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Gaineville's History
Arriving in North Central Florida in the 1500s, Spanish explorers found the area was already populated by a complex Native American civilization called Timucuan. What is now known as Paynes Prairie State Preserve was then used as a cattle ranch and a place where Franciscan priests founded missions.
Much of the area we now know as Alachua County was deeded in 1817 by the King of Spain to Don Fernando de la Mata Arredondo and Sons, merchants from Havana, Cuba. Our county’s name came from the Seminole language. Alachua means jug, and may have been a reference to the large sinkhole in Paynes Prairie.
Florida became a territory of the United States in 1819 by virtue of a treaty with Spain. Alachua became the territory’s ninth county in 1824. At first, the county extended from the Georgia border to Tampa Bay. The city of Gainesville was established in 1854, along a route of the Florida Railroad, beginning as a community of 250 people.
Following the Civil War and Reconstruction, Alachua County’s population grew to 18,000, with 1,400 residents in Gainesville, which had become a center for cotton and vegetable crops.
Then, Gainesville was hit with two major fires in the 1880s, prompting a rebuilding with brick. During this time, it was fast becoming a city and a center of population in North Central Florida. Smaller towns, like Archer, High Springs, Melrose and Hawthorne, were established because of the growth of the railroad and the area’s initial success in citrus and phosphate. However, a series of freezes in the late 1800s ended the area’s efforts in the citrus industry.
As time went on, and as the 20th Century approached, Alachua County, with a population of approximately 32,000 people, had a growing economy based in the phosphate, cotton and vegetable industries. The cotton industry faded because of the affects of the boll weevil. An end to the phosphate industry came about because of World War 1.
Few people, during this time, could see that the next new industry would be education. It would come to dominate Gainesville and Alachua County for the next century. Gainesville was chosen as the site for the University of Florida (UF) in 1905, opening a year later with 102 students, 15 faculty members and two buildings still under construction. Twenty years after its opening, UF had a student population of 2,000 attending classes in 13 buildings. Even within a decade, UF was shown to be the most significant piece of the Alachua County economy, helping the community to survive the land-boom collapse of the mid-1920s and the Great Depression of the 1930s.
Veterans poured into Florida, following World War II, with many of them coming to Gainesville to attend UF. The university grew to more than 9,000 students, and admitted coeds in 1947. The university built a medical school during the next decades, and growth continued. Today, UF enrolls 47,000 students and has become one of the major research institutions in the southeast United States. G
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