Ghost Towns of Florida (T-Z)

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Tarrytown, FL

County: Sumter
Zip Code: 33597
Latitude / Longitude: 28°33’18″N 82°03’16″W
Elevation: 89 ft (27 m)
Time Zone: Eastern (EST) (UTC-5)
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Comments: Tarrytown is an unincorporated community in central Sumter County, Florida, United States. The ZIP Code for this community is 33597, which is shared by Webster, four miles to the north.
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Tasmania, FL

Tiger Bay, FL

Tillman (Palm Bay), FL

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Latitude / Longitude: 27°59′52.52″N 80°40′12.03″W / 27.9979222°N 80.6700083°W / 27.9979222
Elevation: 19 ft (5 m)
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Tohopkee, FL

Torrey (Inhabited), FL

Traxler, FL

County: Alachua
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Latitude / Longitude: 29° 52′ 0″ N, 82° 32′ 0″ W
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Comments: Traxler is a ghost town located in Alachua County, Florida, United States.
Remains: William H. Traxler, son of settlers from South Carolina, was born near the natural bridge in Columbia County in 1854. In the 1880s he acquired property in Alachua County on the Bellamy Road, opened a general store, and began farming. He married the daughter of Simeon Dell, Mary Lelia, in 1889. Prospering, he increased his holdings and enlarged the commissary. The post office, established in 1891 with Mr. Traxler as postmaster, was discontinued in 1906. At one time the community had a one-room school, a number of tenant farm homes, a cotton gin, grist mill, and church.
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Troy, FL

County: Lafayette
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Established: 1845
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Comments: Troy is a ghost town in Lafayette County, Florida, United States that served as its county seat.
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Utopia, FL

County: Broward
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Latitude / Longitude: 25°59’19″N 80°12’12″W
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Comments: Utopia was a census-designated place (CDP) in Broward County, Florida, in the United States.
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Current Status: As of the 2000 census, the CDP population was 714. The area is now part of a West Park neighborhood.
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Vandolah, FL

Venus, FL

County: Highlands
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Latitude / Longitude: 27°4′0.84″N 81°21′24.84″W / 27.0669000°N 81.3569000°W / 27.0669000
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Comments: Venus is an unincorporated community in southeastern Highlands County, Florida, United States. Lake Placid is the nearest town to the north. Palmdale, another unincorporated community, is to the south. Hunting and fishing are popular recreations.
Remains: Delray Plants Co., an indoor foliage plant greenhouse, is located here. Consolidated Citrus LP is located here.
Current Status: The Venus Project has its research center located here, and is derived from the name of the community. On June 24, 2012, Venus was struck by an EF0 tornado spawned by Tropical Storm Debby, resulting in one death and property damage.
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Verna, FL

County: Manatee
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Latitude / Longitude: 27° 23′ 14″ N, 82° 16′ 5″ W
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Comments: Verna is an unincorporated area in Manatee County, Florida, United States.
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Viana, FL

Vicksburg, FL

County: Bay
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Latitude / Longitude: 30° 19′ 32.16″ N, 85° 39′ 52.92″ W
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Comments: Vicksburg is a ghost town in Bay County, Florida, United States, located near the intersection of State Road 77 and County Road 388.
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Viking, FL

County: St. Lucie
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Latitude / Longitude: 27°32′30″N 80°21′43″W / 27.54167°N 80.36194°W / 27.54167
Elevation: 13 ft (4 m)
Time Zone: Eastern (EST) (UTC-5)
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Comments: Viking is an unincorporated community in St. Lucie County, Florida, United States. Viking is located along U.S. Route 1, 7 miles (11 km) north-northwest of Fort Pierce.
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Villa City, FL

Vineland (Inhabited), FL

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Latitude / Longitude: 28°23′43″N 81°30′11″W / 28.39528°N 81.50306°W / 28.39528
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Vogt Springs, FL

