Instructions:
1....Print this file.
2....At its end, click on "rules" to see a copy of the trail rules, print it, and then click where indicated at the end of the 3-page rules and patch order form to get back to the list of Florida trails.
3....If you want a hand-drawn map showing the locations of all of the sites, send a self-addressed stamped envelope to Steve Rajtar, 1614 Bimini Dr., Orlando, FL 32806.
4....Hike the trail and order whatever patches you like (optional).
WARNING - This trail may pass through one or more neighborhoods which, although full of history, may now be unsafe for individuals on foot, or which may make you feel unsafe there. Hikers have been approached by individuals who have asked for handouts or who have inquired (not always in a friendly manner) why the hikers are in their neighborhood. Drugs and other inappropriate items have been found by hikers in some neighborhoods. It is suggested that you drive the hike routes first to see if you will feel comfortable walking them and, if you don't think it's a good place for you walk, you might want to consider (1) traveling with a large group, (2) doing the route on bicycles, or (3) choosing another hike route. The degree of comfort will vary with the individual and with the time and season of the hike, so you need to make the determination using your best judgment. If you hike the trail, you accept all risks involved.
When purchased in the 1870s by the Wisconsin Company, this was the highest point in Volusia County, being 57 feet above sea level. It was later owned by Dr. Frances Dickinson, who named it Arawana and built a library here. It was later owned by Katherine Southworth Porter.
On this hill, called Government Hill because it was where a government experiment station was once located, was the home of Capt. Taintor. It was also the home of the Dickerson family.
About ten acres here in the 1890s comprised the orange grove of the Wheldon family. Just to the north was the Roberts grove.
This church was organized on February 28, 1883, and its first building was completed in 1887. The first pastor was Rev. J.C. Cromack, but he lasted only two months. A Sunday school annex was built in 1923. Jane Murray donated $2,000 for the construction of a parish hall and when it was completed in 1951, it was named Jane Murray Hall.
The Bissons had an orange grove here in the 1890s.
In 1963, this much older building became the friary of the American Congregation of Franciscans, part of the Episcopal Church. Later, it was converted to a bed and breakfast.
An Episcopal church was built here in 1896. Prior to that time, services were held in homes of members. In about 1940, the building was sold and moved to the campus of Bethune-Cookman College in Daytona Beach.
The railroad line started by W.W. West later became the Blue Spring, Orange City and Atlantic Railroad, running through town on Graves Ave. and on to New Smyrna. It was renamed in 1887 as the Atlantic and Western Branch of the Jacksonville, St. Augustine & Indian River Railway. Two trains ran daily between Orange City (Blue Spring) Junction and New Smyrna.
The junction, located two miles west of Orange City, brought attention to Blue Spring, which had five steamboats stopping there daily. The line became a part of the Florida East Coast system, and the rails were removed n 1930.
The first public school, organized in 1876, had its classes in a small building located here with Emma Tabor as its first teacher. The land was donated by the partners in the Wisconsin Company.
Although the area is often called Blue "Springs" by some, this early marker shows that the name chosen early was "Spring", singular. This followed the elimination of one of the two springs, leaving only one. Nevertheless, the confusion is perpetuated by the present name of this road now being "Blue Springs" Ave.
This church began in 1889, when the pastor of this church was R.L. Spencer. Services were held in the blacksmith shop next to the black school on Volusia Ave., and then moved to this location. A new sanctuary was built here in 1916.
This building was erected before 1900, was moved here from the site of the library, and was given by Dr. Frances Dickinson to Bertha Fuller. In 1939, Fuller deeded it to the 4-H girls of Orange City.
Holley Ave. is named after William Holly of the Wisconsin Company.
This hotel was built for H.D. DeYarman, Sr. of Eau Claire, Wisconsin, with one room complete by 1875. In 1884, it had a capacity of 50 guests, paying $7-10 per week. By 1902, it was known as the Orange City Hotel.
It has also srved as a convalescent home, the White Elephant Building, and the Heritage Inn.
The Orange City Library was organized at the DeYarman house in 1879, and its books were located in a number of stores and other buildings. The Dickinson Memorial Library took them over in 1971.
Dr. Frances Dickinson donated five acres for a school site, and in 1925-26 it was used for the Marian L. Coleman Elementary School for black students. Dr. Dickinson's original medical library has been moved to Port Orange.
A brick building located here was originally a store selling groceries, hay, grain, nails and other provisions. By 1906, the wooden roof over the porch had been replaced by cloth awnings and the building was converted to a hotel and cafe.
