Subdivision, the plat of which also shows an existing 50’ wide easement referred to as “Railroad Avenue”. But there is no train anywhere near this parcel now. A notation in the legal description of Mayfield (see below and right of curved road) states the land was “part of Block 22 of the unrecorded plat of Higley”. Land once owned by Hannah Higley abutted land owned by her son Edward at this exact location in 1883 - where today one travels on ‘Em En El Grove Road’ (C on Map).

 

“Railroad Avenue” easement at right above, beside “Higley unrecorded”

One 1885 deed mentions the intersection of “Webb Street and Boulevard in Block 30”, while a document recorded in 1937 places Block 30 in the same location as “Railroad Avenue”, and in the vicinity of Block 22 - or the area identified on the Map as #1 – the once upon a time heart of downtown Higley. [B and D on map are South and North ‘Em En El Grove Road’].

Florida Agriculturalist of April 22, 1885 published a notice regarding organization of the “Silver Springs, Higley and Southern Railway”, listing two officers as “E. E. Higley of Chicago, Ill., and George W. Webb of Higley, Florida”. The proposed route of the new railroad was said to be Silver Springs south to Lisbon, due south of Higley, Florida. That train, and another earlier planned railroad in the direction of Fort Mason, were never completed.

 

Higley Post Office of Orange County opened August 20, 1883. Nearly every land deed refers to a “plat of Higley, filed on or about April 2, 1884”, at the county seat in Orlando, 50 miles and a full day’s journey to the south. By 1887 the town was said to be home to 300 residents. 

After Lake County was established in 1887, copies of town plats were handed over to the new county – but neither Orange nor Lake appear to possess the Higley plat.

Florida’s Yellow Fever scare of 1887 was the first nail in the coffin of many a central Florida Ghost town. A second and final nail for many early Citrus-Belt towns were back to back freezes of December 1894 and February 1895. Countless central Floridians lost everything due to these freezes. Two months after Florida’s second freeze, Edward E. Higley died, April 10, 1895, at Eustis. 

Higley's remains were returned to Cedar Rapids, Iowa, where he was buried alongside his father, Henry Higley (1818-1868). Hannah (Emery) Higley died in 1918, seven years after the U. S. Land Office had made its first list of vacated lot and block numbers in a nearly abandoned Lake County Town of Higley.

Today, Town of Higley remains rural, accessible only by buggy – horseless or otherwise. But when founded, Higley had been promoted as an excellent citrus growing region, a fact established by a neighbor settlement (#2 on our Map), founded two decades before Edward E. Higley ever set sights on this northwest corner of Orange County. I will take you to that historic site next!

Emeralda – where history is hiding in plain sight - when this series continues next Friday.

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Holiday shopping made easy! Why not give a lasting gift for the history buff in your family - Tavares: Darling of Orange County, Birthplace of Lake County.

Perfect companions: First Road to Orlando; Beyond Gatlin; Orlando Lakes; The Rutland Mule Matter; CitrusLAND: Ghost Towns & Phantom Trains. Visit my CroninBooks.com website for details on each. 

Buy the Tavares book at Amazon by clicking on my book cover above.

 

Next week: Lake County’s Emeralda Island and its Sister City.

Sister Cities Series Part 2 - Clermont of Lake County, Florida

 CLERMONT of Lake County, and

Sister City VINELAND, New Jersey

 

Hotel Clermont, Clermont, Lake County, Florida (Florida Memory Project)

CLERMONT originated from MINNEOLA. Webb’s Historical of 1885, the encyclopedia of early Florida place names, listed only the town of Minneola. According to Webb’s, Minneola was settled in 1882 by George W. Hull, a Canadian (not George W Hull of Umatilla). But Webb’s also stated that two land agents were selling town lots at Minneola: Hull & Humiston Agency (George W. Hull & Ralph G. Humiston); and “Clermont Improvement Company”. 

George W. Hull (1852-1914) was a Minneola merchant, and he established the Minneola Post Office on the 15^th of February 1883. Nearly two years later, on January 21, 1885, a Clermont Post Office was established by Arthur F. Wrotnowski. Each post office was originally located in Sumter County, and both became Lake County post offices when the new county was formed in May 1887. 