Waterbury, FL

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Latitude / Longitude: 27° 26′ 44″ N, 82° 18′ 11″ W
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Comments: Waveland, Florida, was a community in what is now Martin County, Florida, which encompassed all of Sewall’s Point, that part of Rio lying east of Warner Creek, and that part of Jensen Beach lying south of N.E. Center Street, more or less.
Remains: A U.S. post office was established in Waveland on September 2, 1880, but its name was changed to Sewall’s Point on May 4, 1891. On December 4, 1891, a new Waveland post office was established which continued until August 31, 1918, when it was merged into the Jensen post office, which became Jensen Beach on June 1, 1943.
Current Status: The name of Waveland has to this day been associated with All Saints Episcopal Church and its cemetery. N.E. Waveland Avenue is a present-day road which runs south from N.E. Dixie Highway in eastern Rio. There is also a Waveland Beach Strip on Hutchinson Island in St. Lucie County, but it is not related to this former community.
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Waveland, FL

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Latitude / Longitude: 27° 16′ 0″ N, 80° 12′ 0″ W
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Weedon Island, FL

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Latitude / Longitude: 27°50’43.09″N 82°36’5.35″W
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Comments: Weedon Island is located in Pinellas County, Florida, United States. It is located within the Weedon Island Preserve, in the northern portion of the city of St. Petersburg, on the western coast of Old Tampa Bay. Weedon Island is archaeologically significant as it serves as a type-site for the Weeden Island Culture. Weedon Island is named for its early owner Dr. Leslie Weedon.
Remains: Former confederate soldier Captain W.B. Henderson purchased the land that was to become Weedon Island in 1886 with war bond. When Captain Henderson’s daughter Blanche married Dr. Leslie Weedon in 1898, the Captain gave the new couple the Island as a wedding present. Weedon Island was only an island in high tide and during low tide it was connected to the peninsula. Leslie Weedon and his family spent the weekends here from nearby Tampa. At that time there was no bridges across Tampa Bay so they traveled here with their belongings by boat and brought everything back home for the week days. Another family had lived here, The Benjamins who lived on nearby Benjamin Island. Henry R. Benjamin bought Benjamin Island for $1,000 (worth $23,000 in 2016) from Captain W.B. Henderson on April 30, 1878. He kept the land for two years and sold it to his son George M. Benjamin.
Current Status: Today, the island is a preserve
Remarks: The demand during World War II for commercial flights was declining and another contributing factor was that the bridge burned down in 1953. In 1965 and 1970, two teenagers were killed in a car accident on the bridge. The airport soon became vandalized and completely destroyed. In 1955, the Florida Power Corporation (Progress Energy) bought most of the northern end of the island to build a power plant. In 1960, a temporary salt water conversion plant was built here by Progress Energy, Cornell University and the federal government which operated for four years and made 35,000–50,000 gallons of fresh water a day. In 1970 the Greek Oil Tanker Dellan Apollon almost ran aground while trying to dock at the power plant on the island. By the early 1970s the last commercial land owners had sold the land, showing there was no future for commercial development and only the energy facility was left alone and the rest of the island was converted to a nature preserve. On March 25, 2000 on a clear day a helicopter was returning form St. Joseph’s Hospital in Tampa and hit a radio tower guy wire and crashed into the mangroves on the island with all three people on board. In 2012 the power plant on the island was demolished.

Welchton (Inhabited), FL

Welcome (Industrial), FL

County: Hillsborough
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Latitude / Longitude: 27°51′53″N 82°05′17″W / 27.86472°N 82.08806°W / 27.86472 -82.08806
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West Tocoi, FL

