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Lakeland-Winter Haven, Florida Metropolitan Statistical Area
Polk County is located in the central portion of the U.S. state of Florida. The county population was 725,046, as of the 2020 census. Its county seat is Bartow, and its largest city is Lakeland. Polk County comprises the Lakeland–Winter Haven Metropolitan Statistical Area. This MSA is the 81st-most populous metropolitan statistical area and the 89th-most populous primary statistical area of the United States as of July 1, 2012. The center of population of Florida is located in Polk County, near the city of Lake Wales. Polk County is home to one public university, one state college, and four private universities. History Early history The first people to inhabit the area now called Polk County were the Paleoindians who arrived in Florida at least 12,000 years ago, late in the last ice age. With large amounts of water locked up in continental ice caps, the sea level was more than lower than at present. The Florida peninsula was twice as wide as it is today, and Flo ...
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James K
James is a common English language surname and given name: * James (name), the typically masculine first name James * James (surname), various people with the last name James James or James City may also refer to: People * King James (other), various kings named James * Saint James (other) * James (musician) * James, brother of Jesus Places Canada * James Bay, a large body of water * James, Ontario United Kingdom * James College, a college of the University of York United States * James, Georgia, an unincorporated community * James, Iowa, an unincorporated community * James City, North Carolina * James City County, Virginia ** James City (Virginia Company) ** James City Shire * James City, Pennsylvania * St. James City, Florida Arts, entertainment, and media * ''James'' (2005 film), a Bollywood film * ''James'' (2008 film), an Irish short film * ''James'' (2022 film), an Indian Kannada-language film * James the Red Engine, a character in ''Thom ...
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Indigenous Peoples Of Florida
The indigenous peoples of Florida lived in what is now known as Florida for more than 12,000 years before the time of first contact with Europeans. However, the indigenous Floridians living east of the Apalachicola River had largely died out by the early 18th century. Some Apalachees migrated to Louisiana, where their descendants now live; some were taken to Cuba and Mexico by the Spanish in the 18th century, and a few may have been absorbed into the Seminole and Miccosukee tribes. Paleoindians The first people arrived in Florida before the extinction of the Pleistocene megafauna. Human remains and/or artifacts have been found in association with the remains of Pleistocene animals at a number of Florida locations. A carved bone depicting a mammoth found near the site of Vero man has been dated to 13,000 to 20,000 years ago. Artifacts recovered at the Page-Ladson site date to 12,500 to 14,500 years ago. Evidence that a giant tortoise was cooked in its shell at Little Salt Sp ...
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Urriparacoxi
Urriparacoxi, or Paracoxi, was the chief of a Native American group in central Florida at the time of Hernando de Soto's expedition through what is now the southeastern United States. "Urriparacoxi" was a title, meaning "war leader". There is no known name for the people he led, or for their territory. Encounter with de Soto Hernando de Soto landed on the west coast of the peninsula of Florida in the summer of 1539 with a large contingent of men, with the intention of exploring and colonizing the country. The exact place at which de Soto landed has been controversial, but a number of historians accept Tampa Bay as the site. Soon after landing de Soto encountered Juan Ortiz, a Spanish sailor who had been held captive by local chiefs for eleven years. Ortiz told de Soto of a chief called Urriparacoxi who lived inland, who had a lot of maize, and to whom the local chiefdoms, including Mocoso and Uzita, paid tribute. De Soto sent one of his lieutenants, Baltazar de Gallegos, with be ...
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Tampa Bay
Tampa Bay is a large natural harbor and shallow estuary connected to the Gulf of Mexico on the west-central coast of Florida, comprising Hillsborough Bay, McKay Bay, Old Tampa Bay, Middle Tampa Bay, and Lower Tampa Bay. The largest freshwater inflow into the bay is the Hillsborough River, which flows into Hillsborough Bay in downtown Tampa. Many other smaller rivers and streams also flow into Tampa Bay, resulting in a large watershed area. The shores of Tampa Bay were home to the Weedon Island Culture and then the Safety Harbor culture for thousands of years. These cultures relied heavily on Tampa Bay for food, and the waters were rich enough that they were one of the few Native American cultures that did not have to farm. The Tocobaga was likely the dominant chiefdom in the area when Spanish explorers arrived in the early 1500s, but there were likely smaller chiefdoms on the eastern side of the bay which were not well documented. The indigenous population had been decimat ...
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Juan Ponce De León
Juan Ponce de León (, , , ; 1474 – July 1521) was a Spanish explorer and ''conquistador'' known for leading the first official European expedition to Florida and for serving as the first governor of Puerto Rico. He was born in Santervás de Campos, Valladolid, Spain in 1474. Though little is known about his family, he was of noble birth and served in the Spanish military from a young age. He first came to the Americas as a "gentleman volunteer" with Christopher Columbus's second expedition in 1493. By the early 1500s, Ponce de León was a top military official in the colonial government of Hispaniola, where he helped crush a rebellion of the native Taíno people. He was authorized to explore the neighboring island of Puerto Rico in 1508 and to take office as the first Governor of Puerto Rico by appointment of the Spanish crown in 1509. While Ponce de León grew quite wealthy from his plantations and mines, he faced an ongoing legal conflict with Diego Colón, the l ...