Clermont Improvement Company was based out of Vineland, New Jersey, the hometown of Attorney William House (1838-1891), President, and Fire Insurance Agent Thomas Steele (1835-1901), the Secretary. Town of Vineland had been laid out in 1867 by Civil Engineer Arthur F. Wrotnowski, (see Vineland Plat header this post), the Treasurer & General Manager of Clermont Improvement Company.

A. F. Wrotnowski Civil Engineer 1867 Advertisement Vineland, New Jersey 

Born in France, Arthur F. Wrotnowski arrived in the USA with his parents at age 10, and settled first at Baton Rouge, Louisiana. He and older brother Louis became Civil Engineers, and the two brothers served with the Union Army in the Civil War - details reserved for Chapter 29 of my book, Tavares: Darling of Orange County, Birthplace of Lake County. After the War, Arthur served as Louisiana State Engineer, but also became involved with Vineland, New Jersey, where in designed that city for founder Charles K. Landis.

Header of 1867 Town Plat of Vineland, New Jersey surveyed by A. F. Wrotniwski

Arthur Francis Wrotnowski married Angie H. Bladine at her hometown of Philadelphia on February 4, 1885, within a couple of weeks of opening the Clermont post office in Florida.  

Clermont Improvement Company had acquired land adjacent to Minneola, Florida in 1882, and in July 1884, Surveyor Arthur Wrotnowski extended two of Minneola's north-south streets further south. (See upper right corner of Map of Clermont below). Disston and Bloxham Avenues, as they crossed Division Street heading south, became part of a new town of Clermont. Disston and Bloxham of Clermont originally extended all the way south to Lake Minnehaha. (Tavares also had a Disston and Bloxham Avenue, and Chapters 3 and 4 explain the importance of each name to central Florida's development in the 1880s).

Header and portion of 1884 Clermont Town Plat by A. F. Wrotnowski

“William A. House, of Vineland, is President of the Clermont Improvement Company,” reported New Jersey’s Bridgeton Pioneer newspaper October 9, 1884: “He states the company owns fifteen thousand acres of the finest land in Florida. A dozen families have already left Vineland and Sea Ilse City to settle at Clermont.” One year later, House relocated his family to Florida.

Access to Clermont in 1884 was via stagecoach from Leesburg, but Wrotnowski’s town plat envisioned a “proposed railroad” to run alongside Lake Minneola. That railroad right-of-way was eventually used in 1886-87 by two railroads, Orange Belt Railway from Sanford to St. Petersburg on the Gulf of Mexico (red arrow below); and Tavares, Apopka & Gulf Railroad from Tavares with a plan to also terminate on the Gulf (red star below). The railroad right-of-way is now a popular lakeside trail.

Born October 14, 1839, it is believed Arthur had named his Florida city for his birthplace of ‘Clermont -Ferrand’. Arthur F. Wrotnowski died in 1911 at Arizona.

Minneola Town Plat of 1925 shows path of the two railroads (far left) as they entered Clermont lakeside (bottom left) at Division Street - the line separating Minneola and Clermont.

Tavares, Apopka & Gulf Railroad was intended to be Lake County’s Gateway from the Gulf of Mexico. It fell short of its goal, but opened up Lake County towns Ellsworth Junction, Astatula, West Apopka (aka Ferndale), Montverde, Wait’s Junction, Minneola, Clermont, and Mascotte. Each of these 19^th century places are featured in Chapter 29 of my Tavares book.

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The holidays are quickly approaching. Why not give a lasting gift for the history buff in your family - Tavares: Darling of Orange County, Birthplace of Lake County.

Perfect companions: First Road to Orlando; Beyond Gatlin; Orlando Lakes; The Rutland Mule Matter; CitrusLAND: Ghost Towns & Phantom Trains. Visit my CroninBooks.com website for details on each. 

Buy the Tavares book at Amazon by clicking on my book cover above.

 

Next week: Lake County’s Ghost Town Higley and its Sister City.

Sister City Series Part 1: Bloomfield of Lake County, Florida

BLOOMFIELD of Lake County, Florida

Sister City: RICHMOND of Wayne County, Indiana

 "One-half mile south of the lake (Harris) on a pretty knoll"

One Lake County deed of 28 June 1888, describing land auctioned at the courthouse, gave the location of the first Lake county courthouse as “Bloomfield”. A Sumter County “place” at the time Lake County was formed in 1887, a Bloomfield Post Office had opened three years prior, on April 21, 1884. Merchant William D. Mendenhall served as the first Postmaster.

