USA > Florida > Florida, 1513-1913, past and future; four hundred years of wars and peace and industrial development > Part 30
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are frequent particularly along the Gulf shore and on the islands that border Apalachicola Bay. The city at the mouth of the river of the same name, is the county seat of Franklin county and this coast abounds in some of the richest oyster beds to be found in southern waters. For years the exportation of oysters and fish has brought immense sums of money to this section.
A large industry is in the manufacture of pine and cypress and, in addition, a considerable manufacture of lumber into finished products. A large variety of hardwoods of red and white cedar, black and white cypress walnut, ash, gum and bay timber abounds in the low lands of the county. The development of the agricultural resources, as in a number of other counties, has been delayed by the slow clearing of the timber from the lands, but the soil is capable of a wide variety of products, including generally the vegetables grown in this section, besides many of the fruits. Sugar cane is an especially attractive crop. Cattle-raising has been undertaken to a considerable extent.
Apalachicola is the county seat of Franklin county. Its material prosperity was seriously menaced by a destructive fire in May of 1900, which wiped out a large proportion of the business houses and nearly a hundred residences. This disaster has been almost forgotten in the splendid rebuilding of the city which has a bright future.
CALHOUN COUNTY
Calhoun county has an area of 1,192 square miles. Its population in 1890 was 1,681, in 1900 it was 5,132 and in 1910 it was 7,465. This county borders the Gulf of Mexico and is limited on the east by the Apalachicola river.
Its soils are largely of a loose sandy nature underlaid with clay ; there are also some fine hammock lands. The timber consists prin- cipally of pine and cypress with large quantities of valuable hard- woods along the creeks and rivers.
Calhoun has much importance among the counties of Florida as being probably the largest producer of honey. Calhoun county honey has a reputation all its own in outside markets. The principal farm products are cotton, corn, oats, sweet potatoes, cane syrup, rice and peanuts. Blountstown on the Apalachicola river is the county seat.
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JACKSON COUNTY
Jackson county has an area of 965 square miles. Its population in 1890 was 17,544, in 1900 it was 23,377 and in 1910 it had reached 29,821.
Along the rivers on the eastern boundary of the county is a narrow strip of extremely rich land extending the length of the county. Rising from this is a series of high hills and of high rolling pine lands, dotted with rich and dense hammocks of hardwood. The timber of this county includes a very large variety of valuable woods suitable for the manufacture of furniture, wagons, farming utensils, and similar products. The soil products are principally cotton, corn, oats, rice and sugar cane. While the other varieties of farming products can be raised economically and profitably, their cultivation on a large scale has not been undertaken. Grapes, plums, pears, figs, persim- mons, apricots, quinces and pomegranates flourish here and better watermelons are found nowhere else. The pine lands of the county afford excellent ranges for cattle, sheep and goats, and those engaged in the industry reap large rewards.
A great necessity for the full development of the resources of this county is larger capital than has yet been brought to it. No sec- tion of Florida offers more in the way of fertile and cheap lands, of a desirable climate and variety of resources, and when the attention of developers shall be directed to this section, a more rapid growth may be expected than has yet marked its development.
Marianna is the county seat, and the principal business center. It has a population slightly in excess of two thousand.
HOLMES COUNTY
Holmes county, the smallest in area in the state, contains 458 square miles. Its population in 1890 was 4,336, in 1900 it was 7,762 and in 1910 it was 11,557.
The county generally is undulating although considerably above sca level, and in certain places high elevations are reached. The lands generally are sandy with a clay subsoil. They may be classed in general as high grade pine land with considerable area of fine hammock. The agricultural products are upland cotton, corn, sweet potatoes, cane syrup and peanuts. The sheep industry, also the rais- ing of cattle, mules and horses is an important feature of the indus-
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tries of the county. The principal population centers are Westville, the county seat, Bonifay and Caryville.
WASHINGTON COUNTY
Washington county has an area of 1,435 square miles. Its popu- lation in 1890 was 6,426, in 1900 it was 10,154 and in 1910 it was 16,400.
