Wacahoota, Florida is an unincorporated community in Alachua, Levy, and Marion counties, Florida, United States.
Wacahoota, Florida is an unincorporated community in Alachua, Levy, and Marion counties, Florida, United States.
The name "Wacahoota", spelled Wacahootee or Wacahootie on early 19th century maps, is believed to derive from a combination of Spanish vaca, "cow", and Muscogee hute or hoti, "cowpen". The Seminoles living around Payne's Prairie in the 18th and early 19th centuries owned large herds of cattle, and Wacahoota was likely the site of one or more cowpens used by them. [1]
Wacahoota was associated in the 1830s with a location known as "Bowlegs' Old Plantation", in present-day Levy County. Bowlegs Old Plantation is presumed to have been earlier occupied by Billy Bowlegs's band of Seminoles. [2]
Wacahoota was one of the two most populous places in Marion County when it was created in 1844, having been settled by planters from South Carolina after Florida was transferred from Spain to the U.S. The Wacahoota train station was in Alachua County. [3]
A post office named "Wacahootee" was established in 1842 in what soon became Marion County. It closed in 1869, was reopened in 1873 and closed again in 1877. A post office named "Wacahoota" was established in Alachua County in 1895, closing in 1907. [4]
Marion County is located in the north central portion of the U.S. state of Florida. As of the 2010 census, the population was 331,298. Its county seat is Ocala.
Alachua County is a county located in the north central portion of the U.S. state of Florida. As of the 2010 census, the population was 247,336. The county seat is Gainesville, the home of the University of Florida since 1906, when the campus opened with 106 students.
Levy County is a county located on the Gulf coast in the northern part of the U.S. state of Florida. As of the 2010 census, the population was 40,801. Its county seat is Bronson.
The Seminole Wars were three related military conflicts in Florida between the United States Army and the Seminole, a Native American group which had coalesced in Spanish Florida during the early 1700s. The fighting occurred between about 1816 and 1858, with two periods of uneasy truce between active conflict. Both in human and monetary terms, the Seminole Wars were the longest and most expensive of the Indian Wars in United States history.
Micanopy is a town in Alachua County, Florida, United States, located south of Gainesville. The population as of the 2010 census was 600. The oldest community in the interior of Florida that has been continually inhabited, it has a downtown that is designated as a historic district, listed on the National Register of Historic Places. It contains a number of antique stores, as well as several restaurants. It is also known for being the filming location of the 1991 romantic comedy, Doc Hollywood.
Chief Billy Bowlegs or Billy Bolek was a leader of the Seminoles in Florida during the Second and Third Seminole Wars against the United States. One of the last Seminole leaders to resist, he eventually moved to Indian Territory . He is buried in Fort Gibson National Cemetery, Muskogee County, Oklahoma.
Bolek, also spelled as Boleck or Bolechs, and known as Bowlegs by European Americans, was a Seminole principal chief, of the Alachua chiefly line. He was the younger brother of King Payne, who succeeded their father Cowkeeper as leading or principal chief in Florida. Bolek succeeded King Payne in 1812 when he was killed.
The Newnansville Town Site was where the former town of Newnansville, Florida was located. Originally within Alachua County, in 1832 it became part of the newly formed Columbia County, but in 1839 it was restored as the county seat of Alachua. When it was realized that the Florida Railroad would bypass Newnansville, the county voted in 1854 to move the county seat to Gainesville, a newly founded railroad town. Bypassed again by another railroad in the late 1880s, Newnansville could not survive the competition. It was abandoned in the 20th century.
Dudley Farm Historic State Park (Florida), also known as Dudley Farm, is a U.S. historic district and museum park located in Newberry, Florida. It was added to the U.S. National Register of Historic Places on October 4, 2002, and was designated a National Historic Landmark in January, 2021. The address is 18730 West Newberry Road. The farm is a particularly fine and well-preserved example of a mid-19th to mid-20th century farm.
Evinston is an unincorporated community in Alachua and Marion counties, Florida, United States.
Ahaya was the first recorded chief of the Alachua band of the Seminole tribe. European-Americans called him Cowkeeper, as he held a very large herd of cattle.