A ghost town now, Bloomfield was at times confused with nearby Yalaha. But unlike towns Parkland and Yalaha, each founded ON Lake Harris, Bloomfield was “one-half mile south of the lake on a pretty knoll.” The knoll where Bloomfield once existed is still a pretty knoll today (see photo above) – a grassy slope rising from Lake Margaretta to the 1880s homestead of William Dulin Mendenhall (1829-1900).

Complicating my initial search for Bloomfield is existence of Bloomfield Avenue. One mile east of Mendenhall’s homestead and the 1882 town of Bloomfield he founded, the town over time expanded east, toward what is now Bloomfield Avenue, after additions by William P. Tillman and Joseph Hutchison. By the year 1884, Bloomfield consisted of “3 stores, a hotel, 2 saw-mills, a cabinet shop, and the handsomest post office in the county.”

Intersection of Bloomfield Avenue and Number Two Road, southeast of Mendenhall Homestead.

Mendenhall’s “pretty knoll” is accessed today via Number Two Road off Highway 48. The road curves first around Lake Margaretta before coming to appropriately named, ‘Gospel Hill Road.” This side road leads up to the crest of the one-time Mendenhall homestead. Continuing on Number Two Road eventually turns east and intersects with Bloomfield Avenue (intersection sign above).

All seven members of the Mendenhall family visited their hometown of Richmond, IN in 1889, where they attended the Whitewater Quaker Meeting. Town of Richmond had been founded by Quakers in 1806, and Mendenhall’s had long been residents before moving to Florida. Quakers, it seems, also had a number of connections with “Bloomfield” place names in the north.

The first meeting of Lake County Commissioners was held “August 2, 1887 at Bloomfield. The building in which they met was described in county archives as “long, narrow, and known as the Mendenhall Store.” A temporary Lake County courthouse opened in a house that “had been the residence of J. W. Hanner, Jr.” The Reverend J. W. Hanner, Jr. (1840-1907) had relocated in 1887 to Montverde, explaining why the house at Bloomfield was available.

Mendenhall Homestead south of Lake Margaretta. H. H. Duncan's homestead adjoined the lake to the east (right above). 

Mendenhall’s homestead adjoined the homestead of Henry H. Duncan. In 1887, Duncan, most often mentioned as associated with Yalaha, was a member of the State House representing Sumter County. He then became Lake County Clerk of Court, at Bloomfield and later Tavares, serving in that position for 33 years.

William Dulin Mendenhall is buried at Yalaha Cemetery. His wife, Ann Elizabeth (Warner) Mendenhall died in 1939 and is buried at Albuquerque, New Mexico.

Bloomfield existed beyond the death of its founder in 1900, but fell victim to Florida’s land bust of the 1920s. Care to know more? The transition from Bloomfield to Tavares is part pf my book, ‘Tavares: Darling of Orange County, Birthplace of Lake County’, available at Amazon.

Our next 'Sister City' Blog will be Clermont, Florida and her Sister City

The holidays are quickly approaching. Why not give a lasting gift for the history buff in your family - Tavares: Darling of Orange County, Birthplace of Lake County.

Perfect companions: First Road to Orlando; Beyond Gatlin; Orlando Lakes; The Rutland Mule Matter; CitrusLAND: Ghost Towns & Phantom Trains. Visit my CroninBooks.com website for details on each. 

Buy the Tavares book at Amazon by clicking on my book cover above.

 

Central Florida History Challenge - Part 6

LADY LAKE Railway Depot, built circa 1883-84, was named for the city it served, a town named for a nearby body of water known in the 1880s as Lady Lake. But 'Lady' was not the lake’s original name. History lost track of the lake’s first name! Named in the 1840s for a specific woman, as years passed, her identity became blurred, and so the lake took on instead an unnamed “Lady”. 

Historic marker at Lady Lake Depot

A legend soon followed, a story suggesting the lake had been named for a woman “who drowned in the lake”. One 1850s map however suggests a different story, and serves as one piece in a compelling story supported by facts - a story about an amazing 19^th century lady – perhaps even two!

