We spent the day in Sanford,FL visiting my brother in law and sister in law Jim and Veronica and my nephew James. Jim is Tim's brother. We had a great time together and even though it had been a couple of years since we have been together once we were together it seemed that time apart was erased. They live in Sanford, FL so we checked out Sanford, had lunch and then went back to their house and hung out for a few hours. It really was good to be with them and be around family for the day.
Sanford, FL is a city in central Florida and is about 20 miles northeast of Orlando. The population is 53,510 with a median income of $31,200 and a median age of 32. It is the county seat of Seminole County and is known as the 'Historic Waterfront Gateway City' since it sits on the southern shores of Lake Monroe and at the head of navigation on the St. Johns River. Sanford has a lot of history starting with Native Americans living in the area thousands of years ago. In the 1700s the Seminole Indians arrived in the area. During the Second Seminole War in 1836 the US Army established Camp Monroe and built a road that is currently known as Mellonville Ave. Florida was acquired from Spain in 1821 but due to the Seminole wars settlements were delayed. In 1835 the Seminole Indians burnt the Port of Palatka and a camp was built on Lake Monroe. The town of Mellonville was founded around Fort Mellon in 1842. Orange groves were planted in 1869 along with the first fruit packing plant. In 1870 General Henry Shelton Sanford bought 12,548 acres to the west of Mellonville and laid out the community of Sanford. He believed that Sanford would become a hub for transportation and called it 'The Gateway to South Florida'. Several groups of Swedes were imported and identified as indentured servants to do the labor of establishing the new town and clearing the sub tropical wilderness in advance of creating a citrus empire in 1871.
In 1877 Sanford was incorporated with a population of 100. Sanford eventually absorbed Mellonville and in 1883 the Southern Florida Railroad ran a line from Tampa to Sanford and then connected to the Jacksonville, Tampa and Key West Railroad. The great freeze of 1894 & 1895 killed off most of the citrus and farmers change their crops and began planting Celery in 1896. From that year until 1974 Sanford was nicknamed Celery City. In 1942 Naval Air Station Sanford was established and was a big naval base until budget cuts in 1967 shut the base down and gave the Air strip to Sanford which was renamed in 1969 to the Sanford Airport. Today it is known as Sanford International Airport. Sanford has also been the setting of several movies like 'My Girl', 'Passenger 57', 'Rosewood', 'Wilder Napalma' and 'Monster'.
Today is a travel day and we are headed to Wauchula. We will be departing after the storms clear from here. The line of storms going through right now is the tail end of the devastating storms that hit across the Midwest and southern states these past few days.
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