Maj. E.B. Alling donated the land on which the town hall sits, 99 feet on Graves Ave. and 150 feet on Holly Ave. It cost $20,000 when it was built in 1928. Alling designed it in the style of a New England town hall, and included a 200-seat auditorium on the second floor. The Orange City Methodist Church donated a 517-lb. bell.
A citrus packing house was located here during the 1890s. Also at this intersection was located a store which David P. Graves built in 1887 and later sold to Charles Smith. Smith, the first postmaster, replaced it with a larger building and named it the Pioneer Store.
A.I. Wellman constructed a two-story building here in 1878 and sold it to W.W. West. He ran a general store in it during the 1880s, with the city hall located upstairs. West built the two-mile, narrow gauge railroad from his store to Blue Spring Landing in 1881. It was powered by a mule and carried mostly oranges and a few passengers.
This was also the home of the Southern Express Co., a predecessor of today's American Express. During the 1920s, the town's general store was here. The post office took over the corner in 1960.
The Times was published on the second floor, with the post office located downstairs. Later, it was converted to apartments.
A vote was taken to decide the name of this town, and the majority selected Blue Spring. However, J.S. Stillman, Sr. favored Orange City and that is the name he wrote on the application for the post office. The first post office for Orange City was established in February of 1877, with James M. Smith as the first postmaster.
Just to the east of the newspaper building was located the Hotel Freeman.
In the mid-1880s, this was the location of Hill's Drug Store. The town's library books were kept inside it.
On March 12, 1909, a strong southeast wind worsened a major fire centered approximately here. It destroyed five buildings on Graves Ave. and three on Oak Ave.
In the 1930s, Dr. R.W. Hill lived upstairs in a two-story building on this corner, and ran a drug store on the first floor. In March of 1939, an oil stove set fire to the building and destroyed it, along with Dr. Marshall's house just to the east and several other buildings.
Dr. Seth French, a Union army surgeon during the Civil War, moved to Sanford in the early 1870s. He spent parts of each summer in Eau Claire, Wisconsin, where he had been involved in the retail pharmaceutical business with his brother as part of Farr, French, and Co.
French and his wife, Harriet, were part of a group of seven from Wisconsin who organized the Wisconsin Company and bought 3,200 acres here in 1875-77. French as their agent divided it into five-acre lots when he settled here.
The Frenches moved into this house during the spring of 1876. The oaks were planted later. When the house was built, French Ave. was a barren sandy trail through a pine forest.
French became the first Commissioner of the Bureau of Immigration on March 7, 1879, promoting the rapid settlement of state lands. By 1881, the Frenches spent most of their time in Sanford.
This road was originally named Smith Ave. after James M. Smith, one of the founders of Orange City.
Mr. Jocelyn died of tuberculosis and was buried here. Two others were also buried here before the town cemetery was established in the southwest portion of Orange City. They were dug up and re-buried there.
This road is named in honor of Seth and Harriet French. The land to the southeast of this intersection was the Carpenter grove in the 1890s.
On April 15, 1877, this church was organized by Rev. G.W. Rogers, and Rev. J.T. Lewton was appointed the first pastor. Frances L. and C.J. Smith donated a lot and an $800 building was completed in January of 1881.
Mr. and Mrs. Emerson P. Markham donated this lot in 1887 and the church was moved here. On the old lot, they built a parsonage. A new church was built here in 1927, and a fellowship hall to the west side of it was completed in 1955.
The first Orange City building erected to be a school was constructed here in the mid-1880s. By 1900, it was expanded with a three-story addition. It was sold to Mrs. Marris and moved away in 1926-27, making room for the present stucco-covered school which cost $48,000. It was designed by architects De La Haye and Roberts.
Across the street to the south was the Baldridge orange grove.
Dr. French urged that ten acres be set aside for a university, and in 1876 J.E. Stillman provided the land. The road on which it sat was named University Ave. in anticipation of a future school.
The General Congregational Association of Florida met in January of 1885 and decided to establish a college and considered Orange City, Winter Park, Mount Dora, Daytona and Jacksonville as possible sites. Three months later, Winter Park was selected because its citizens donated the greatest amount of money for its construction.
Orange City finally had its college when the Florida Methodist Episcopal Church, South, founded the St. Johns River Conference College in Orange City in 1887. Orange City beat the other contenders, Silver Springs, Mount Dora and St. Augustine. The college was coeducational and taught classical, scientific, literary and art courses. It closed in Orange City in 1892 and eventually became Florida Southern College in Lakeland.
