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Ghost Town Tuesday; Osceola, FL

In rural Seminole County north of Geneva on Osceola road near the banks of the St. Johns River there is a small number of ruins of the town of Osceola.


To be specific the only real ruin that is observable is the bank vault from the town of Osceola.  Osceola was a small company town set up by the Osceola Cypress Company in some time in the 1910s.  Osceola's sawmill apparently housed up to 200 workers and their families in the heyday of the operation.  The sawmill shut down in 1939 and all residents apparently had abandoned the town by 1940.  Apparently all the structures aside the bank vault were made of wood which were dismantled and scraped.  The only real map reference I can find for Osceola is on the 1936 Seminole County Map.

1936 Seminole County Highway Map

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