PART
FOUR: Our search for a Pasco County Ghost Town
Tracing movements of James
J. HEAD has been key in our search for the long lost PASCO County Ghost
Town named DREXEL. Beginning at HEADLAND,
Alabama, founded by James in 1871,
to the remote Gulf Coast resort at TARPON
SPRINGS, founded by Hamilton DISSTON,
previous installments of this series has led us to the 1883 DISTON Post Office
in Hillsborough County. Established
on lands owned by Hamilton DISSTON, one can only speculate that one ‘S’ was accidental. James Head then
moved, establishing an 1888 DISTON Post Office in Pasco County.
THE TARPON SPRINGS HOTEL, Library of Congress
Philadelphia Capitalist Hamilton Disston acquired four million
Florida wilderness acres in 1881,
remote lands desperately in need of reliable transportation. By 1883 though, his Gulf Coast properties,
including a resort at Tarpon Springs, was still only accessible via steamboat. The
planned railroad to Tampa Bay from Savannah, GA, intending to travel alongside Lake Magdalene in northern Hillsborough
County, fizzled out, leaving Head’s short lived DISTON Post Office in that County isolated.
But then a different railroad builder started in the direction
of the Gulf Coast in 1886. On January
12, 1888, the Orange Belt Railway first arrived at Tarpon Springs, a big day for Florida’s Gulf Coast. Long awaited rail
service finally started servicing this remote coastal region, providing access
to the growing tourist industry up north. Eight days after that first train
arrived at Tarpon Springs, DISTON Post Office, on January 20, 1888, relocated into Pasco County.
DISTON became a stop on the Tarpon Route,
the moniker assigned to the Lake Monroe to St. Petersburg line of the Orange
Belt Railway.
Postal records though show DISTON became DREXEL nine months
later, on September 15, 1888, and
that James J. HEAD remained on as the
Postmaster.
Russian immigrant Peter
A. Demens founded Orange Belt Railway in 1886 with $25,000 of his own money, but needed additional financing
to complete the line to the Gulf of Mexico. The additional funds were arranged
by a Philadelphia banker, a Senior Partner in DREXEL Bank, Edward T.
Stotesbury (At that time Drexel Bank was a subsidiary of J. P. Morgan of
New York).
Edward T. Stotesbury
Drexel encouraged Herman
O. Armour, of the meat packing Armour
& Co. fame, to provide funding for the railroad extension. Edward T. Stotesbury
served on the board of railway, and twice served as President. As Orange Belt
Railway progressed in the direction St. Petersburg, Armour appeared only briefly as a railway stop, located south of Clearwater and north of Largo in then Hillsborough County (now
Pinellas).
Like that of the Armour
depot, the community of Drexel eventually
fizzled out too. Today, long after trains stopped running that once served this
region, present day Land O’ Lakes
Boulevard, a/k/a US Highway 41, crosses an abandoned
railroad right-of-way east of Lake
Thomas. In fact, if it were not for Pasco County’s Tax Appraiser, and reference
to a once-upon-a-time place called Drexel
(Plat Book 3, Page 157), one might never realize the Orange Belt Railway crossed
here, carrying 19th century tourists to and fro the popular tourist
destinations of Tarpon Springs and St. Petersburg.
Drexel reference (upper left) at Railroad Right of Way (double red line)
Land O' Lakes Boulevard - US Highway 41, Pasco County
DISTON of
Hillsborough and Pasco Counties were meant to honor the man who had bailed
Florida out of debt in 1881, the man
who then paved the way for the building of badly needed railroads. DREXEL of Pasco County honored the bank
that provided the additional funding required in 1888 to extend rail service to the Gulf Coast.
Hamilton Disston, Edward T. Stotesbury and Drexel Bank were
merely a few of many who altered Florida’s Gulf Coast history, yet memorials
meant to remember each have long since vanished. A Drexel Road wanders around the west side of Lake Thomas today,
while on the east side, south of the old abandoned railroad crossing, Land O’ Lakes Boulevard intersects with northeast bound Ehren Cutoff Road.
I mention this crossroad because it seems appropriate to end
my series with the very individual we’ve tracked from 1871 Headland, Alabama. North
a few miles on Ehren Cutoff takes you to the one-time location of Ehren Post Office, of Pasco County, a
postal center was established January 17, 1890.
The first postmaster at Ehren is also a familiar character in this series,
the one and only, James J. Head.
My blog will return in mid-July with the history, mystery and
intrigue of yet another fascinating Florida Ghost Town.
For more
on the Orange Belt Railway visit my website:
References
available upon request to Rick@CroninBooks.com