Willow, FL

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Latitude / Longitude: 27° 38′ 36″ N, 82° 20′ 48″ W
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Comments: Willow is a ghost town in Manatee County, Florida, United States.
Remains: In 1923 or 1924, a mill was built at Willow by the McGowin-Foshee Lumber Company from Alabama. The company leased 54,000 acres of land for logging. James I. Robbins, Bruce Robbins and James A. Robbins bought it in 1926. The Robbinses also bought 40,000 acres of woodlands that ran south to where State Road 70 is today. The area is believed to have included a sawmill, turpentine still, a planer mill, a dry kiln, Robbins family home, general store (known as the commissary), 75 to 80 worker houses with garden plots, a house of prostitution located on the Little Manatee River, Snowden’s filling station, a post office constructed in 1889, a railroad depot with a water tower and a church, school and juke joint located in the black section of town. There was a narrow gauge railroad which had 3 engines, a service car and about 30 logging cars equipped with no brakes. At its height, as much as 50,000 board feet a day was cut. There were around 250 workers. They were paid in scrips (small round tokens) that were to be spent in the commissary and were also accepted in the house of prostitution. Willow was separated into white and black sections. The white section was the south end and the black section was the north end. The black children went to the school in Willow and the white children went to school north in the town of Wimauma.
Current Status: As of 2009, the Florida Railroad Museum was expanding its facilities in Willow where restoration and repair work is conducted. There is a new railroad depot now at Willow built by the Florida Railroad Museum. The Museum has put a fence around the depot and its maintenance facilities at Willow and has installed security cameras. On weekends, some of the museum’s volunteers who live in other distant towns will stay overnight in Willow in the restored passenger car sleepers on Friday and Saturday nights so they can work at the museum for the entire weekend.
Remarks: The town failed with the onset of the Great Depression as the price of lumber dropped and the business moved to Tampa in 1937. The business’s steam engine from its sawmill is on display at the Robbins Manufacturing Co., located in Tampa on Nebraska Avenue. A railroad single truss bridge crossing the Little Manatee River built in 1913 by the Seaboard Air Line Railroad Company remains, as do bare foundations of some of the old buildings. The railroad bridge needs a significant amount of repair before it can be used again and some of the rails leading to it on the south side have been removed, so that trains can not currently travel across it. On the north side of the railroad bridge, at about Saffold Road, all of the rails have been removed from the rest of this route north to Durant. This abandonment occurred in 1986.

Wilson (Kennedy S. C.), FL

Wiscon (Inhabited), FL

Yamato Colony, FL

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Latitude / Longitude: 26° 25′ 0″ N, 80° 5′ 0″ W
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Comments: The Yamato Colony was an attempt to create a community of Japanese farmers in what is now Boca Raton, Florida, early in the 20th century. With encouragement from Florida authorities, young Japanese men were recruited to farm in the colony. There were as many as 75 Japanese men, some with their families, at the peak. There was “a cluster of two-story frame houses, a general store…, some packing houses.”
Remains: Because of various difficulties, including blight, the colony never grew very large, and gradually declined until it was finally dispersed during World War II.
Current Status: The taken land was appraised and settlers were paid for the seized land. Some were able to repurchase the land after the war. The Yamato Colony is remembered today in Yamato Road, a major street in Boca Raton, and in Morikami Park and the Morikami Museum and Japanese Gardens. Delray Beach is a Sister City with Miyazu, in honor of George Morikami and the Yamato Colony.
Remarks: The Model Land Company was created by Henry Flagler to hold title to the land granted to his Florida East Coast Railway by the State of Florida. The company encouraged the settlement of its land, particularly by recent immigrants, to gain money from the sale of the land and to increase business for the railroad. In 1903, the company was referred to Jo Sakai, a Japanese man who had just graduated from New York University. Sakai purchased 1,000 acres (4 km²) from the Model Land Company, and recruited young men from his hometown of Miyazu, Japan, to settle there. Several hundred settlers grew pineapples, which were shipped from the Yamato station on the Florida East Coast Railway. Pineapple blight destroyed the crop in 1908. In addition, the colony could no longer compete with cheaper (and earlier maturing) pineapples from Cuba. As a result, many of the settlers returned to Japan or moved elsewhere in the United States. The remnants of the colony were dispossessed after the entry of the United States into World War II, when their land was taken to create an Army Air Corps training base (now the site of Florida Atlantic University and the Boca Raton Airport). The only member of the Yamato Colony to stay in the area was George Morikami, who continued to farm in neighboring Delray Beach, Florida until the 1970s, when he donated his farmland to Palm Beach County to preserve it as a park, and to honor the memory of the Yamato Colony. Unlike Japanese farmers in California, the Florida Japanese were not placed in internment camp, just restricted to travel within the county, and some were escorted by official watchers.

Yukon, FL

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Latitude / Longitude: 30°14′N 81°42′W / 30.233°N 81.700°W / 30.233
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Comments: Yukon is a ghost town located within Jacksonville, Florida.
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Tantie, FL