If you happen to be driving west through Suwannee County towards
the Suwannee River and the county line on CR250, you will pass through Dowling
Park. If you blink, you might not notice it. Very little exists along CR250 – little
more than a couple of convenience stores and a church. You will probably see
signs for Advent Christian Village, but unless you actually make the turn to
enter the Advent Christian Village, you’ll be over the Suwannee and into
Lafayette County before you know it. However, if you look to the south while
you’re crossing the Suwannee River, you’ll get a glimpse of Dowling Park’s
past: an old railroad trestle, crossing the Suwannee.
Originally, the area was known as Hudson on the Suwannee;
however, when Live Oak, FL-based Suwannee County timber magnate Thomas Dowling
located the center of his expanding timber enterprise there at the turn of the
twentieth century, it was renamed Dowling Park.
Dowling Park Lumber Company, early 1900s [source]
The Dowling Park sawmill and railroad depot were located
adjacent to a railway line initially named the R.L. Dowling Shortline (after a
relative, Robert L. Dowling, who served as vice president of the railroad), which
connected Dowling Park to the main railroad line passing through Live Oak. It
was later renamed the Live Oak, Perry, and Gulf Railroad as it expanded
westward towards Perry and the Gulf.
In addition to serving as the community surrounding the
sawmill, Thomas Dowling hoped that his Dowling Park would become a popular
vacation resort area. As such, in the early 1900s, he opened the Dowling Park
Hotel Resort, which contained swimming pools, bowling and billiards, and other
resort amenities along the Suwannee at Dowling Park.
[source]
Park Hotel, ca1905
[source]
Dowling Park Hotel Resort Assembly Hall, billiard and bowling hall, early 1900s
Thomas Dowling (left) and Richard Sears of Sears, Roebuck & Co. (right) beside the Park Hotel Pavilion, early 1900s [source]
[source]
Dowling Park street map, 1906
The original community of Dowling Park served the sawmill
and the people who worked there. However, once local timber supplies began to
dwindle and the logging industry followed the expansion of the railroad
westward, a new purpose was required if any of the community were to survive.
Prior to his death in 1911, Thomas Dowling’s pastor, Burr Bixler of the Advent
Christian Church of Live Oak, persuaded him to deed 120 acres of his property
at Dowling Park – in the area which had been the location of the sawmill and
railroad depot, among other aspects of the Dowling Park community. Bixler’s
initial plan for the land was to use it as an Advent Christian campground;
however, after being contacted by a widowed parishioner in failing health who
was seeking a home for her soon to be orphaned children, Bixler set about
establishing a home for orphans and a retirement community for members of the
Advent Christian Church clergy in Dowling Park. In December of 1913, the first
building of the American Advent Christian Home and Orphanage at Dowling Park
opened its doors to its first orphans.
Original Advent Christian Church in Dowling Park, ca1915 [source]
Construction of the original "old folks home" at Dowling Park, ca1920 [source]
[source]
Live Oak Perry & Gulf Railroad crossing the Suwannee River at Dowling Park, 1942
[source]
Live Oak Perry & Gulf Railroad, westbound near Dowling Park, ca1945
[source]
Live Oak Perry & Gulf Railroad crossing the Suwannee River at Dowling Park, 1945
Today, if you turn north off of CR250 and enter the Advent Christian Village, you will find an incredible and far from desolate self-contained
retirement community, featuring stores, hospitals, restaurants, a post office, and
residences ranging from individual homes to a full-care nursing home facility. I
drove all around the facility, thinking that many people would find it a
pleasant place in which to retire, although I could see no signs of Dowling
Park’s historical past. Based on the maps, it would seem that the woods to the
south of the Advent Christian Village’s Tresca Park Campground and Park of the
Pines Neighborhood would be the location of the former railway depot, and
possibly aspects of the sawmill and lumber company as well. However, I felt
weird enough driving around a retirement community where I knew no one, and
didn’t know how they’d take to me bushwhacking through their woodland.
North Entrance on CR136
Along Dowling Park Drive after entering from the South Entrance on CR250
A Google Earth glimpse of where the railroad depot and sawmill would have been located, in relation to the modern day facilities of Advent Christian Village.
Back on CR250, shortly before you reach the Suwannee River,
if you look to your left at just the right spot, you can see the old railroad
bed, coming out of the woods and merging with what is now CR250. Just before
you reach the bridge over the river is a turnoff on the northern side of the
road, which will bring you to a small park and boat ramp. From there, you can
look southward and see the old railroad trestle. A walk under the bridge
carrying CR250 across the Suwannee will take you to the remains of the old
railroad trestle, where engines of the Live Oak, Perry, and Gulf
Railroad once steamed through. The rails have been removed, but the bones of
the bridge remain. It is possible to walk along the railroad bed itself back up
to where it merges with CR250.
Looking south from the boat ramp. The bridge in the fore is CR250; the bridge in the rear is the remains of the railroad trestle.
Another view from the area near the boat ramp.
Walking south, approaching the railroad trestle.
At the base of the railroad bed
Railroad trestle of the former Live Oak, Perry and Gulf Railroad, crossing the Suwannee
What remains of the railroad trestle up close.
Looking back toward Dowling Park along the old railroad bed
Occasionally one comes across a remaining railroad tie.
Where the old railroad bed merges with CR250.
On Google Earth, you can see the traces of the old railroad. (Below, shown with and without highlights of the old railroad.)
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