The Historical Society of Avon ParkAVON PARK, FL · EST. 1886
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DeForest Canfield

DeForest Canfield (D. F. Canfield) was a pioneer Avon Park lumber merchant, civic leader, and the inaugural Tax Collector of Highlands County following its creation in 1921.[maxwell-1976][lof-1929-13787] Canfield Street, one of the primary east-west corridors in Avon Park, was named in honor of Canfield and his pioneer family.[maxwell-1976][sanborn-1920]

Pioneer Settlement and Commercial Trade

D. F. Canfield married Cora Coy, daughter of pioneer settler H. E. Coy, uniting two prominent early families who arrived during the initial development of the Lake Wales Ridge.[maxwell-1976] The Canfields erected their early family home near the town core and engaged in commercial building, lumber milling, and citrus development.[maxwell-1976]

During the railway expansion following 1912, Canfield operated the Canfield Lumber Yard, situated along the north side of the Atlantic Coast Line Railroad tracks.[maxwell-1976] The 1918 Florida State Gazetteer and Business Directory listed him as “Canfield DeForest, lumber,” operating alongside local sawmills to furnish structural timber for Main Street and residential subdivisions.[gaz-1918]

Canfield Street

On the November 1920 Sanborn Fire Insurance Map, Canfield Street was officially indexed as one of the twenty-eight named thoroughfares of Avon Park, running east-west south of Main Street.[sanborn-1920] In subsequent decades, the corridor accommodated significant civic institutions, including the 1926 Church of the Nazarene and the modern Avon Park High School educational complex.[maxwell-1976]

Highlands County Tax Collector (1921–1929)

When the Florida Legislature created Highlands County from the northern portion of DeSoto County under Chapter 8513 in April 1921, Governor Cary A. Hardee appointed D. F. Canfield as the county’s first Tax Collector.[maxwell-1976]

Canfield administered county tax assessments, collections, and state remittances throughout the 1920s Florida land boom.[lof-1929-13787] When the real estate market collapsed and precipitated the failure of all three county depositories (the Highlands Bank & Trust Company, the State Bank of Avon Park, and the First National Bank of Sebring) between February and May 1929, Canfield held $9,722.69 in public tax collections trapped in the insolvent banks.[lof-1929-13787] On 8 June 1929, the Florida Legislature enacted Chapter 13787, Laws of Florida 1929, formally discharging Canfield and his sureties from personal liability upon the assignment of bank receivership claims to the State Comptroller and the Board of County Commissioners.[lof-1929-13787]

References

Where this comes from

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

Sources

  1. Leoma Bradshaw Maxwell, The First Hundred Years of Avon Park, Florida (references/the-first-hundred-years-of-avon-park_leoma-bradshaw-maxwell_1976.md) (1976)
  2. R. L. Polk & Co., Florida State Gazetteer and Business Directory, 1918 (1918)
  3. Legislature of the State of Florida, Chapter 13787 (No. 223), Laws of Florida 1929: An Act for the Relief of D. F. Canfield, Individually, and as Tax Collector of Highlands County, Florida (1929)
  4. Sanborn Map Company, Sanborn Fire Insurance Map: Avon Park, DeSoto County, Florida, November 1920 (1920)

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