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.
This park is named after Dr. Gaston Holcombe Edwards, who served as a surgeon in the Colon Hospital in the Panama Canal Zone. After that in 1909, he settled in Orlando. In 1925, he and his partner, Dr. John McEwan, bought the building at the southeast corner of Eola Dr. and Robinson St. (which later became a youth hostel, and then Panera's Restaurant), and transformed it into a modern clinic with a staff of 11 doctors. This portion of the larger Ivanhoe Park was renamed in 1937 to honor Dr. Edwards.
The Atlantic Company operated a brewery here until 1954, when it sold its operation to a corporation headed by Joe Ringenback of New York. It operated as the National Brewery until it was torn down in January of 1964.
The church whose square tower that can be seen over the interstate originally had a sanctuary built in 1928 at the southwest corner of Ridgewood St. and Cathcart Ave. Their present building with a view of Lake Ivanhoe was built on 2 1/2 acres in 1951 at a cost of $235,000. The land was donated by Grace Phillips Johnson.
This large commercial building was constructed in 1921-23 for the privately-owned Orlando Light and Water Company. It was bought in 1923 by the City of Orlando at a time that it supplied electricity to the area extending north to Longwood. It exhibits an Italian Palazzo Revival style, often adapted for commercial buildings in Florida in the 1920s. In the 1990s, it was transformed into a center for performing arts, but kept its architectural integrity, including its classically-derived window and door treatments.
Formerly at this intersection was a large orange ball, resembling a huge orange. In 1952, the chairman of the Orlando Park Board, Lloyd Gahr, suggested that it be replaced with the present statue. The ball was moved to the Nick Belitz fruit stand on US 17-92 north of Maitland. The eight-foot statue is one of nearly 200 such replicas installed throught the U.S. in the early 1950s to celebrate the 40th anniversary of the Boy Scouts of America, in a program called Strengthen the Arm of Liberty.
WDBO was licensed as a radio station in 1924, when it belonged to Rollins College. It moved its studio to the Fort Gatlin, Angebilt and Orange Court Hotels and then in 1947, moved to this location which still has its call letters in relief above the lakeview windows.
Beth Johnson was named chairman of Orlando's first municipal planning board on July 30, 1953. In 1957, she won a special election to fill a vacancy in the Florida Legislature, making her the first woman in 35 years to represent Orange County in the Florida House. In 1962, she defeated Claude Edwards in an election to become the first woman to serve in the Florida Senate. She was born in 1909 and died on April 30, 1973. In June of 1973, this park was dedicated in her honor.
In 1921, the city gave the American Legion a lot near here along Legion Pl. for its headquarters. It laid the cornerstone of its new building on February 28, 1924. A captured large German gun was moved here in 1931 from near the bandshell at Lake Eola. In 1936, the San Juan Garage was torn down, and the materials were moved here and used in the construction of a home just to the north of the Legion building. That main building was torn down in 1938 to make room for a new $82,000 home for the Legion, built with WPA funds. In 1940, the adjacent park was dedicated as Legion Park.
Nearby is the Chamber of Commerce Building. The Chamber in 1967 traded its Central Blvd. property for city land here, and on January 1, 1968, the new home for the Chamber opened for business.
J.E. Robinson had a printing plant here in the late 1940s. He also owned one about a mile and a half to the north, and the Chief Press in Apopka.
In 1930, Staton Motor Company opened its office here to sell Ford cars. Ted L. Staton, who moved to Orlando in 1917 and who had been a real estate agent, ran the auto agency.
George Russell arrived here from Connecticut in 1885 and acquired land west of what is now Orange Ave. and north to Lake Ivanhoe. He had a large home, a packing house next to the railroad, a foreman's house, and a novelty works, and grew pineapple in slatted sheds on the shore of the lake. In 1910, he built a pavillion, dock, dance hall, picnic area and dressing rooms. It was known as Russell's Point, and was later called Joyland. In 1919, it was sold to D.A. Cooper and S.H. Atha and was turned into a residential subdivision. They sold out their entire subdivision on their first day of sales.
