100% Pure Cane Syrup
$10/12 oz. bottle
$12/16 oz. bottle
Homemade Jellies & Jams
$4.50/pint jar
Guava, peach, strawberry, & more
Notecards
$10/8 Cards & Envelopes
Featuring historic people and scenes from the Kathleen area
Campfire Mugs
$6 each – 15 oz. mug featuring name and train depot logo of Kathleen Area Historical Society
History Book
$20/Each
Communities of the Kathleen Area
Settlers from Georgia and the Carolinas began arriving in the communities of the Kathleen area in the 1840s, well before the establishment of Polk County, Florida, in 1861. In the summer of 1851, circuit-riding preacher Rev. J.M. Hayman offered his first sermon at Br. William T. Rushing’s homestead at Indian Pond in Socrum, a site soon to become home to Bethel Baptist Church. Against the backdrop of the Seminole Indian Wars, the Civil War, public land incentive programs, and the coming of the railroads in the 1880s, the seven other northwest Polk County communities of the Kathleen area (Galloway, Gibsonia, Green Pond, Griffin, Kathleen, Providence, and Winston) soon followed and were well established by 1900. Self-sufficient and resilient pioneers set up homesteads, nurtured large families, built churches and schools, served in positions of leadership, and created an agricultural-based economy with cattle raising, citrus, timber and logging, and strawberry farming.
Lois Sherrouse-Murphy is president of the Kathleen Area Historical Society, a descendant of the Georgia Salzburgers and Kathleen-area pioneer families, and serves as a local and family historian. The photographs featured in Images of America: Communities of the Kathleen Area were selected from the personal collections of residents, the historical society, libraries, and State of Florida archives.