The Florida Legislature of 1913 created from the southern part of Washington county, the new county of Bay. The separate county organization has hardly yet been completed, and no official reports have been published by which the resources and products of the two counties have been separated. The present description of Washing- ton county, therefore, must include with it the facts regarding Bay county. The little town of Vernon located near the center of the county, is the capital. It is surrounded by some of the best farming lands in the state and it is the center of extensive lumbering and naval stores interest. St. Andrews Bay, now in Bay county, is one of the widely known winter resorts of the state, as well as a summer resort for visitors from the interior of Florida and Georgia.
Stock-raising is one of the leading successful industries. Cattle and sheep thrive well on the native grasses. Special attention has been paid here to the improvement of the sheep stock and a high grade of wool is an article of large production. Similar attention has been paid to the improvement of cattle breeds, and Washington county is a section from which large quantities of excellent beef cattle are sent to outside markets.
The principal farming crops are cotton, corn, sugar cane, oats, rice, potatoes, peanuts and cassava.
BAY COUNTY
The reader is referred to the description of Washington county for the organization and resources of Bay county.
WALTON COUNTY
Walton county has an area of 1,382 square miles of land surface. Its population in 1890 was 4,816, in 1900 it was 9,346 and in 1910 it was 16,460.
The topography of the county varies, as does its soil. In the
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northern and western portions the surface is undulating, the soil is rich hammock land with heavy sand loam, well adapted to general farming. In the southern part the surface is varied and especially adapted to grazing, while in the eastern part of the county the land is rolling and rich. It is one of the best watered counties in the state, and flowing through each precinct are streams of pure, wholesome water, many of them having valuable curative powers.
A large diversity of crops is possible in the county, chief among them being short staple cotton, corn, hay, oats, sugar cane, potatoes, velvet beans and cassava. Stock-raising is one of the best and most profitable industries, and the annual wool clip is extremely valuable. The county has a vast area of timber lands, pine and hardwood. Naval stores operations are extensive and the revenue from them is large.
De Funiak Springs is the capital and principal business center. It has a population of more than two thousand. It is located three hundred feet above sea level, and here is located the State Normal School for white pupils, which has a large attendance from many parts of Florida. The educational interests of Walton county are extensive for both races and are supported enthusiastically by the citizens. The Florida Chautauqua is an institution of many years standing, and draws pupils from many states, north and south, during the winter seasons.
This section offers many inducements to home seekers migrating from the northern states, because they find here conditions in many respects closely resembling those which they have left behind. The steady increase of population for the past twenty years indicates a healthy growth toward a large prosperity.
SANTA ROSA COUNTY
This county has an area of 1,546 square miles. Its population in 1890 was 7,961, in 1900 it was 10,923 and in 1910 it was 14,897, indicating a healthful growth through the last two decades.
The county extends from the State of Alabama to the gulf. Its area is about one and one-half times that of the State of Rhode Island, and almost as large as Delaware. Until the year 1902, less than five thousand of its million acres of land were under cultivation. Large tracts are owned by sawmill and turpentine operators, much of which is for sale subject to the removal of the merchantable timber.
The soil products include every variety grown in this latitude,
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and special attention has been given to the cultivation of the fig, peach and grape. The soil is almost ideal for market gardening and a long list of vegetables is produced here. It is one of the greatest sheep-producing sections of the state, and cattle-raising is an important industry.
Milton is the county seat. It is located near the southern border; it is also an increasingly important commercial center.
ESCAMBIA COUNTY
The county of Escambia, one of the smaller divisions of this state, is one of the most important. It has an area of 657 square miles. Its population in 1900 was 28,313, in 1910 it was 38,029. It is the most western county in the state and it owes much of its commercial importance to its principal city, Pensacola, which is located on one of the finest harbors on the coast of the United States. This city has been made the subject of a special article elsewhere in this book, and needs no further description.
