Ridgewood, Florida

Ridgewood[1][2]is an unincorporated community located in Putnam County, Florida, United States. Situated two miles east of Welaka, Florida, and 3 1/4 miles southwest of Pomona Park, Florida. It is located at latitude 29° 28' 13.8432 North, longitude 81° 38' 43.4400 West. First settled 1871, by 1883 Ridgewood had a population of 100 with a post office, one store, two steam saw mills and a public school. The hard freezes of the 1890s destroyed most of the citrus crops in the area and as a result the community declined. In the years ahead, a forest fire was said to have destroyed the remainder of the town during the 1920s. Today, Ridgewood is making a slow comeback with a population of 27 from an informal door to door person count June 2014. All that remains of Ridgewood is a Cemetery, now known as the Welaka-Georgetown Cemetery but was once known as Ridgewood Cemetery. It was during World War Two that the name was changed to Welaka-Georgetown Cemetery. Putnam County records show the first burial was recorded in 1917. Mail ran on Monday, Wednesday, Friday and Saturday. Unimproved land sold from $5 to $30 per acre. Application to start a post office by Franklin B Parse was submitted May 30, 1883 to the United States Postal Service, approved and appointed June 15, 1883[3]

Ridgewood Sign
Printers plate
Archive & Post Office Records
Post Master[4] Date Appointed
Franklin B Parse June 15, 1883
Gerald C Butler June 5, 1888
Fred W Parsch June 26, 1896

Post Office discontinued on November 15, 1900, mail sent to Fairview[5]

References

  1. Putnam County Archives, Palatka Library, Palatka, Florida
  2. Michaels, Brian D (1986). The River Flows North (1st ed.). P.O. Box, 1976 Palatka, Florida 32078: The Putnam County Archives and History Commission. p. 217.
  3. Frank Hatton, First Assistant Postmaster, Office of the First Assistant Post Master General, Washington, D.C. April 16, 1883
  4. Office of the First Assistant Post Master General, Washington, D.C.
  5. United States Postal Service, Washington, D.C.

This article is issued from Wikipedia - version of the 1/20/2016. The text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share Alike but additional terms may apply for the media files.