Deep Lake (ghost town)

Deep Lake is a former town located along the defunct Atlantic Coast Railroad at State Road 29. There are no signs and there is no post office at this time. Just after 1900, Walter Langford of Fort Myers and John M. Roach of the Chicago Street Railway Company acquired Deep Lake Hammock, nearly 300 acres of relatively high land (called Hollywood Head) surrounding a deep lake in the wilderness.

Langford and Roach were attracted to it because the tropical vegetation appeared to have survived the winter freeze which destroyed groves further north. The entrepreneurs cleared 200 acres and planted Marsh Seedless grapefruit trees. The partners in the grapefruit enterprise had difficulty bringing supplies and fruit trees from Fort Myers and had to ship their matured fruit by ox cart to market.

Since there was no roads, canals, nor railways, they built their own tiny rail system in 1913 from Everglades to Deep Lake. They created gas-powered railroad car out of a Ford automobile engine, and mounted on a four-wheeled carriage. The wheels were flanged to run on the rail, along with some small flat cars mounted on four wheels. The railway line had been laid without benefit of a grade, so it flooded in wet weather.

In 1922, Barron G. Collier bought Deep Lake, and purchased the considerable holdings of George Storter around Everglade-Half Way Creek. Collier made an extensive effort to develop the grove, but the land proved to be too rocky and hard to fertilize. When Collier came to this remote trading post and farming community, less than a dozen families were living there.

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