Lee: Little but Proud

The tiny community of Lee is located in eastern Madison County, between the towns of Madison to the west and Live Oak to the east. I’ve had a hard time finding much information about the history of the small town, but judging from the number of photographs I was able to find in the Florida Archive, it was once much bigger than it is today. Here’s what I was able to learn:

Settlement of Madison County began in the early 1800s, initially led by cotton planters clustered around the city of Madison. However, the area where the community of Lee sprang up began to coalesce into a community in the decades following the Civil War. As with many of the small communities that emerged across north Florida in the late 1800s, the settlers of eastern Madison County made their livings off of lumber mills, cotton, farming, and the railroad. The first sawmill in what would later become known as Lee was established in the 1890s, although the community itself wasn’t formally incorporated until 1909. During the early decades of the twentieth century, Lee had an active depot on the Seaboard Air Line Railway, a drug store, shoe store, gas station, barber shop, bank, post office and grocery. 

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First sawmill in Lee, 1890s

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J.E. Whitty and Son Drugstore,1918 (store built 1910)

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Interior of shoe shop, early 1900s

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Kinsey's Barber Shop (left); Emory Turlington's store (right), early 1900s

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Farmers Bank, Early 1900s

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Interior of Farmers Bank, early 1900s

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Lee School, 1920s

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JC Black Cotton Gin, 1934

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Seaboard Air Line Railway Company Depot, 1938

When you arrive in the modern community of Lee, one of the first things you will see is the town motto - Lee: Little but Proud. The town is indeed little, with fewer than 400 residents. Not much remains of the businesses that once clustered along the railroad; however, signs of the town's former glory can still be seen.

Formerly Kinsey's Barber Shop

Formerly Kinsey's Barber Shop

Formerly Emory Turlington's store

The view from Kinsey's Barber Shop towards Turlington's store

I am not sure what kind of business is (was?) run by David Joseph, but it is nice to see the Farmer's Bank still stands. It also served as the location of the Lee Post Office for a time.

Across the street from the remains of Kinsey's Barbershop is the picturesque old Fry Grocery Store.

I wish I had been able to find an old photo of this structure because it was quite fun to photograph, and I'd love to see it in its former glory.

Looking north from the former Farmers Bank

Sadly, there was no sign of many of the former businesses, such as the sawmill, drugstore, shoe store, or the railway depot.

Florida's Original Tourist Attractions (on PorterBriggs.com)

Hi All -

I just got an article published on PorterBriggs.com about one of my favorite topics - the abandoned springs-resorts of north Florida. CLICK HERE or on the image below to check it out!

Hampton Springs Hotel: Update!

Joe of Florida Trailblazer (and y'all should check out his site if you haven't) emailed me the link to a really fantastic document on the Hampton Springs Hotel. My original post on the hotel is here, but it definitely deserves this followup comparison between how things were then and how they are now. The document where the following old pictures - and more - can be seen here. There is no date on the document itself, but based on its contents, it was published no earlier than 1927. Definitely check out the whole file - it gives a great look into how the tourism business was run in north Florida in the late 1920s, and it clearly shows how strongly they were pushing the medicinal benefits of Florida's spring water. You can explore the file in detail on your own, but I wanted to post some comparison before and after shots, so you can visualize the hotel upon its modern remains:

Hampton Springs Hotel

You might have noticed that even though this blog is relatively young, I have done quite a few posts on Florida's springs and the remains of hotels and springhouses that surround them. This is partly because Florida's springs are one of my favorite features of this state. This is also because in the early days of Florida tourism - before Disney was a household name and when Miami was nothing but a small town - Florida's springs were what drew tourists to the state. It certainly didn't hurt that basking in mineral-rich waters, such as Florida's springs, was believed to have numerous medicinal benefits. The Hampton Springs Hotel was once such a tourist attraction.

Located just outside of the town of Perry, the hotel was constructed over the springs back in the early 1900s, the grand hotel attracted so many visitors that it had to be expanded - and its famous visitors even allegedly included Theodore Roosevelt. In the late 1920s, modern medicine of the day began to discount the 'healing' claims of Florida's mineral-rich springwater, and many of Florida's spring-affiliated resorts closed. Hampton Springs Hotel, however, added a golf course, a hunting and fishing club, and an exclusive spa club, which helped the hotel continue attracting visitors through the 1930s. Beginning in the late 1930s and into the 1940s, the hotel was used to house troops who were testing military aircraft at the airport located in Perry. The hotel complex was destroyed by fire in 1954.

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In the upper left it reads, 'Guaranteed for Rheumatism, Indigestion, Dyspepsia, Stomach, Kidney, Bladder Troubles, Gastritis, and Skin Diseases'

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This is a promotional brochure for Taylor County, which features an image of the Hampton Springs Hotel. The text reads: "Anyone interested is invited to come to Taylor county. The homeseeker, the tourist, and the sportsman are all welcome. Perry is known as a Glad Hand Town, where the visitor is given a cordial greeting, and made to feel at home. If you are interested in fruit growing, trucking, farming, darying, raising livestock or poultry, if you are interested in hunting or fishing, or just wish to rest and recuperate, you are asked to come and investigate opportunities. Meet our people, see our proved and unimproved lands, learn of the great variety and yield of the crops, partake of the pleasures our section has to offer, then if you are pleased, make your plans to stay with us."