On October 12, 1936, Lloyd's Furniture Store opened here with Lloyd F. Gahr as its manager. In addition to furniture, the store featured rugs and drapes. It was later managed by Lloyd's brother, Douglas. In 1964, after the furniture business had moved out, the building served as the temporary library while the new one was being built downtown.
In 1887, the Orlando Water and Sewerage Company erected a standpipe here, 110 feet tall and 12 feet wide. The base of the standpipe was 111 feet above sea level. When full of water, the weight of its contents provided pressure monitored by a hydraulic valve controlled at the Lake Highland pumping station, for pipes and hoses to help in the event of a fire emergency. The standpipe was dismantled in 1920. Just to the west of the standpipe was the home of Henry C. Hill, bought in 1896 by Clarence Thornton, and in 1912 by John Cheney.
Frederick Augustus Lewter came to Orlando in 1884 from Halifax, North Carolina. His family's name was Luther before they emigrated to the U.S., and he was descended from Martin Luther. In 1885, he married Linnie Holshouser. In 1886, they bought or built a six-room home here on a 250-acre plot of land that stretched from Orange to Magnolia Aves., and from Marks to Park Lake Sts. The house was gradually enlarged to accommodate their 11 children. He used to sit on the back porch and shoot ducks on the lake which used to be on this property, and sent his hunting dog to fetch them.
The Lewters owned the Standard Poultry Farm, one of the largest in the South. They had over 20,000 chickens of more than 40 breeds, as well as turkeys.
Mr. Lewter dug a ditch 10 feet wide and 10 feet deep to drain the overflow from Lake Given into Lake Ivanhoe at a cost of $10,000. He also built Colonial Dr. from Orange to Magnolia Aves. Park Lake St. began as a lane leading from the Lewter home to their barnyard and cow pasture. Mr. Lewter donated more land to the city for streets and other purposes than any other person.
The home was purchased by Florida National Bank in 1957 for $215,000, and it was torn down to make room for a new bank building. Ground was broken for it in March of 1960. It cost $2 million, including the 200-car parking lot and 13 drive-in tellers. Later, the bank moved out and left the building vacant for several years before it was demolished on December 12, 1999.
On the shore of Lake Concord was a development started in 1925 by the Cheney family. Its name was a combination of the three children of John Cheney - Glenn, Donald and Joseph. Donald had a home on Marks St. which was eliminated when Interstate 4 was built.
In 1944, the 20-acre estate and mansion of James Laughlin located here was sold for $35,000 to become the home of Orlando Junior College. In 1954, the college announced plans to build here a two-story, 12-classroom structure. It was completed not long after at a cost of $175,000. In 1958, it added a $250,000 science building and changed its name to the University of Orlando. The school, back to the name of Orlando Junior College, received accreditation in 1961. The Harry P. Leu Student Center, donated by Mr. Leu, was added in 1965.
In 1971, while known as the College of Orlando, it phased itself out of existence. Later that year, the campus became the home of Lake Highland Preparatory School headed by James Higgenbotham, who resigned as Superintendent of Orange County Schools so he could accept the new position.
This home located on a sloped site on the shore of Lake Highland features an unusual combination of architectural elements. The roof line is Oriental, while the massing of windows and other details appear to be based on a Swiss chalet.
Weber St. is named after Frank Webber of Bangor, Maine, who moved here in 1880 and set out an orange grove and field of guavas near the lake. When the city named this thoroughfare, it dropped one of the "b's" from the name.
This home was designed in 1932 by local architect James Gamble Rogers, and was built in 1935 for Dr. L.C. Ingram, who had a medical office on Central Blvd. The style, known as Norman Revival, is rare in Florida. To provide a romantic, time-worn appearance, they used weathered painted brick, half-timbering, and an intentionally sagging ridge. It features a mock cloister entrance porch with a trefoil arch doorway and lancet window arcade, and decorative brickwork.
Architect Ida Ryan moved to Orlando in 1917 from Waltham, Massachusetts. She was the first woman to receive a master's degree from M.I.T., but solely because she was female she was not allowed to join the state architectural society. She moved to Florida and became Orlando's first female architect.