The agricultural resources of the county await their best and largest development. Among the more important agricultural products are upland cotton, corn, sweet potatoes, cane syrup, hay, Irish potatoes, pecans, peaches and pears. Much attention has been paid also to stock-raising and to the breeding of horses and mules.
The importance of Pensacola as a shipping port, in addition to the natural resources of the section, has brought to that city a large number of enterprising citizens and capitalists who are pushing the section to high and profitable development.
FOURTH CONGRESSIONAL DISTRICT
Area, 16,701 Square Miles-Population, 196,572-Density of Population, 11.8
This district includes the thirteen counties of Monroe, Dade, Palm Beach, St. Lucie, Osceola, Brevard, Orange, Seminole, Volusia, Put- nam, St. Johns, Clay and Duval. This area borders the Atlantic side of the state from Key West to within forty miles of the Georgia line. The density of population in the northern section, which is probably the most thickly settled part of the state, is reduced by the large areas of sparsely inhabited territory in the south. It is the section which has been developed agriculturally and as a desirable resort
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for travelers, tourists and others, by the building of the Florida East Coast Railway. No part of Florida has grown with more rapidity since 1890; and the future promises a development even more remarkable.
MONROE COUNTY
The county of Monroe has an estimated area of 1,100 square miles, and a population in 1910 of 21,563, all but about 2,000 of this being centered at Key West, the southernmost city in the United States. This city, although separated by many miles of deep waters from the mainland of Florida, is the fourth in population in Florida; and at one time (in 1880) it was the largest city in the state.
Monroe county includes many of the Florida Keys, which number several hundred, although names have been given only to the largest. These are sparsely inhabited, many of them being untenanted. Key West has the unique distinction of being the only city or incor- porated town in its county. The mainland portion of the county is largely the low lands of the southern Everglades; and, with the exception of being the scene of important events in the early history of Florida, it has no claim to distinction. The story of Key West, therefore, includes most that is noteworthy in the history of Monroe county. This city has received a large increment of commercial importance by the extension of the Florida East Coast Railway to its terminals on its wharves. Strategically it has been considered for many decades of the utmost importance to the United States, and the Federal Government built here many years ago fortifica- tions that have been garrisoned with troops or marines. The importance of this location as a coaling station for the United States Navy and for commercial ocean traffic, will be increased and enhanced by the opening of the Panama canal.
Key West has large importance in the manufacture of cigars, and its factories, employing more than twelve thousand cigar makers, are located here. The waters surrounding the "Island City" abound in a larger variety of food and game fishes than any other point on the coast of the United States. Formerly sponge fishing was an important industry, and it was here that sponges from American waters were made an article of commerce. The sponge fisheries of Key West are still largely productive, but the center of the industry with its development, has been moved to Tarpon Springs on the Gulf coast.
To the stranger visiting this unique city for the first time, it has
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an appearance foreign and strange. Located on an island of the sea, a few miles long by a mile wide, it appears to be a low recf of rock arising from deep waters. But few buildings have been erected here rising above the second story, for the great storms that sweep over these southern latitudes have made necessary as little resistance to the winds as is possible to devise. Similar conditions control the build- ings of Havana, Cuba, and other cities that border on the Carib- bean sea.
Yet on this seemingly barren island of Key West has arisen a city of remarkable enterprise and well-earned prosperity, which in the increased traffic of the future will assume an importance hard to be imagined. Here are beautiful homes, well paved strects, a street car line, several institutions of learning and large wealth. The citi- zens of Key West, whose poetic inclinations must be fostered by the grandeur of ocean that sweeps all about them, resent any suggestion of the idea that they are not the most fortunate and happily located people on earth.
DADE COUNTY
This county has a land area of 2,733 square miles. Its population in 1910 was 11,933. Originally, Dade county included the present area of Palm Beach county, which lies to the north of it; and the history of the development of these two counties really began with the extension of the Florida East Coast Railway into this section.
