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HomeMy WebLinkAboutLakeside Settlement Developmets-1994 Lakeside settlements grew slowly This is the last of a three-part series marking the 35th anniversary of Winter Springs, chartered June 20, 1959. This week: The backwoods of Clifton G Springs and Tuskawilla Landing become Winter _��-�`� � y Springs. t ��,i _ By Jim Robison SF • + ty�..v._ ---'7C-77—:".- OF THE SENTINEL STAFF (4r SEN �, -...7 -_ Baltimore Sun correspondent George R. Newell, ) writing from the south shore of Lake Jesup in the Seminoles past spring of 1881,forecast good times ahead. The lakefront settlements of Clifton Springs and WINTER SPRINGS Tuskawilla Landing and other fledgling villages to of Brantley and Mitchell, other investors chartered the south have'"resources and capabilities which bid the Lake Monroe and Orlando Railroad in 1875, fair make before long a prosperous and thickly which eventually became the South Florida Railroad.community." He noted that Orange County (Seminole was part One of the most successful merchants at Lake Je- of Orange until 1913)"has grown from about 700 per- sup was W.W. White. At White's wharf near Clifton sons to nearly 7,000. Nearly every state in the Union, Springs, settlers could buy just about everything besides many foreign countries, has contributed to they needed. They exchanged meat, hides and this increase. Many thousands of acres of land have plumes for flour, grits, cane syrup, molasses, rice, been set but in orange and lemon groves, and still medicines, cloth and hardware. Caravans of tinders more are devoted to the culture of cotton, rice and would arrive to stock up on supplies. sugar cane." Lumbering crews, sawmills and turpentine stills He also wrote, "The orange is doing for Florida moved into the oaks and tall pines to the south. Cat- what gold had done for some of the far western tle grazed near spring-fed lakes. states, what grain is doing for those in the central Newell wrote of attending a February agricultural part of our country, and what cotton has done and is fair at F.P.Fair's packing house at Gabriella. doing for other southern states." "Of all months in the year to hold a county fair in, For two decades the south shore of Lake Jesup had February struck me, a Marylander, as the most ab- been as far south as steamboats could land freight surd. February, associated for many years in my for wagons to haul to Maitland and Orlando. Many mind with snow, slush, ice,and all else that helps to yeoman farmers hauled their crops to the lake's make up unpleasant weather, to be selected as the wharves. proper time to make a good show of fruit, flowers "The amount of freight which these small boats and vegetables! ._ Passing by many magnificent or- carry is astonishing," Newell wrote. "Every available ange groves,all of them blossoming and exhaling the inch of space in every part of the boat is filled until rich fragrance of their flowers, in the balmy air, I she is down to her guards in the water. But even came at last to the fair grounds, saw the tempting then the majority of the boats do not draw over four display of fruits, the blooming flowers,the fine array feet of water. The river is the highway over which of prize vegetables and became convinced that the must be traveled the necessaries of life for a large seasons in Florida are run entirely regardless of al- number of people living within 50 miles on either manacs and`Old Probabilities.'" side." Despite Newell's promotional "Letters from Florida" Flat-bottomed steamboats crossed Lake Jesup with to the Baltimore Sun,the shores of Lake Jesup didn't goods for a wharf at the north end of what today is become a "thickly settled community" overnight. Tuskawilla Road. Early entrepreneur George Brant- Fewer than 600 people were residents of the village ley, who owned the wharf and store on Lake Jesup, when it incorporated as North Orlando in 1959. held mortgages on lots of land, including several By 1972 residents, tired of their name, were look- - hundred acres of orange groves, sugar cane and cot- ing for something to give them a separate identity. ton fields. Brantley, a former state senator, and Dan- By referendum that year, voters agreed to change iel Mitchell,a former Army colonel,made their wharf the community's name to Winter Springs. and general store at Tuskawilla Landing the center Today, Winter Springs, home to more than 24,000 of commerce for settlements south of the lake to people,has the largest land area of the county's 8ev- Maitland,Winter Park,Orlando and Kissimmee. en cities. Tuskawilla Road was a rugged wagon trail blazed for what was planned as a narrow-gauge railroad to Jim Robison is assistant Seminole County editor for Orlando. Although that effort stalled with the deaths The Orlando Sentinel. gqa6 /y but surely into city A city's name springs forth The city of Winter Springs probably has had more community names than any other in Seminole County. Winter Springs — and Oviedo — grew out of what Seminole County historian Arthur E. Franke Jr. calls the Lake Jesup Settlement, founded by homesteaders who settled south of the lake just after the Second Seminole War. The lake takes its name from one of the commanders during the war, Maj..Gen. Thomas S. Jesup. The first Lake Jesup colony, a failed effort by 160 people in 1842, was called Camp Defiance. Lake Jesup's Gee Creek is named for planter Henry Gee, a wealthy slave owner, who owned thousands of acres along Lake Jesup in the yews just alter the Seminole war. Settlers in the late 1860s chose the name Tuscawilla from the writings of naturalist William Barham. His notes identify a tribal village of Cuscowilla, now called Micanopy in Alachua Coun- ty. Bertram and his father, botanist John Bertram, camped at Lake Jesup in 1766 as they followed the St. Johns in search of its source. Their campsite was just east of the south side of the 1.6-mile Cen- tral Florida GreeneWay bridge. The Bartrams noted a sulfur spring near their campsite. It was later named Clifton Springs to hon- or the hometown of a New York doctor, Henry Fos- ter,who in the mid-1800s was urging Northerners to build winter homes south of Lake Jesup. An 1880 South Florida Railroad timetable identi- fies Soldier Creek as a flag station between Bents (Lake Mary) and Longwood. The creek runs be- tween Lake Jesup and the Spring Hammock pre- serve. W.G. White,who owned a wharf on the lake, also owned a grove nearby. White's Campground at the grove was a community gathering place for spring church picnics. Nearby Brantley Avenue (also Lake Brantley near Altamonte Springs) was named for one of Seminole County's early entrepreneurs, George Brantley. In the 1950s, developers started what became the village of North Orlando. The Village Council in 1966 polled residents to come up with a new name. Suggestions of Ranch City, Semino, Casanola, Norlando and Sunrise City made the list. Most, though, favored keeping the name North Orlando. In the early 1970s, the council voted to change the village's name to Semoran. That lasted just a week until, in response to a resident opinion survey, the council reversed itself and adopted the present name. In March 1972, the Village of North Orlando 9 became the city of Winter Springs after negotiations / y a 6 / with the old Winter Springs Development Company, developers of Tuscawilla.