Long believed to be a town founded in August 1884 when the first train from Ocala arrived, a depot was in fact established at LADY LAKE because a popular lakeside resort was already existing there.

Enchanting LADY LAKE is also linked historically to TWO of the six central Florida bodies of water listed below. These ‘other’ two lakes help tell the story of that forgotten ‘Lady’. It would not be correct to say Lady Lake’s original namesake makes the lake a “sister lake”, but the amazing female namesake had in fact a close family bond with the two Orange County lakes.

Here then is our central Florida history challenge #6: What TWO lakes below are linked to the mysterious female namesake of the original LADY Lake?

Lake LILY of Maitland

Lake CONWAY of Pine Castle

Lake EOLA of Orlando

Lake BUTLER of Windemere

Lake JOANNA of Mount Dora

Lake MINNEOLA of Clermont    

Select two lakes you think have a historical family link to LADY LAKE, then click the link to my FREE Blog Page. There you will find the answer, as well as a brief of history of all six central Florida lakes listed above.

Now, our History Challenge #6 Answer 

Lakes CONWAY and BUTLER are the correct lakes, but before I explain why, allow me to say a word or two about the origins of the other four lakes:

Once known as John’s Hole according to central Florida pioneer Will Wallace Harney, for an 1870s pioneer who lost his Oxen, Chickens, and Wagon when his rig slid down the steep slope into the lake, John’s Hole is today Lake LILY, keeper of Maitland’s iconic fountain. Along the west side of Lake Lily one can walk a stretch of the historic 19^th century brick road that once guided early settlers south to Winter Park, Orlando and beyond. Named for Fort Maitland from the Seminole Indian War, the town of Maitland was settled in 1870. A Post Office opened here January 2, 1871. Maitland became one of the earliest snowbird colonies in central Florida, and if you’d like to know more about the first days of Maitland, check out my books, First Road to Orlando (2015), and Orlando Lakes: Homesteaders & Namesakes (2019), both available at Amazon.

Iconic Lake Eola, Orlando, Florida

Lake Eola is of course Orlando’s iconic lake, and it too dates to the 1870s and the arrival of cattleman Jake Summerlin. He acquired 225 acres surrounding the lake. Meant to be Eula, short for Eulalie, Surveyor James J. Davis mistakenly spelled it as Eola on the plat and the name stuck. Why Summerlin chose Eula aka Eola is covered in my Orlando Lakes: Homesteaders & Namesakes (2019).

Lake Joanna of Mount Dora, Eustis based on today’s city limits, is yet another body of water chock full of history. The largest of three lakes on the 1870s homestead of Alexander St. Clair-Abrams, this lake he named for his wife Joanna. Two smaller lakes west of Lake Joanna were named Irma and Alfred for his children. (Neither Irma nor Alfred are named on maps today, but you can reach Lake Joanna via Abrams Road to Irma Road as it circles around an unnamed lake). One of two founders of the 1882 town of Tavares, Alexander St. Clair-Abrams also named three Tavares streets Joanna, Irma, and Alfred. Irma Street was later changed to Main Street. This and much more is covered in greater detail in my latest book, Tavares, Darling of Orange County, Birthplace of Lake County (2020).

Lake Minneola of Clermont is shown named as such on the 1884 map of Clermont (page 278 of my Tavares book mentioned above). A Minneola post office was established on the lake in 1883, where a lakeside town of Minneola existed north of Clermont.

 

Now then, about Lakes Butler, Conway, and Lady Lake:

Surveyors began mapping the wilderness of central Florida at the end of the Seminole Indian War in 1842. Among the earliest to arrive in then Mosquito County were two different groups of surveyors, one consisting of a half dozen or so ‘traveling surveyors’, those who traveled together surveying one state after another as our nation expanded, and a second smaller band of Florida boys who worked exclusively inside their home state.

Each hired surveyor was assigned one township at a time, six miles by six miles, 36 square miles per township. Each sketched their work on paper, signed and dated it, and passed it along to a Florida Surveyor General, who also signed the survey after approving the work. The documents are today excellent sources for historians to determine the evolution of Florida settlements. A few surveyed lakes were named on those early surveys, but most were shown as an unnamed “Pond”.

