Heathrow

Heathrow Demographics

The Heathrow Community area began primarily as a citrus-based agricultural community. In 1883, ex-President Ulysses S. Grant broke ground for the South Florida railroad, connecting Sanford and the towns of Heathrow Community, Longwood and Altamonte Springs with Jacksonville. The link was completed in 1884, the same year the area's first bank was opened. The area became the largest shipper of oranges in the world, and thousands of groves brought prosperity.

But after 25 years of growing prosperity, a decade of disaster followed. In 1887, a fire destroyed all of the wooden buildings in downtown Sanford. The next year there was a yellow fever epidemic. In 1894 and 1895, two freezes wiped out the town's citrus industry. Three-quarters of the town's population was involved in the growing, harvesting and marketing of oranges. Overnight the people had to find new occupations. They turned to growing vegetables and in 1898 the first carload of celery was shipped.

From 1900 to 1940, agriculture formed the base of Seminole County's economy and vegetables were transported by rail all over the country. However, between 1950 and 1985, agriculture declined because it was cheaper to grow crops in the more fertile soil of South Florida. Citrus prospered until 1984 and 1985 when killer freezes, Mediterranean fruit flies and a citrus canker once again destroyed nearly all the groves in Central Florida.

The arrival in Orange County of Martin Marietta Corporation's aerospace factory in the 1950s and Disney World in the 1970s caused rapid growth in industry and tourism, which spilled over into Seminole County. The construction of the Altamonte Mall in the 1970s made southern Seminole County a focal point of retail sales in Central Florida. Some of today's major employers in Seminole County include Siemens Stromberg-Carlson, United Telephone of Florida, American Automobile Association, K-Mart and Wal-Mart, ESCO, ABB Power Distribution, Sprague Electric, NCR and Southern Bell. Because both city and county governments offer a positive environment for development, there has been an influx of companies moving to Seminole County. Two of the more recent companies moving into Seminole County in 1995 are Dixon Ticonderoga and Cincinnati Bell Information Systems.

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