Middlebury register. (Middlebury, Vt.) 1886-1937, 1906-04-06
LAND OF SUNSHINE.
o. p. Moore Writes of His Travels
in Southern Florida.

like to hear again from the Pilgrims that left
Middebury on the 9TH Of last December,
will write few lines to your valued paper,
which has been a welcome visitor every week
since we left Vermont.
After leaving Tampa and going through
Tampa Bay, via. st. Petersburgh we arrived
at Brandentown, the capital of Manatee
county, situated on the beautiful Manatee
river, about six miles from its mouth Manatee
county with only about 10000 population
ships more oranges and grape fruit to New
York, Boston and other northern cities than
any other county in Florida.
The county is traversed from east to west
by the Manatee river and there are many
noted places Of interest upon its banks. AT
Ellenton, near its north bank, stands a very
large old-fashioned mansion built and owned
before the civil war by very rich veteran
planter, and where in 1865 Secretary Benja-
min was reported to have been secreted, while
the Union army, where on their way from
the Southern States, were looking for him.
The plantation consisted of several thousand
acres, and now has several hundred orange
and grape fruit groves. The ruins of several
old sugar mills with their mammoth chimneys
towering above the trees can be seen by the
tourist going from Manavista to Ellenton.
Leaving Ellenton we pass through Col.
Atwood's grape fruit grove, containing 49,
600 trees, the largest all grape fruit grove in
the United States. The next place of interest
was the Manatee Lemon Company's $50 acre
grove of lemon, orange, and grape fruit trees.
We were very courteously escorted through
this noted grove by Captain Waite the
superintendent of the company; Walter L.
Preston OF Providence, X. l., is manager of
the company. We met Mr.. Preston at the
Tampa Bay hotel at Tampa and he gave us a
letter OF introduction to his superintendent.
| (Walter L. Preston is frequent guest of
John Higgins and Charles II. Williamson,
stopping every spring for a few days at the
Addison House.) He inquired about all OF
his friends in Middlebury and sent his best
regards
Pamasola, Fogartyville, Bradentown and
Manatee are situated on the south bank OF
the Manatee river, and are famous for their
large and thrifty groves of orange, peach,
lemon and grape fruit. Your correspondent
with several other tourists has travelled over a
goodly part of this section of the county, The
residences in this part OF the county compare
very favorably with the residences in our own
county in Vermont. We visited the old
Foster plantation, SO called, containing over
four thousand acres, and looked over the
property. We were again greatly interested
in the ruins of another large sugar mill where
thousands OF slaves had been employed before
the war. Both these mills were built of arti-
fetal stone, made from cement and sea shells.
and their walls stand erect, except where
northern soldiers battered them down during
the war. A large portion of this plantation
has grown up to oak, pine, palmetto, cedar
and other tropical trees, and will cut over 100
cords of four foot wood to the acre.
Another old landmark is the Braden Castle
on the north end of this plantation, which
was owned and built by the king of planters,
and probably the richest of them all in this
part of Florida, Colonel Braden. This Castle
was also demolished during the war by the
Union soldiers. Ten acres and the site on
which this old Castle stands were sold about
one month ago for ten thousand dollars,
where hospital will soon be built for Mana
tee county. At Manatee, Rev. NJ. /. Severance
and wife, n. w. Boardman, w. II. Dow, and
your correspondent took the train for Sarasota
beautiful little city situated on Sarasota
Bay. From this place we sailed through
Sarasota Bay distance of IL miles and
landed on Little Sarasota Key, one of the
thousand islands in the great Gull of Mexico,
and on which w. II. Dow has purchased 25
acres Of land 10 build winter home Here
we saw several sharks, ranging from to IL
feet long and one of the tourists caught one
which your correspondent measured. 1t was
feet and inches long, and had rows of
teeth on both Jaws and its mouth measured o
inches across and nearly one foot when open.
We saw thousands of pelican, heron,
turkey buzzard, wild ducks, sea gulls and
many other kinds of birds that live in the
water and on the islands of the Gulf of Mexico
We spent eight days on this island which is
seven miles long and one mile wide, and
about g feet above the blue waters of the Gulf
Of Mexico.
O. =. MOORE.