Florida resident Benjamin F. Whitner, Jr. completed THE first Mosquito County survey in 1843. He signed off on his mapping of 36 squares miles, land that included Lake Conway, and then his boss, then Florida Surveyor General Valentine Y. Conway, also signed the survey. Lake Conway was named on that 1843 approved sketch.

Whitner stayed in the area, surveying 540 square miles of present day South Orange County and North Osceola County. In 1846, Whitner reached the area where Lake Butler is today, and signed off on his survey that was then approved by his new boss, Robert A. Butler. Lake Butler was also named on Whitner’s 1846 sketch of that township. 

Present-day Lady Lake, 1848 survey by Benjamin F. Whitner, Jr.

Surveyor Whitner then completed a survey in November of 1848 well outside of the area he had been previously working. Earlier surveyors had performed part of the mapping of Township 18S; 23E, but on November 13, 1848, Benjamin F. Whitner signed off on a survey of six one-square mile sections – that area shown above - land surrounding present day Lady Lake.

Palatka Daily News of July 24, 1884, only one year after the railroad entered then Sumter County, reported: “Lady Lake has long been famous with the old residents of Sumter County as a health resort; since the railroad came it has more than sustained its past record.” Lady Lake had long-been a health resort prior to the railroad". A Sumter County map of 1850 identified the very same body of water, as you can see below, as “Lake Sarah Jane”.

Lake Sarah Jane as shown on an 1850s Sumter County map

After the Civil War, Benjamin F. Whitner, by then a retired surveyor, relocated his family from Florida’s Panhandle to Orange County, where he and his wife became key players in the early development of present day Seminole and Orange County. In 1869, Sarah Jane (Church) Whitner, wife of Surveyor Benjamin F. Whitner, partnered with Mary (Pitts) Randolph to manage the first-ever free-standing Orange County hotel. Their Orange House Hotel was located at Fort Reid. 

Benjamin F. Whitner died near Sanford in 1881, two years before the first train ever arrived at faraway Lady Lake in Sumter County. As they laid Surveyor Whitner to rest at Sanford, two Orlando lawyers were at that time in the early stages of establishing Tavares, their Darling of Orange County, a lakeside community destined to become - the birthplace of Lake County.

Webb’s Historical of 1885 described Lady Lake as a town on “Florida Southern Railway, one mile from a lake of the same name. A stage-line runs from Brooksville and Tampa. November 1, 1883 - no population, December 1, 1883 – 1 store and 8 people. J. T. Biles, Postmaster.” According to Webb's, the town had been founded in December of 1883 upon the arrival of "8 people". But we know now that long before those eight folks arrived, the lake had been a popular health resort.

A story of triumph over tragedy; of homesteaders becoming town builders; of steamboats and railroads forging a new homeland; and of remarkable men and women (such as Sarah Jane [Church] Whitner), who made it all happen. And about that "other woman" first mentioned above. One of two daughters living with Surveyor General Robert A. Butler in 1850 was Sarah Jane Patton - but that story, and the real story behind Dora Ann Drawdy and the naming of Lake Dora, are best left for the readers of my new book: Tavares: Darling of Orange County, Birthplace of Lake County.

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Central Florida History Challenge - Part 5

 Central Florida History Challenge #5

Three notable central Florida investors were among an assemblage of dignitaries at William Cramp & Son’s Shipyard on Thursday, October 22, 1885. Arriving in Georgia from New York, a party of 25 had traveled to Savannah aboard a special Henry B. Plant train, transported there to witness the launching of a steamship that was soon to influence as well the naming of a present-day Lake County town.

Henry B. Plant

Among the group was Henry B. PLANT himself (above photo); Henry S. SANFORD; and Philadelphian Hamilton DISSTON. Each an important player in the formation of Florida’s 19^th century Citrus Belt, they all three joined a chorus of cheers at noon in Savannah as Mrs. Margaret (Loughman) Plant smashed a bottle of wine on the bow of the new 200 foot vessel, sending the boat, “gracefully into the water.”.

Built as a fast mail and passenger vessel to run between Tampa and Havana, what was the name of that 1885 Plant steamboat that influenced the naming of a Lake County town?

