The Enterprise Midden, sketch of Enterprise shell mound in 1874 from Jeffries Wyman's book , was “dinner debris” deposited by people living along the lake starting around 3,000 B.C. The ancestors of these natives, the Paleoindians, may have occupied the area thousands of years before that time.

          Under Menendez, the Spanish may have come as far upriver as Lake Monroe searching for the headwaters of the St. Johns River. In 1765 John and WilliamBartram did travel upriver and through the lake seeking the river’s headwaters. At present day Stone Island, the Bartrams observed calciferous deposits containing human remains. Around this time, William de Brahm, as surveyor for the British, observed and mapped “Lake Grant” and the river for the colonial government of East Florida. In the early 1820s after Florida was acquired from Spain, Lt. Charles Vignoles surveyed the region for the new Territorial government and noted Green Springs on his map as the main feature of interest along the lake.

          Ft. Kingsbury, named after an officer who died of fever at Ft. Mellon, was located along the lakefront to the west of Green Springs, as illustrated on the MacKay and Blake army maps of 1838-39. The log stockade was a “satellite” fort of Ft. Mellon across the lake, and one of a line of posts from New Smyrna to Tampa intended to push the Seminole Indians south.

          At that time the interior of the peninsula was connected with a network of Indian trails, probably the basis of the St. Augustine or Old Spanish Trail which linked the north shore of Lake Monroe to Beresford, Spring Garden, and Old King’s Highway on the coast. This important trail continued from Lake Monroe to connect with sites in south Florida.

          Old Enterprise – Taylor ’s grant -- included the shell midden, three springs, and the site of Ft. Kingsbury . Atop the shell mound, Taylor built a “pleasant and commodious” inn to attract travelers who visited Lake Monroe on the steamboats. There were also several outbuildings and slave quarters, a sawmill, sugar boiler, and orange grove.

          Aside from the picturesque quality of the area with its emerald springs, the main attraction of the upper St. Johns River at that time was live oak, highly prized by the Navy for shipbuilding.

Shown at right is the old oak tree (no longer standing) on the lakefront near the Brock House.

          The quest for live oak to supply the Navy resulted in the wholesale decimation of the timber resources of the Southeast, alarming Congress into passing a law in 1822 to protect remaining stands of timber on public land.

          Not long after the Taylor’s arrival, tragedy struck the family when Taylor’s oldest daughter “Polly” (Mary Arabella) died in September of 1842 in an epidemic now thought to have been smallpox which also took the lives of nine slaves. But the family persevered, planting oranges, sugar cane, and cotton and attracting tourists to their mineral springs. One visitor impressed by the improvements made by all the families around the lake declared in 1843 that Enterprise “is destined one day to become one of the most important inland towns in the Territory.”

          In 1851 Brock started purchasing land a mile west of Old Enterprise, laying out streets and lots, and building a wharf. The property he bought included a wood frame store and possibly a small boardinghouse. He planned to build a huge hotel that would rival anything in the North to accommodate passengers “doing the St. Johns River.”

          Around this time, Virgil DuPont, related to the large and influential DuPont family in St. Augustine, had acquired a land grant near a small flowing spring later known as Benson Springs near the present power plant. He ran a small hotel with an orange grove across from the site of the future Brock House. By 1854, Brock would complete his own 100-room hotel that would put Enterprise on the map as “the premier destination on the St. Johns.” From his wharf he operated the first regular line of steamboats from Jacksonville to Lake Monroe.

          During this era, the Brock House Hotel became the most famous hotel in Florida , attracting notables and celebrities from all over the world. Among its famous visitors were Grover Cleveland, Ulysses S. Grant, Jay Gould, the Vanderbilts, James Rockefeller, and Gen. William Sherman.

          In 1876 Brock sold his property to Luther Caldwell who expanded and improved the hotel. Caldwell was involved in forming a new railroad to ship citrus from the Indian River. The rail-pier, where five steamboats a day once docked, was located just east of Broadway Street. In 1887 Enterprise was able to access the Jacksonville Tampa and Key West Railroad by a spur from Enterprise to Enterprise Junction. The advent of these rail lines spelled the end of the steamboat era.

          In 1867 Elijah Watson had opened a dry goods store to serve the 486 people in the area. Five years later William Thayer and John Sauls opened a competing store at the corner of DeBary Avenue and Main Street (shown).

          The town seal (left) shows the old shell mound to the right of a tree. At the base of the tree appears to be an ax which is leaning against the trunk..

          In the late 1880s a yellow fever epidemic raged across the state, closing down entire cities. The population of Enterprise was reduced so much that the town voted to deincorporate in 1895.

          Among the prominent guests at Brock’s now expanded hotel were Samuel Frederick DeBary and Henry A. DeLand. DeBary, an agent for Mum’s Champagne in New York, purchased 5,000 acres to the west in 1871 and built a grand 20-room mansion/hunting lodge as a winter retreat for his family and friends. Over the next decade, he cultivated thousands of acres of orange trees in the area, shipping the fruit north on his steamboat line. One of his properties was Green Springs, an attraction enjoyed by his guests and guests of the Brock House. Much of the acreage around the spring was planted in orange trees. The shell mound was carted away to create roads and sidewalks and cultivate the orange groves.

          But the courthouse building was not the oldest school in Enterprise. That honor goes to a freedmen’s school formed by Charles Chipman in 1869. “I am now teaching about fifteen scholars by the light of pine knots in front of my shanty, after working through the day trying to get a potato crop growing.” Chipman asked the freedmen’s bureau to build a schoolhouse for students here and for the 25 waiting for a teacher at Sauls, but the bureau ceased operation, and his request went unfilled.

          Over the years, the Brock House had hosted numerous religious assemblies including the Methodist missionary conferences. The Methodist concern for orphans resulted in the beginnings of the Children’s Home. In 1908 Mother Hattie Brooks, widow of a Civil War doctor, was brought from Tampa to help found an orphanage in Enterprise .

         At some point during the early 1900s, the Brock House Hotel was renamed the Epworth Inn, and became a Methodist retreat for those seeking spiritual haven from the world and for those studying at the Methodist Training Center in town. The Brock House property was eventually acquired by the Methodist Children’s Home.