Hogtown was a 19th-century settlement in and around what is now Westside Park in Gainesville, Florida, United States where a historical marker notes Hogtown's location at that site and is the eponymous outpost of the adjacent Hogtown Creek. Originally a village of Seminoles who raised hogs, the habitation was dubbed "Hogtown" by nearby white people who traded with the Seminoles. Indian artifacts were found at Glen Springs, which empties into Hogtown Creek. In 1824, Hogtown's population was 14. After the acquisition of Florida by the United States, white settlers began moving into the area. The 1823 Treaty of Moultrie Creek obliged the Seminoles to move to a reservation in central Florida. Under the terms of the treaty, Chief John Mico received $20 as compensation for the "improvements" the Seminoles had made in Hogtown.
Hague is an unincorporated community in Alachua County, Florida, United States. It is located on Alachua County Road 237 between U.S. Route 441 and the Deerhaven Subdivision line of the CSX Railroad, between the cities of Alachua and Gainesville.
Campville is a community in eastern Alachua County, Florida, north of Hawthorne. The community grew up along the route of the Florida Transit and Peninsular Railroad, with a sawmill, a store, a church, a school and a score of homes in the area when a post office was established in 1881. It was named for three brothers by the name of Camp who ran a large sawmill in the area. The population was about 300 in 1928, when a brick factory, several tree nurseries, and four stores were located in the community. The brick factory was also founded by the Camp brothers and bricks produced there can be seen in Gainesville's old downtown buildings. The bricks are a tan buff color. The post office was closed in 1966.
Arredondo, Florida is an unincorporated community in Alachua County, about seven miles southwest of Gaineville on the highway from Gainesville to Archer. It was established as a shipping station on the rail line that ran from Fernandina through Gainesville to Cedar Key, largely absorbing an earlier community called Kanapaha. The rail line was removed in the 1970s. The name comes from the Arredondo Grant, a Spanish land grant that includes much of Alachua County and parts of Levy and Marion counties. A post office opened in Arredondo in 1873 and remained in service until 1925.
Fairbanks is an unincorporated community in Alachua County, Florida, United States. It is located along Florida State Road 24 between Gainesville and Waldo.
Tarver was a plantation, a fort, a townsite and a railroad station in Alachua County, Florida, United States. Tarver Plantation, named for its owner, was established on the north edge of Paynes's Prairie, about 0.8 miles (1.3 km) east of the Alachua Sink, in the 1830s. The plantation was fortified as Fort Tarver during the Second Seminole War. Part of the plantation, on a bluff overlooking the prairie, was given to the Florida Southern Railroad as a townsite to induce the company to build their railroad through the area. The railroad commenced operations between Palatka and Gainesville in 1881, with a scheduled stop at Tarver. As of 1883, only one house had been built on the townsite. The site is now an overlook in Paynes Prairie Preserve State Park accessible from the Gainesville-Hawthorne State Trail.
Grove Park is an unincorporated community in Alachua County, Florida, United States, on Florida State Road 20 west of Hawthorne.
Paradise was an unincorporated community in Alachua County, Florida, United States. It has been annexed into the city of Gainesville, and is located approximately where Alachua County Road 232 crosses U.S. Route 441.
Rutledge, Florida is an unincorporated community in central Alachua County, Florida. The community was established for formerly enslaved persons during Reconstruction by the Freedmen's Bureau. The First Morning Star Missionary Baptist Church and the Greater Liberty Hill United Methodist Church, both founded in the 19th century, continue to serve the community. The Greater Liberty Hill church is the site of the Liberty Hill Schoolhouse, which is on the National Register of Historic Places. The Rutledge Community Cemetery, formerly called Union Cemetery of Rutledge, is under the stewardship of the Second Morning Star Missionary Baptist Church. The center of the community was located about five miles west of Gainesville, Florida in the 19th century. As of 2021 it extends from just west of the Gainesville city limits to I-75. A post office was established in 1886, and closed in 1905. In 1888 the community had three stores and a boarding house. It was on the planned route of the Gainesville, Tallahassee and Western Railroad, which was never built.
Municipalities and communities of Alachua County, Florida, United States | ||
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| Unincorporated communities | ||
| Ghost towns | ||
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Municipalities and communities of Marion County, Florida, United States | ||
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| Unincorporated communities | ||
| Footnotes | ‡This populated place also has portions in an adjacent county or counties | |