She designed this Mediterranean Revival style home for herself in 1920-24. It exhibits an assymetrical window placement, side yard orientation, and gently scalloped buttresses.
This is an imposing example of the Florida Spanish Revival style of architecture, built in 1926 for druggist George F. Freymark. It uses textured stucco, ceramic and barrel tile, iron grilles, scalloped parapet walls and arched window surrounds.
The lake which it overlooks was known as Givens Lake, Lake Given and sometimes as Guava Lake, until 1875. Then, it was renamed after Leora Bettison Robinson, the wife of Norman Robinson, State Chemist and Rollins College professor. In 1912, it was again renamed, this time as Park Lake.
This Spanish Revival style home was built in 1925 for Henry Hill Dickson, the president of the Dickson-Ives Company, which operated a department store on the southwest corner of Orange Ave. and Central Blvd. for most of the 20th Century, closing in 1965. During the 1920s, Henry formed a group of men who sold azaleas and other shrubs throughout the city in a beautification program, and the city park known as Dickson Azalea Gardens was dedicated in his honor in 1935. This home shows a strong mission influence.
This was the home of Harry Nelson Dickson, the son of Henry, who served as the secretary of the Dickson-Ives Company. This Spanish Revival home is a bit more ornate than its neighbor, showing colorful diamond-shaped tiles, other color accents and emblems. Both homes show an imaginative use of scalloped parapet walls, archways, and roofs topped with barrel tiles.
This is a 1926 adaptation of the Italian Villa Revival style. Compared to 19th Century examples of the style, this is smoother, simpler, graceful and sophisticated. Elements include paired French doors in the major rooms, a balcony over the front entrance, enclosed sun porch and pale buff stucco.
This was the home of William S. Branch Jr., who moved to Orlando from South Dakota in 1903. He ran the family bookstore after the death of his father. A talented musician, he was the organist for St. Luke's Episcopal Cathedral and was a major contributor to the city's cultural and social life.
Braxton Beacham Sr. moved to Orlando in 1884, grew citrus, and sold dry goods. He became rich from celery he grew in Sanford. After serving as mayor in 1907, he bought hundreds of acres south of Orlando and founded the Prosper Colony and the town of Taft. In 1921, he built the Beacham Theatre and also built stores reaching from it northward to Washington St.
The Davis Park Motel opened on this corner on March 20, 1955. It was designed by local architect Richard Boone Rogers and contained 35 rooms. Its first managers were Mr. and Mrs. William E. Davis and Mr. and Mrs. Joe Stroud.
"Boo" Dickson, who lived here, invented reflective highway markers similar to those still in use along Orlando streets. In 1937, he donated 86 of them, known as Model A Highway Markers, to the city. They were installed along the center line of Orange Ave. every 100 feet from Highland Ave. to the Winter Park city limits. That same year, Dickson patented his invention.
Located here was the Walker-Smith Drug Store. In 1947, it was sold to Johnny Evans, who renamed it the Evans Rexall Drug Store.
This corner is the site of the home of Al R. Douglass, who was the vice president of the Orlando Loan and Savings Company. In the 1920s, he sold real estate and DeSoto automobiles. The Pan-American Company bought this lot in 1930 for construction of a service station. It was later converted to a restaurant, offices and stores.
Real estate developer Carl Dann built a large house here in 1919. Known as Orlando's preeminent builder of his time, the projects he developed included the Dubsdread Country Club, Highland Grove, Colonial Park, Colonial Hills, and the Mt. Plymouth Club and Tourist Hotel in Lake County.
John F. Gordon moved here from Mississippi in 1880. At this site, along the railroad right of way, he established a sawmill. He also owned a grocery store and served as deputy sheriff.
In 1903-04, A.J. Adams had this Colonial Revival home built. John M. Cheney purchased it in 1907. Cheney had moved here from Milwaukee in 1886 to practice law. Judge Cheney bought the Orlando Water Company, built an electric generating plant on Lake Highland, and managed the Orlando Baseball Club beginning in 1912.