S. S. AMBASSADRESS

S. S. ASTATULA

S. S. ROXIE

S. S. MASCOTTE

The ANSWER to our History Challenge #5:

NOT “S. S. Ambassadress”! As explained in Chapter 25: Northern Gateway – Eustis (Tavares: Darling of Orange County, Birthplace of Lake County), the ‘Ambassadress’ belonged to William B. Astor, Jr.. Built in 1877, it was at that time considered to be the largest yacht in the world. Just prior to buying this yacht, Astor, Jr. had sailed the St. Johns River in his slightly smaller yacht, and upon reaching the southern shore of Lake George, invested in 80,000 acres of wilderness land he and fellow investors called ‘Manhattan’. Here they established a river port town of Astor – and built two hotels at the gateway to Orange County’s ‘Great Lake Region’. 

This is how history had recorded the William B. Astor, Jr. central Florida investment, although missing has been another key player, Samuel Benlisa of New York. Benlisa and the towns along the route of the St. Johns & Lake Eustis Railway are each featured in Chapter 25.

 

NOT “S. S. Astatula”! Truly an important name in the story of a developing Great Lake Region of Orange and Sumter County of the 1870s, a land known today as Lake County, Astatula pre-dates the central Florida arrival of Henry Plant, Henry Sanford, and Hamilton Disston. 

Chapter 27: A River Gateway – Ocklawaha, reveals how a river Captain opened up the Ocklawaha River in the 1860s to bring the first steamboat into Lake Griffin prior to the first train ever reaching this region. Astatula was one of a fleet of ships operated by Hubbard Hart, and for a brief time was the name of one of the region’s “Great Lakes”. Today, Astatula of Lake County is what remains of a much larger 1880s lakeside metropolis on Lake Harris.

 

The Roxie and Okahumkee Riverboats on the St. Johns River

NOT “S. S. ROXIE”! An 1884 ‘Great Lake’ Riverboat,, the Roxie was spotted at Lane Park on Lake Harris by a traveler aboard the St. Johns & Lake Eustis Railroad in 1884. The vessel, shown above thanks to the Florida Memory project, is not the answer however we are looking for.

The Roxie had begun cruising the waters of the Great Lake Region prior to the October 1885 launching of Plant’s vessel at Savannah. “Here we are at the Park (Lane Park); the train stops on one side of the depot, and on the opposite side the Roxie lightly floats on the water of Lake Harris.” Quoted from page 201, Tavares: Darling of Orange County, Birthplace of Lake County.

 

“THE MASCOTTE LAUNCHED” headlined an October 25, 1885 issue of Savannah Morning News, an article which told too of a special train from New York that had delivered Henry Plant and two dozen distinguished guests to witness the launching of his newest iron steamship, the S. S. Mascotte, at “200 feet long, 30 feet breadth of beam, and 21 feet depth at hold”.

Gathered at Cramp & Son’s Savannah Shipyard for the special occasion were Henry Plant, Henry Sanford, and Hamilton Disston, three individuals who contributed much to developing central Florida’s 19^th century Citrus Belt. Memorials to the three today include Plant City and Winter Garden’s Plant Street; a town of Sanford; a ghost town of Diston on the one-time Orange Belt Railway line, and multiple Disston Avenues - such as those at Tarpon Springs, Clermont, Minneola, and Tavares.

An excerpt from Tavares Darling of Orange County, Birthplace of Lake County, Chapter 29: Gulf Coast Gateway – Clermont: “Three months after the launch of Plant’s new steamship, the Palatka Daily News of January 27, 1886 published yet another article about Mascotte, only this particular story referenced an application for a Sumter County post office of Mascotte.” Opened 30 March 1886, fourteen months later, on May 27, 1887, the post office was changed to Mascotte of Lake County.

A Town of Mascotte website says "J. W. Payne of Baltimore settled here around 1885, and that he named the town after a ship.” And now, you know the rest of the story!

A story of triumph over tragedy, of homesteaders becoming town builders, of steamboats and railroads forging a new homeland, and of remarkable men and women who made it happen, Tavares: Darling of Orange County, Birthplace of Lake County, even has a touch of mystery and intrigue. The lady of Lady Lake, it turns out, had a name. And so too did the mystery ladies of Mount Dora.

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