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Peace River (Florida)
The Peace River is a river in the southwestern part of the Florida peninsula, in the U.S.A. It originates at the juncture of Saddle Creek and Peace Creek northeast of Bartow in Polk County and flows south through Fort Meade (Polk County) Hardee County to Arcadia in DeSoto County and then southwest into the Charlotte Harbor estuary at Punta Gorda in Charlotte County. It is long and has a drainage basin of . U.S. Highway 17 runs near and somewhat parallel to the river for much of its course. The river was called ''Rio de la Paz'' (''River of Peace'') on 16th century Spanish charts. It appeared as ''Peas Creek'' or ''Pease Creek'' on later maps. The Creek (and later, Seminole) Indians call it Talakchopcohatchee, ''River of Long Peas''. Other cities along the Peace River include Fort Meade, Wauchula and Zolfo Springs. Fresh water from the Peace River is vital to maintain the delicate salinity of Charlotte Harbor that hosts several endangered species, as well as commercial ...
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Safety Harbor Culture
The Safety Harbor culture was an archaeological culture practiced by Native Americans living on the central Gulf coast of the Florida peninsula, from about 900 CE until after 1700. The Safety Harbor culture is defined by the presence of Safety Harbor ceramics in burial mounds. The culture is named after the Safety Harbor site, which is close to the center of the culture area. The Safety Harbor site is the probable location of the chief town of the Tocobaga, the best known of the groups practicing the Safety Harbor culture. The Safety Harbor people were organized into chiefdoms and lived primarily in villages along the shoreline of Tampa Bay and the adjacent Gulf of Mexico coast. The chiefdoms may have consisted of about of shoreline, and extended about inland. Each chiefdom had a principal town or "capital" with a temple mound and central plaza. Fifteen such towns have been identified along the Florida Gulf coast from southern Pasco County to northern Sarasota County, an area th ...
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Manasota Culture
The Manasota culture was an archaeological culture that was practiced on the central Gulf coast of the Florida peninsula from about 500 BCE until about 900, when it developed into the Safety Harbor culture. From about 300 to 700 the Manasota culture adopted the ceremonial ceramics and burial practices of the Weeden Island cultures of northern Florida and adjacent Alabama and Georgia. The Manasota culture was defined by archaeologists George Luer and Marion Almy in 1979. Their definition partially replaced an earlier definition of a Perico Island tradition or culture, which failed to hold up under later research. Luer and Almy identify 25 archaeological sites around Tampa Bay and between Tampa Bay and Charlotte Harbor as belonging to the Manasota culture. The Manasota culture incorporated ceremonial burial practices of the Weeden Island cultures starting around 300 until 700. Weeden Island sacred ceramics were first described at the Weedon Island The Weedon Island Preserve is ...
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Belle Glade Culture
The Belle Glade culture, or Okeechobee culture, is an archaeological culture that existed from as early as 1000 BCE until about 1700 CE in the area surrounding Lake Okeechobee and in the Kissimmee River valley in the Florida Peninsula. Major archaeological sites of the Belle Glade culture include Belle Glade Mound, Big Mound City, the Boynton Mound complex, Fort Center, Ortona Mound and Tony's Mound. The Belle Glade site, west of the city of Belle Glade, which gave its name to the culture, and Big Mound City, south of Belle Glade, were partially excavated in 1933 and 1934 by a Civil Works Administration project supervised by Matthew Stirling. A report and analysis of the two sites was published by Gordon Willey in 1948. The best known site, Fort Center, was the subject of major excavations under the direction of William Sears during the 1970s. Other sites are known from test excavations and/or aerial surveys. There is little evidence to support the idea that there was a ...
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Kissimmee River
The Kissimmee River is a river in south-central Florida, United States that forms the north part of the Everglades wetlands area. The river begins at East Lake Tohopekaliga south of Orlando, flowing south through Lake Kissimmee into the large, shallow Lake Okeechobee. Hurricane-related floods in 1947 prompted channelization of the meandering lower stretch, completed by 1970. The straightened course reduced wetland habitat and worsened pollution. In response, ongoing efforts since the 1990s have partially restored the river's original state and revitalized the ecosystem (see Restoration of the Everglades). Course The Kissimmee River arises in Osceola County as the outflow from East Lake Tohopekaliga, passing through Lake Tohopekaliga, Lake Cypress, Lake Hatchineha and Lake Kissimmee. Below Lake Kissimmee, the river forms the boundary between Osceola County and Polk County, between Highlands County and Okeechobee County, and between Glades County and Okeechobee County befo ...
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Nalcrest, Florida
Nalcrest is a retirement community in Polk County, Florida, United States. The community's ZIP code is 33856. It is part of the Lakeland– Winter Haven Metropolitan Statistical Area. The community's name is an acronym for National Association of Letter Carriers Retirement, Education, Security and Training, as it was designed by and continues to be operated by the Nalcrest Foundation, Inc., a branch of the National Association of Letter Carriers, the union representing United States Postal Service city letter carriers. It was the brainchild of William Doherty, the first United States Ambassador to Jamaica and NALC President from 1941 to 1962. Construction began on the community in July 1962 and the community opened in 1963. Initially, due to HUD regulations, residency was open to both NALC members and others, but when the mortgage was paid in 2002, the HUD restrictions were removed and residency is now limited to NALC retirees in good standing only. The community consists ...
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Lake Weohyakapka
Lake Weohyakapka is a lake in Polk County, Florida, in the United States. The name is derived from the Creek language, most likely meaning "walking on water". The turpentine settlement of Walinwa (Walk In Water) was once located by the lake and was connected to other logging, sawmill, and turpentine industry towns by the Kissimmee River Railway, a Seaboard Air Line Railway subsidiary operated by the then nationalized railroad operator (United States Railroad Administration The United States Railroad Administration (USRA) was the name of the nationalized railroad system of the United States between December 28, 1917, and March 1, 1920. It was the largest American experiment with nationalization, and was undertaken a ...). Walk-in-the-Water Wildlife Management Area (WMA) abuts one part of the shore. References Lakes of Polk County, Florida Lakes of Florida {{PolkCountyFL-geo-stub ...
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