Robert Howe, a sergeant in the Confederate army, moved to Orlando from Kentucky in 1883, and bought several acres here at the southeast corner of the lake. He built a large home and boathouse, and set out a citrus grove which he named Kalorama. One of his oranges set a state size and weight record - 18 inches in circumference and three pounds, four ounces. He sold his first crop at the Ives-Delaney grocery store at five dollars a box. Howe moved from this location to Eola Dr. and Central Blvd. in 1903.
Harold Palmer bought Simonet Electric in 1950 and changed its name to Palmer Electric. Next door to the west in 1940 was the Fluffy Donut Shop.
A 47-unit Prairie style apartment complex with a view of Lake Concord was designed by architect Ida Ryan and built here in 1921-22. When it was new, it was the most prestigious apartment complex in the city. Its first manager was Cecile Wichtendahl, who had previously run the Jefferson Court Hotel. The Amherst was sold in 1945 for $175,000 and was torn down in 1986.
In 1922, Carl Dann built a pharmacy at this location. It was one of 61 parcels which he developed in the 1910s and 1920s.
In 1924, the city's second Presbyterian congregation formed the Calvary Presbyterian Church. The following year, it purchased this lot for $8,775 and erected this sanctuary. The congregation moved to Lee Rd. in the 1960s and this became the home of the First Church of Religious Science and the Center for Spiritual Living.
In about 1925, this home was constructed for Ross Edinger, who performed in black-face under the stage name of Eddie Ross. He sold it in 1930.
William Glenn moved to Orlando in 1914 and partnered with Walter Essington to acquire the South Florida Sentinel and Orlando Morning Sentinel newspapers that same year. They phased out the South Florida Sentinel and Glenn sold the other one in 1931. He acquired this house and lived here until 1939, when he sold the house to Mrs. Henry W. Peabody, chair of the Women's National Law Enforcement League. She moved to Orlando to get away from Massachusetts, which had repealed Prohibition. She preferred this city, where anti-alcohol laws were enforced.
This was the home of Mr. and Mrs. Charles Finley. Born in 1893, Charles was involved in his father's paint business on E. Pine St. For ten years, he was the chief wildlife officer of the Florida Game and Fresh Water Fish Commission.
This home was built in 1928 for prominent Orlandoan Grace Phillips Johnson. During the 1930s, she was the president of the Ivanhoe Investment & Construction Company. This home has an Eclectic Mediterranean style with circular wells and decorative details typical of French and Spanish Baroque construction of the 17th and 18th Centuries.
This home was built in 1928 and is one of Orlando's best examples of the Tudor Revival style. Such "Tudor manors" appeared in affluent suburbs throughout the country during the 1920s and 1930s. It shows applied half-timbering, stone ornamentation, horizontal bands of small-paned windows, and a Tudor-arched front doorway.
This home was built in 1927, and is believed to have been designed by local architect Murry S. King. The friezes show an Oriental motif, reflecting the Japanese influence on U.S. architecture during the 1910s through the 1930s. This home has buff brick walls, and the heavy tile roof shows decorative finials and ridging.
This is a typical example of the Prairie School/Chicago residential design of the early 20th Century, and was built in 1927. It is constructed of ceramic tile covered with stucco, and features broad roof overhangs, large window areas and linear glazing patterns.
This 1928 Mediterranean Revival style home shows some Northern Italian elements. Present are a heavy porch, slender arched windows, a pitched hip roof and plain stucco surfaces. It was designed for Judge William K. Whitfield by Raymond C. Stevens, and shows the influence of renowned architect Addison Mizner.
This area between Lakes Concord and Adair is part of exclusive Edgewater Heights, developed in the 1920s by John Holbrook, who also had a dealership selling Haynes-Hupmobile automobiles. He was the representative of F.H. Thwing of Kansas City and Thomas Smith of Denver, who acquired the land for $100,000.
This Mediterranean style home is a bit more formal in its design than most. It was built in 1938 of stucco over tile, and was inspired by an Italian Renaissance design. It shows three-part windows, a loggia and twisted columns.