The Legislature of 1913 created a new county from the northern section of Dade, which it called Broward county, after the late lamented ex-Governor of Florida. This action, however, was sub- ject to ratification by the majority of the people of the section, which failed to approve the measure. In spite of its extreme southern location, Dade county includes as its county seat the thriving city of Miami, which, in less than twenty years, has grown from an Indian trading post to be a city with a population which is growing so fast that an enumeration today is wholly inadequate six months later. It is located in the center of a section of remarkable fertility, and with a wonderful variety of fruits and vegetables, many of which are unknown to the northern consumer. It is equipped with every municipal improvement and convenience that the most ambitious cities in the north can boast of. It has a splendid system of schools, churches of many denominations, and its enterprising citizens are planning the development of its harbor on Biscayne Bay to accommo- date deep draft and ocean-going steamships. Its importance in the
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future is hardly to be estimated in the commerce of the state, and eventually the products of an immense and fertile territory will be shipped direct by water transportation to the markets of the world.
Homestead, lying twenty-eight miles south, is another center of rapidly developing agricultural and fruit growing interests. It is the last city on the mainland of Florida to be touched by the over-seas rail line of the Flagler system.
The area of Dade county includes a large number of the important Florida Keys. The western section of the mainland is largely occu- pied by the southeastern portion of the Everglades, and the possible development of this vast area for agricultural purposes will add much to the importance of these cities. Miami is one of the centers from which is being operated the development of the Everglades country, and here one of the largest of the drainage canals which are to lower the level of Lake Okeechobee, finds its way to the ocean level.
In the northeastern corner of this county is located Fort Lauder- dale, well known in the early history of Florida as a military post, and now the center of a large fruit and agricultural development. A few miles south is the little city of Dania. The products of Dade county are largely from its groves and vegetable plantations. Citrus fruits reach their perfection here and immense groves of grapefruit and orange trees supply the northern markets with their carliest products of tropical fruits. It is in this county, more than in any other of the state, that the products of northern soils are grown side by side with the fruits of the tropics. In no section of Florida is the development of natural resources and possibilities being pushed with greater vigor than in the county of Dade.
PALM BEACH COUNTY
The county of Palm Beach has an area of 3,048 square miles, and the resident population in 1910 was 5,577. The county takes its name from the famous resort where are located the Royal Poinciana and The Breakers, two of the most famous resort hotels in the world.
Among the other important settlements and cities of the county, all of which are located on the eastern border thereof, are Hobe Sound; Jupiter, where is located the famous Government lighthouse known as the Jupiter Light; West Palm Beach; Lantana; Delray, and a few others of importance.
The soil products are the same as those of Dade county and their commercial value is but little less than that produced in the county
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to the south. The delightful atmosphere of ocean breezes and the wonderful tropical surroundings of these two counties have induced the building of many beautiful homes by northern investors who spend here from three to seven or eight months of each year.
ST. LUCIE COUNTY
St. Lucie county has a land area of 1,395 square miles and a population in 1910 of 4,075. This county was formerly a part of Brevard county, from which it was divided several years ago. Its principal city is Fort Pierce, which is also the county seat-this has a population of approximately two thousand. Other important points as centers of population are Waveland, Jensen, Eden, Sebastian, Ancona, White City, San Luis, Gifford, along the eastern coast of the county; and Okeechobee, a settlement of increasing importance at the northern end of the lake of the same name.
One of the most important land developments in this state has been undertaken in the northern part of this county. This is known as Fellsmere, and includes the drainage and reclamation of 120,000 acres of rich lands, which have a general elevation of eighteen feet above the ocean, and from which an intervening ridge of coquina rock has prevented the escape of the natural rainfall throughout the cen- turies. More than a million dollars has been spent in the develop- ment of this section, and though it is probably the largest undertaking of its kind, the example set here is being followed in the costly develop- ment of similar sections and tracts of land up and down the east coast of this state.
OSCEOLA COUNTY
Osceola county has 1,773 square miles of land surface. Its popu- lation in 1890 was 3,133, in 1900 it was 3,444 and in 1910 it was 5,507.
