The Historical Society of Avon ParkAVON PARK, FL · EST. 1886
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The English colony story for Avon Park is unsupported

The claim that Avon Park was founded by an organized English colony that named the town after Stratford-upon-Avon is an exaggeration of a genuine historical reality: there was no English colony, but the town’s acknowledged first permanent settlers were an English family[maxwell-1976].

The Absence of an Organized Colony

Detailed examination of late nineteenth-century Florida corporate, promotional, and land records demonstrates the absence of an organized English colonization project at Avon Park:

  • No British Syndicate or Agency: Unlike contemporary English settlements in Florida, no British land company prospectus, UK immigration agent, or passenger manifests for organized migrant parties exist for Avon Park. Founder Oliver Marvin Crosby operated through his own concern, the Florida Development Company, backed primarily by Connecticut hat manufacturers and northern capital.
  • Silence of Primary Architectural Records: The 1990 National Register nomination for the Avon Park Historic District—the most rigorously sourced survey of the town’s early building fabric—documents the 1886 founding, the freeze of 1895, and Crosby’s ruin without once mentioning English colonists or a British scheme[nrhp-avon-park-district].
  • Silence of Contemporary Press and Brochures: The Pabor Lake Pineapple (published four miles north from 1892 to 1897) and Crosby’s own 1888 promotional book, Common Sense About Florida, make no mention of an English colony or British recruitment scheme[pineapple][crosby-1888-pamphlet]. A promoter seeking northern homeseekers would not have concealed an established European colony.
  • Absence in Period Newspaper Databases: Comprehensive searches of the Chronicling America and Florida Digital Newspaper Library databases for the period 1884–1900 yield no contemporary mentions of an “English colony” or English institutions such as “cricket” associated with Avon Park.
  • Bibliographical Confusion in Popular Accounts: The persistent citation in modern web articles that English settlers named the town traces back to an uncited passage in an unrelated work on African American historic sites[wiki-avon-park].
  • Comparison to Actual English Colonies: Chetwynd in Lake County (founded 1883 by Granville Bryan Chetwynd-Stapylton for English gentry sons)[chetwynd] and Narcoossee in Osceola County (founded 1883–1884 by Arthur and Edward Nelson Fell, complete with a lawn tennis club and cricket grounds)[narcoossee] exhibit the hallmarks of real English colonization projects. Avon Park possessed none of these formal colonial structures.

The Reality: The English Founding Family

The English tradition survived because the town’s first permanent family was English, prominent, and directly responsible for suggesting its name:

  • William A. King (born Birmingham, England, July 1853; died Avon Park, February 1929) and his wife Mary Ann Chinn (born Solihull, Warwickshire, England, April 1858; died Avon Park, August 1938) were recruited by Crosby during his trip to England in late 1885[findagrave-king][maxwell-1976].
  • King arrived on the Lake Wales Ridge on 9 February 1886 to manage the physical clearing of the townsite and erection of log cabins on Lake Tulane[maxwell-1976]. Mary Ann King arrived on 6 May 1886 with two Scottish cousins, Johnstone and MacGregor, initially residing in tents[maxwell-1976]. In August 1893, the Pabor Lake Pineapple acknowledged William King in print as “the first settler of Avon Park”[pineapple].
  • Because the rolling pine woods and lakes reminded Mrs. King of the countryside around her native Warwickshire home near Stratford-upon-Avon, she suggested that the town be named “Avon Park” rather than Crosby’s promotional plat label “Lake Forest”[aphs-verona][maxwell-1976].
  • The Kings were central to community leadership for four decades. William King served as an inaugural alderman under the 1913 town charter (named directly in the legislative act)[lof-1913-6662], chairman of the DeSoto County Commission, inaugural Highlands County Commissioner in 1921, and mayor of Avon Park (1919–1922 and 1925–1929)[maxwell-1976]. The couple also helped establish the Episcopal Church of the Redeemer in 1894[maxwell-1976].

The Mary Ann King naming account traces directly to pioneer records and scrapbooks documented by town historian Leoma Bradshaw Maxwell in The First Hundred Years of Avon Park, Florida (1976), based on personal acquaintance with Mrs. King and preserved family archives[maxwell-1976]. The authentic story of a hired English horticulturist and his wife who pioneered the settlement and suggested its lasting name was subsequently magnified into the popular legend of an English colony.

References

Where this comes from

Evidence
corroborated — More than one independent source agrees.
Review
unverified — Drafted from sources but not yet checked by a volunteer.
Rights
society

Sources

  1. Florida Bureau of Historic Preservation / National Park Service, National Register of Historic Places Registration Form, Avon Park Historic District (ref. 90000486) (1990) · official
  2. Leoma Bradshaw Maxwell, The First Hundred Years of Avon Park, Florida (Held at the Avon Park Historical Society Depot Museum, Avon Park, Florida) (1976) · book
  3. Wikipedia, Avon Park, Florida (2026) · secondary
  4. W. E. Pabor and E. A. Pabor, Pabor Lake Pineapple, October 1892 to September 1897 (1897) · newspaper
  5. O. M. Crosby, Common Sense About Florida: Lake Forest and Avon Park (1888) · book
  6. Wikipedia, Chetwynd, Florida (2026) · secondary
  7. Avon Park Historical Society, The Verona Hotel: The early years of Avon Park (2026) · secondary
  8. Find a Grave, William A. King and Mary Ann (Chinn) King memorials, Bougainvillea Cemetery, Avon Park (2026) · secondary
  9. Wikipedia, Narcoossee, Florida (2026) · secondary
  10. Legislature of the State of Florida, Chapter 6662 (No. 242), Laws of Florida 1913, Special Laws, section 47 (1913) · official

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