Sears (ghost town)

 ghost town  Add category

 Upload a photo

Sears began 1926 when Standard Lumber Company (owned by the Sears-Roebuck company) built a saw mill in the area about twelve miles south of LaBelle. The town was named after Richard Sears, founder of Sears & Roebuck and owner of Standard Lumber. It was a former stop on the Atlantic Coast Railroad, along the Harrisburg-Everglades City branch.

Sears was heavily logged in the early 1900s as timber was ideal for making railroad cross-ties for a growing railroad system that was developing in southern Florida. During this time, sawmills began to spring up producing small towns dependent on these sawmills. A booming housing industry was also occuring at this time, and demand for lumber increased. After a fire destroyed the sawmill in 1928, the town of Sears went into decline and the population eventually disappeared around the late-1930s.

www.ghosttowns.com/states/fl/sears.html