This county, named in honor of the great Seminole warrior, was created from portions of Orange and Brevard counties in 1887. Its surface is level, relieved here and there by ponds, lakes of considerable size, and by sparkling streams of water. It is bordered on the west by the Kissimmee river and by the lake of the same name. It contains the eastern portion of the Kissimmee Valley, one of the richest and most fertile sections in Florida.
It has large acreas of pine land which have fostered the develop- ment of the turpentine industry. It has also many small and rich hammocks of oak and hickory. Much of the land is open prairie and
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affords the best of native pasturage for cattle. In this county the cattle industry has been for many years most profitable. As in other counties of lower and middle Florida, the revolution of the cattle industry by the breaking up of great ranges is changing these con- ditions rapidly.
This county has large areas in farms and gardens on which citrus fruits, peaches, melons, squash, cabbage, tomatoes, beans, egg plant, and potatoes are raised in large quantities for the early markets. The county seat is the beautiful city of Kissimmee, which is located at the head of navigation on the river of that name. Its population in 1910 was above 2,100. It has a large reputation as a winter resort and an easy access is had by the Kissimmee river into Lake Okeechobee. Within recent years large areas of rich lands have been developed, and the settlement of the county by energetic farmers from northern and western states is going forward rapidly.
BREVARD COUNTY
Brevard county has an area of 1,025 square miles and its popula- tion in 1910 was 4,717.
It borders the Indian river for nearly seventy miles. Formerly it included the area which is now known as St. Lucie county. Brevard county is the location where oranges were originally cultivated along the east coast and its products made the Indian river fruit famous. The industry is being renewed on a large scale on the low muck lands, and the fruit of to-day bears up the reputation that was estab- lished years ago. Immense quantities of early vegetables of every variety are produced here and are among the earliest to mature for the northern markets.
Along the borders of the Indian river through Brevard and St. Lucie counties and extending somewhat into Palm Beach county, are thousands of acres of pineapples and this strip of land hardly a mile wide, produces practically all the "pines" raised on the eastern coast of the state. It has been and is an extremely profitable crop, and large fortunes have been made in its cultivation.
The county is traversed its entire length by the Florida East Coast Railway. The construction of this railway in the late '90s replaced the large transportation business over the Indian river, which was carried on by a fleet of flat-bottom, stern-wheel steamers, such as were known years ago over the length of the Mississippi river. The Indian river fisheries are famous and extremely profitable. Nowhere else is found,
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at least in merchantable quantities, the luscious pompano. Spanish mackerel and many other varieties of food fish are extensively exported to New York and other northern markets. The capital of the county is Titusville and this city is thriving under a new lease of life granted or brought about by the development of immense areas of the rich black muck lands that lie to the west and south of it. Among the other important cities in the county, most of them located along the Indian river, are Micco, Grant, Valkaria, Malabar, Mel- bourne, Eau Gallie, Bonaventure, Rockledge, Cocoa, City Point, Pritchards, LaGrange, Turnbull, Aurantia and Lyrata.
ORANGE COUNTY
Orange county has an area of 1,250 square miles. Its population in 1890 was 12,584. Owing to the effects of the great freeze in 1894-95 it was reduced to 11,374 in 1900, and by 1910 it had far more than regained all losses, with an enumeration of 19,107. With- out question Orange county is one of the richest in soil, in climate and in its wealth of energetic citizens. By the Legislature of 1913 the county of Seminole was created from the northern part of Orange county, and by this change the rich territory bordering Lake Monroe and embracing the famous "Celery Delta" of Sanford, was trans- ferred to other jurisdiction. This division of the county is so recent that separate statistics are not yet available, and necessarily the description of Orange county must, for the present, include that of the new division.
The soils of Orange county are varied, rich and adapted to the production of an immense variety of fruits and vegetables. All the citrus varieties, pineapple, guavas, Japanese persimmons, peaches, pears, grapes and strawberries are among the crops thriving here. Orlando was formerly the center for the raising of the higher grade pineapples, and although the product is limited, the fruit commands the highest prices in the markets.
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