Leavitt Ave. is name for W.W. Leavitt, who had the first house erected within the incorporated town limits.
This road is named after David P. Graves, one of the original principals in the Wisconsin Company.
This road is named after John C. and Emma S. Thorpe of the Wisconsin Company, the group which developed the town in the 1870s and 1880s.
This church was founded on April 4, 1954, with Rev. Dorothy Fernandes-Comacho as its first pastor. A sanctuary was erected here in 1955-56 when it was known as the Pilgrim Community Church.
Near the present Four Townes Plaza shopping center ran the St. Augustine Trail, an old road shown on an 1853 plat of the area. It connected Enterprise, DeLeon Springs and Volusia, and then ran east to meet the King's Road at the Matanzas Inlet.
At the intersection just north of the plaza was once a shed protecting a hand-operated water pump, with a sign that said "Old Point Comfort". The land belonged to the sister of the individual after whom the library is named. The pump disappeared one Halloween.
There used to be a small settlement a little southwest of the shopping center named Midway because it was halfway between Sanford and DeLand. Its only remaining evidence is a private cemetery with graves dating back to 1883. Members of the Padgett and Emanual families are buried there.
After the Emanual family was named a bend of the St. Johns River east of the mouth of the Wekiva River, near marker no. 97 off Fort Florida Rd. The Emanuels owned a fishing facility there, reached by a woods trail from Midway.
The Wisconsin Company set aside ten acres here for a cemetery and had Robert W. Sturdevant survey it in 1870-75. Both blacks and whites were buried in the same area until 1883, when a fence was erected to divide the east (white) and west (black) halves. The west half was then named Lincoln Cemetery.
In 1903, the Village Improvement Association started maintaining the cemetery, a task transferred to the Hollywood Cemetery Association when it was formed in 1906.
Benjamin D. Thursby planted the palm trees along Carpenter Ave. leading to the cemetery. The entrance gate is dedicated to his memory.
The spring was visited by John Bartram and his son, William, on January 4, 1766. In the nearby Blue Spring Run were found the first fossilized sloth teeth in the county.
Francis P. Fatio, Jr., born in Switzerland in 1760, was granted 1,000 acres here including the spring boil and half of the Blue Spring Run. His home was at the northeast corner of the tract. In 1803, he also became owner of the Beresford tract bordering on the north.
This area was settled by Louis P. Thursby from Brooklyn, New York. In 1855, a temporary cabin was built. The present mansion replaced it in 1872. Thursby planted orange groves and built one of the first steamboat landings on the upper St. Johns River.
The mansion was expanded in about 1900 when son John added a third story and kitchen. Rainwater was stored in a cypress water tank fed by pipes on the roof. Another pipe carried water into the house for washing, cooking and bathing, as the spring water was too sulferous and the river water too dark. In 1945, plumbing and electricity were added, and the Thursby family sold the house.
In 1972, the Park Service bought and restored the house.
Prior to white settlement, this site was a Timucuan Indian shell mound, examined in the late 1860s by anthropologists Jeffries Wyman, the curator of Harvard University's Peabody Museum, and Clarence B. Moore in the 1890s. The burial mound was about 14 feet high, 25.5 feet wide and 300 feet around, built of alternating layers of white and brown sand and shell.
Objects found in the mound include animal- and acorn-shaped clay figures, pottery marked with corncob designs, and gold and silver ornaments. The latter suggest trade with the Calusas of southwest Florida. In 1955, a large carved owl was found in the St. Johns River near the mound. It likely had stood next to the mound to ward off unauthorized visitors.
A Pictorial History of West Volusia County 1870-1970, by William J. Dreggors, Jr. and John Stephen Hess (E.O. Painter Printing Co. 1989)
Ghost Town Locations in Florida, by James R. Warnke (Warnke Publishing 1992)
History of Volusia County, Florida, by Pleasant Daniel Gold (The E.O. Painter Printing Co. 1927)
Hopes, Dreams & Promises: A History of Volusia County, Florida, by Michael G. Schene (News-Journal Corporation 1976)
Our Story of Orange City, Florida 1894-1966, by Village Improvement Association (June Hall 1966)
True Natives: The Prehistory of Volusia County, by Dana Ste. Claire (Hall Publishing Company 1992)
Volusia: The West Side, by Arthur E. Francke, Jr., Alyce Hockaday Gillingham and Maxine Carey Turner (West Volusia Historical Society 1986)
Click here for a copy of the trail rules.