Little remains of the Hampton Springs Hotel today other than the foundations and the concrete pools built up around the spring itself. Taylor County and the Florida Bureau of Historic Preservation have turned the former site of the Hampton Springs Hotel into a park, where visitors can enjoy the springs, hotel ruins, Spring Creek, and picnic tables. 

Entering the Hampton Springs Park. The walkways and cement structures date back to the hotel.

Numerous remains of building foundations dot the site.

More foundations

More original concrete work

Approaching the springs area

 
Before you reach the springs, you come to this pool.

A closeup of the structure (?) in the center of the pool.

Looking back towards the first pool from the springs.

The springs have been entirely enclosed in these concrete pools. Despite the algae growing in the pool, the water flowing from the spring (coming up from that dark hole in the center) is crystal clear - although it has a strong sulfur smell!

A closer look

From this angle, you can see remains of either tile or scored concrete surrounding the spring (look to the upper right of the hole).

A look at the spring-fed pools.

The spring water flows into various pools before finally exiting the concrete maze and entering Spring Creek.

Stairs into the largest pool, the one located the closest to Spring Creek

Spring Creek

There's an old bridge over Spring Creek (right center). 

Not sure about the concrete structure in the fore.

More information:
Taylor County & Perry, Florida History

1927 Brochure from the Hampton Springs Hotel and Club

Florida Memory: Hampton Springs

Exploring the Hampton Springs Hotel Site in Taylor County

Ruins of the Hampton Springs Hotel

UPDATE: Click here to see a comparison between the original hotel grounds and the way the property looks now!

Worthington Springs

Florida’s springs have long been my favorite feature of this state. In the late 1800s and early 1900s tourists flocked to Florida, not to vacation on its beaches, but to bask in the state’s pristine springs. Unfortunately, Florida’s delicate ecosystem has been overwhelmed by the exponential growth of its human population, and the state’s springs are threatened. Water flow from many has decreased over the years, while others, such as the original High Springs, have essentially stopped flowing altogether.

There is a small community in north Florida called Worthington Springs, a sleepy community roughly twenty miles north of Gainesville, just north of the Santa Fe River, with a population just under two-hundred. There’s not much there, and unless you live there or have friends or family in Worthington Spring, you would doubtless have little reason to check it out.

The modern day town of Worthington Springs

Yet at one time this tiny town had a thriving tourism business centered around the spring which gave the community its name. The spring was located on the northern bank of the Santa Fe, and – as with Suwannee Springs – it was claimed that bathing in its mineral-rich water would yield various health benefits. Tourist facilities for the spring included a hotel, recreation hall, dancing pavilion, and bathhouse. In 1906 the springhead was walled off with concrete, enabling the waters to be funneled into a brand new 90’x50’ concrete swimming pool.

The following photos are on display at the entrance
to the Chastain-Seay Park in Worthington Springs:


Caption: Dancing Pavilion and Bathouse, Worthington Springs, Fla. Famous for its cures of rheumatism, indigestion, and kidney troubles.

This one was labeled 'cooling off at the pool'

Bath House

Summer & Winter Resort, Hotel Worthington, Worthington Springs, Fla.

Unfortunately, by the middle of the twentieth century the spring’s output began to drastically decrease to nothing but a trickle. While the former resort and spring area were turned into the Chastain-Seay community park with boardwalks, picnic tables, and camping areas back in 2002, although nothing remains of either the resort structures or the springs itself. I drove over to the Chastain-Seay Park last week, hoping to find remnants of either the spring or any of the tourist facilities. I located remains of two different foundations, but nothing else. The closest thing resembling a walled off springhead was a fenced in retention pond with a drainage pipe flowing into it. It was close to one of the foundations I had located, and it had a low concrete wall at one end; it seemed possible – if horribly depressing – that the former springhead could have been turned into a retention pond.

The following pictures were taken at the Chastain-Seay Park during the first week of March 2016. I was the only person at the park when I took these.

stagnant water

One of many boardwalks

Foundation and fireplace

Remains of a foundation and wall

Fenced in retention pond with low concrete wall at one end

Closer look at the low concrete wall.
(There was a weak flow of water from this point when I was there.)

Remains of wall/foundation in proximity to fenced in area around the retention pond.

Remains of wall/foundation in proximity to fenced in area around the retention pond.

I got home, and began writing up this blog post. I had done some research about Worthington Springs before heading over there, but I found a website with information about the springs after I returned home that I hadn’t looked at previously, which had a little more information about the location of the springs. The website contained a report from the Florida Department of Natural Resources on the springs of Florida published in 1978, although the information it contained about Worthington Springs within the report came from 1972.

If the roads in the area are the same as the roads which existed in the 1970s, then the retention pond is not the location of the former spring. Of course, this also meant that even though I had walked close to the area described and was fairly certain that nothing like this was there, I had not been to the exact location. I decided to go back and look again, although I wasn’t able to get back there until this morning. I re-scoured the park, looking for any signs of the pool, but other than what looked like a beaver dam, I found no evidence of it or the spring.

The following photos were taken at the Chastain-Seay Park on March 13, 2016. There were a whopping four other people in the park when I was there.

Santa Fe River

This stagnant area was located 400 feet west of the end of the road that currently parallels the highway; however, there is no visible evidence of a spring at this location.

Possible beaver dam