Ellaville | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Country |  United States |
| State |  Florida |
| County | Suwannee County |
| Founded by | George Franklin Drew |
| Named for | One of George Franklin Drew's slaves Ella. |
| GNIS feature ID | 294754 [1] |
Ellaville, Florida is a ghost town in Florida located in the Suwannee River State Park in Suwannee County, Florida, United States. Ellaville was located at the merging place of the Suwannee River and Withlacoochee River.
Ellaville was founded in 1861 by George Franklin Drew a successful businessman and future governor of Florida. Franklin decided to build a mansion on the western banks of Suwannee River. The town was named Ellaville for honoring one of his slaves named Ella.[ citation needed ] He and Louis Bucki built a mill that employed over 500 people and was one of the largest in Florida at the time.
The Florida Railroad built a line to the town that had direct access to the mill. Soon after the town was booming and in its heyday in the early 1870s had a train station, two schools, two churches, a steamboat dock, masonic lodge, commissary and a sawmill. It was also involved in turpentine, railroad car building and logging.
The town had 1,000 residents at its peak. In 1876, George Franklin Drew was elected as Governor of Florida.
The town started to decline near the turn of the century after its mill burned down in 1898. Though it was quickly rebuilt, the number of pine trees declined.
Both rivers flooded and with the onset of the Great Depression, there was no future for the town and the post office closed in 1942. The Drew Mansion was then abandoned and vandalized for many years until it was burnt to the ground in the 1970s. The Florida Archives have photos of the mansion before [2] and after its abandonment. [3]
The Hillman Bridge, built in 1925 by the Federal Aid Project and designed by the RHH Blackwell Company of East Aurora, New York, [4] was abandoned and replaced by a new bridge across the river in 1986. [5] [6]
The Florida Archives have a photo of a store in Ellaville. [7]
Ellaville Park and the Suwannacoochee Spring are in the area. [8]
Suwannee County is a county located in the north central portion of the state of Florida. As of the 2020 census, the population was 43,474, up from 41,551 in 2010. Its county seat is Live Oak. Suwannee County was a dry county until August 2011, when the sale of alcoholic beverages became legal in the county.
Lowndes County is a county located in the south-central portion of the U.S. state of Georgia. As of the 2020 census, the population was 118,251. The county seat is Valdosta. The county was created December 23, 1825.
East Haddam is a town in Middlesex County, Connecticut, United States. The town is part of the Lower Connecticut River Valley Planning Region. The population was 8,875 at the time of the 2020 census.
Live Oak is a city and the county seat of Suwannee County, Florida, United States. The city is midway between Tallahassee and Jacksonville. As of 2020, the population recorded by the U.S. Census Bureau was 6,735.
The Suwannee River is a river that runs through south Georgia southward into Florida in the Southern United States. It is a wild blackwater river, about 246 miles (396 km) long. The Suwannee River is the site of the prehistoric Suwanee Straits that separated the Florida peninsula from the Florida panhandle and the rest of the continent. Spelled as "Swanee", it is the namesake of two famous songs: "Way Down Upon the Swanee River" (1851) and "Swanee" (1919).
George Franklin Drew was the 12th Governor of the U.S. state of Florida. He was a Democrat.
The Western Maryland Railway was an American Class I railroad (1852–1983) that operated in Maryland, West Virginia, and Pennsylvania. It was primarily a coal hauling and freight railroad, with a small passenger train operation.
Cahaba, also spelled Cahawba, was the first permanent state capital of Alabama, United States, from 1820 to 1825. It was the county seat of Dallas County, Alabama until 1866. Located at the confluence of the Alabama and Cahaba rivers, the town endured regular seasonal flooding.
City of Hawkinsville was a paddle steamer constructed in Georgia in 1886. Sold in 1900 to a Tampa, Florida company, it delivered cargo and lumber along the Suwannee River. Eventually rendered obsolete by the advent of railroads in the region, it was abandoned in the middle of the Suwannee in 1922.
The Big Bend of Florida, United States, is an informally named geographic region of North Florida where the Florida Panhandle transitions to the Florida Peninsula south and east of Tallahassee. The region is known for its vast woodlands and marshlands and its low population density relative to much of the state. The area is home to the largest single spring in the United States, the Alapaha Rise, and the longest surveyed underwater cave in the United States, the 32-mile (51 km) Wakulla-Leon Sinks cave system.
The Twin Rivers State Forest is in the US state of Florida. The 14,882-acre (60 km2) forest is located in North Central Florida, along the banks of the Withlacoochee and Suwannee rivers.
U.S. Route 90 (US 90) in the state of Florida is the northernmost east–west United States Numbered Highway in the state. US 90 not only passes through the county seats of all the 16 counties it runs through on its course in Florida and is also the road upon which many of the county courthouses are located, but it was the first paved road in Florida. It is never more than six miles (9.7 km) from Interstate 10 (I-10) throughout the state. It runs as a two-lane highway through most of the sparsely populated inland areas of the Florida Panhandle, widening to four lanes through and near several towns. The speed limit is 55 mph (89 km/h) for all rural points west of Monticello, and it is 60 mph (97 km/h) on all rural points from where it enters Madison County as far as Glen St. Mary.
U.S. Route 129 (US 129) in Florida is a north–south United States Highway. It runs 88 miles (142 km) from Chiefland north to the Georgia State Line in Levy, Gilchrist, Suwannee, and Hamilton Counties.
Hyde Park is a former New York Central Railroad station located where Crum Elbow Creek flows into the Hudson River in Hyde Park, New York. A one-story wooden station was first established by the Central at the spot in 1851 by the Hudson River Railroad, connecting New York City and Albany. It was replaced by the existing building, built in a combination of the Mission and Spanish Revival styles by Warren and Wetmore, the railroad's preferred architects who had also designed Grand Central Terminal and the nearby Poughkeepsie station, in 1914.
State Road 249 is the state designation for U.S. Route 129 between US 27(SR 20) in Branford and US 90(SR 10) in Live Oak. It also includes a bi-county extension in Suwannee County, Florida from Live Oak across the Suwannee River to Jasper in Hamilton County.
Spruce is a ghost town in Pocahontas County, West Virginia, United States. Spruce is 9.5 miles (15.3 km) southwest of Durbin.
The Nature Coast State Trail (NCST) is a 31.7-mile long segment of Florida's Statewide System of Greenways and Trails System built along abandoned railroad tracks, and designated by the U.S. Department of the Interior as a National Recreation Trail. It has two primary sections following unused rail lines that were originally built by the Atlantic Coast Line Railroad. It includes historic sites such as a 1902 train trestle bridge over the Suwannee River near Old Town and train stations in Trenton, Cross City, and Chiefland. At Wilcox Junction abandoned rail tracks cross and connect with several communities. The trail is available to hikers, cyclists, and horse riders.
Croom, also known by its previous name of Pemberton Ferry, is a ghost town in Central Florida near Brooksville, Florida, and Ridge Manor, Florida. A rail line came to Pemberton Ferry in 1884. It was a rail stop by the Withlacoochee River just north of where the I-75 bridge over Croom-Rital Road and Withlacoochee State Trail is today.
Wright's Bridge is a historic covered bridge in Newport, New Hampshire. Originally built in 1906 to carry the Boston and Maine Railroad across the Sugar River, it now carries the multi-use Sugar River Trail. The bridge was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1975.
Koss is an unincorporated community in Menominee County, Michigan, United States. Koss is located in Lake Township, 4.9 miles (7.9 km) west-southwest of Stephenson.
Municipalities and communities of Suwannee County, Florida, United States | ||
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