This home was designed by James Gamble Rogers II, with an American Federal Revival style. Built in 1938 for $50,000, it uses several elements of the post-Colonial Federal style which was popular during the 1780s through the 1820s. These include the many-paned windows, the slender columns, the panelled doors, and an overall sense of balance and symmetry. This was the home of Rodolphus Keene, a citrus millionaire who donated much to Orlando, including the land for the Ben White Raceway.
This 1926 storybook English cottage was only the second house build along the lakeshore. George Beatty Patterson erected it with several elements of the thatched-roof English farmhouse. It has a cork-insulated rolled-edge roof, an eyebrow dormer and heavily exposed timber trim.
This two-story home was designed by local architect Murry S. King and was built in 1926. Its main style is Italianate, but shows some influence of the Pacific school. It features overhangs coming off of its broad roof, plus small-paned arched windows for an urbanized feel.
This 1927 home was designed with a romantic Mediterranean Revival style, and shows an ornamentation theme found on many homes in the Ivanhoe and College Park neighborhoods. It features textured stucco walls, round-headed windows and doors, and stained wood balconies. It was designed and built by Sam Stoltz, a Nebraska artist and builder who moved to Orlando in 1925. He was known as the "world's greatest poultry painter."
This is a Bungalow which also shows a Mediterranean Revival style. Built in 1927, it has a rounded parapet and extended archway. With all covered with textured stucco, these elements give a flair to what otherwise would be quite a modest home.
This is a 1925 Bungalow which shows elements of two other styles. The broad overhangs, roof line and window openings are from the Pacific school. The doorway and columns are Colonial Revival.
This large Mediterranean Revival style home was designed by prominent local architect Richard Boone Rogers, and built in 1939 for Robert Coffey, an internationally known sportsman. The 18-room, 7-bath house cost $100,000. It was later owned by newspaper publisher Martin Anderson, who donated it to Rollins College in 1961. The college disposed of it when it was determined that it was too expensive to maintain. It overlooks the northwest lobe of Lake Ivanhoe, known as "Little Ivanhoe".
This home was built in 1926, but it shows some elements of earlier styles popular in Orlando. The vertical massing of windows is similar to that of two-story homes built during World War I. The eyebrow curves of the main roof line and the entrance porch date back even earlier to the Queen Anne Revival style.
This four-unit apartment house shows an Art Moderne/International style. This style reflects the austere, planar and rectangular surfaces which were popular in Europe during the first half of the 20th Century, and in the U.S. beginning in about 1920. This was built in 1925, and the use of the glass block was popular for its time for buildings of this type.
This area northwest of the lake was developed in the 1920s with apartment complexes for winter residents, and since it was beyond walking distance from downtown, it evolved as one of Orlando's earliest suburban areas.
John G. Sinclair moved here from New Hampshire in 1879 and started a starch factory near here, using casava root. He closed that business in 1881 and started a real estate firm in downtown Orlando.
A 1938 beautification program included the clearing of the lakeshore and the construction of a 30-foot bridge, creating an island to be used as a bird sanctuary.
North of here was the town of Willcox, named after James M. Wilcox who moved to Orlando from Philadelphia in 1880. When the South Florida Railroad built a depot on Princeton St., it added a second "l" to the town's name. In 1887, when it had a population of about 125, it changed its name to Formosa. In 1925, it became a part of Orlando.
Plans for a $150,000 building to seat 5,000 were announced in April of 1926. It opened just eight months later with a dance. On the lake side of the building was a large swimming pool. The Moorish style building, 170 x 225 feet in size, was located on two acres leased here from S.V. Starkey.
In later years it was owned by W.R. "Bill" Kemp, who promoted big band performances here. Kemp died in November of 1971, his heirs sold the building for $300,000 to Mid-Florida Center for Alcoholism, Inc., and it was torn down in November of 1972.
History of Orlando, by E.H. Gore (1951)
Orlando: A Centennial History, by Eve Bacon (The Mickler House 1975)
Orlando History in Architecture, (Orlando Historic Preservation Board 1984)
Orlando: The City Beautiful, by Jerrell H. Shofner (Continental Heritage Press 1984)
Click here for a copy of the trail rules.