AT THE SHELDON STORE

Mrs. J. G. Sheldon has sent me this vivid account of the early beginnings: My father, Albert Baker, moved to Lake Helen from Ilion, New York. He and my mother were staying in Jacksonville, when someone persuaded them to take a trip to DeLand and from there your father took them over to see the lovely lake and rolling pine hills which were to become Lake Helen. My father built a store which was at that time the only building in sight except a tiny log house at the north end of the lake afterwards occupied by Arthur Pelton, wife and Claude. I was just married to Jay Sheldon and on July 4, 1884 we arrived on a St. Johns Riverboat and drove the three or four miles across to Lake Helen. We found the store unfinished and a crew of ten negroes clearing the main street and camping out on our front porch. I had only seen one colored family before going south and the idea of being out in that vast stretch of piney woods with my husband with no neighbors within sight or hearing, and a bunch of hard looking negroes down stairs was not reassuring. I used to imagine at night that I heard them creeping up the stairs. No one ever did, however, and I became quite friendly with them (although two were acknowledged murderers), and they were very kind to me. Our goods did not arrive for three weeks, and we slept on a hard pine floor and ate on a carpenter's table with nail kegs for seats. We had taken dishes with us from Jacksonville and cooking utensils and a gasoline stove. But when it was unpacked the gas tank was missing and did not arrive until the first bill of hardware came in, so I did my cooking on a few bricks I borrowed from those being hauled for the foundation of the hotel, over fat pine chips, from the trees being cleared out of the road. A young man who had a little saw mill out in the woods had suffered an attack of typhoid and he begged us to take him in, so that he might have proper food. Our goods arrived during a terrific rain storm and everything was wet. It was necessary to empty the pillows and dry the bedding for days. At last we were settled, the negroes had moved on, our boarder arrived and the store was fast coming to order. We hired clerks in Jacksonville and there was soon company enough and work enough to banish fear and homesickness. Business was astonishingly good, considering that the store was so far from settlements. Small colored girls came in, perhaps in the forenoon and were so overcome with the wonders of the store, which contained everything from needles to plows, that they would sink down on a box, and remain for hours, gaping with round eyes and open mouths at the pretty things on the shelves. In fact they would totally forget what they were sent after and would have to go "ask mammy" and make another trip. At night the native men with their hounds and rifles would wander in and perch on the counters, sometimes bringing in deer or a bunch of quail. The carpenters would come too, and it was always midnight or later, before we could close up. Often a party of negroes would sing and dance for us, to the clapping of the others. The Spiritualist camp Cassadaga was about a mile from the store and their leader, the genial George Colby, and his friends were often there to add to the sociability. The carpenters were soon on hand to erect the hotel. They housed themselves in tents. Father and Mother Baker arrived and work was begun on their home next to the hotel. Dr. Mills set up a tiny drug store in a corner of our store, while his house and store were being erected. Meanwhile we had secured a postoffice and a school house was planned. One of the natives remarked that he didn't have any 'eddication himself but he thought readin' an' writin' an' figgerin' wuz a good thing and he'd send his young uns.' Arthur Pelton's family were the first to arrive after us. Mrs. Pelton, who was an immaculate housekeeper, had much trouble in the dirty cabin in which they first lived, but she made it clean and homelike and after a while her lovely home was built. The hotel was finished and named after your brother, Harlan DeLand, and the town had already been named after you, Helen Parce DeLand.

Excerpt from, The Story of DeLand and Lake Helen, Florida.

Written by, Helen Parce DeLand