Florida ghost towns?

[Sanderling]

I have never hunted a ghost town and I would think that it would be a lot of fun. Attached is a photo of Center Hill, FL which appears to be largely deserted. I would like to hunt the median area at the right, but would have no idea who to ask for permission. Anyone else have some Florida ghost towns they have hunted?

 

[MassSaltH2O]

No, but that is a very cool photo.
Have you looked into the history of this town?
Looks like someone is maintaining that GT for some reason.
Very interesting!

 

[Sanderling]

Thanks H2O. I do need to research the town. It is not entirely a ghost town as there are homes and other occupied buildings to the right side of the median. I just thought the strip of old deserted buildings looked pretty interesting. So many towns across the US have these streets. Yes the little town did look pretty well maintained. I have only been through there once and it is more that 2 hours away from me. So, one of these days when I am bored and want to do some traveling I will go back there. In the meantime I will do some research as you recommended.

 

[Sanderling]

I took H2O's advice and did some research into Center Hill, so named because it was a hill in the center of Sumter County when settled by whites circa 1830. Prior to that it was settled by freed and fugitive slaves and Seminole Indians. The old settlement of Peliklakaha was attacked during the Seminole Indian wars. Peliklakaha was basically Center Hill prior to the whites settling there. Anyway it has a long history and is a rather nice little town. I contacted the City Clerk who had no problem with us detecting and she even advised the police we would be there. Traveled there on 9/27 with a friend to do some detecting around the old buildings and that median I mentioned. We both were pretty excited, but it was very disappointing. All we found were a few memorial cents, a dime, and my friend found a 1916 wheatie. There was so much trash. We worked the areas shown in the photos for about three hours. It was great to have the opportunity to detect the town.