HISTORY OF PASCO COUNTY

Trilby

The following article by Charlotte Tyer appeared in East Pasco's Heritage.

How's that? Tell you about Trilby, you say? It used to be called Macon, but the mail kept getting sent to Macon, Georgia. Someone who had read George DuMaurier's novel Trilby, published in 1894, suggested that the town be called Trilby. Some old plats show streets named after characters in the novel.

In the early 1900's it was like many railroad towns in America. Folks didn't seem to be in such a hurry then. All the businesses in town would close every Thursday noon in the summer. Practically the whole population would go to the Withlacoochee River for a fishfry under the oak trees in what is now Peterson Park. The men would go to regular stands and shoot the biggest fish with rifles. The boys would splash into the water and pick up the fish. The women brought good things from their kitchens which made mighty fine eating with the crisp-fried fish.

Folks worked hard, though. They raised most of their food — pork, peanuts, eggs, and vegetables. You could buy enough meal or grits for twenty-five cents to last a big family for a week. Most of the women sewed, though there was a community seamstress. The kids got their ideas from their parents and from Sunday School, though they were not all angels. Once a young boy was about to be baptized in the river, and asked the preacher in other than Sunday School language not to drown him. That same boy played a fiddle made from a cigar box, strung with hairs from the tail of his daddy's horse.

With no T.V., there was time for fun like peanut boilings, taffy pulls, hide and seek, postoffice, spin the bottle, and a homemade game called board on deck. This was often played at school recess. As few as three or as many as liked could play. Catcher and batter faced the pitcher, with the only base behind the pitcher and “deck” just to one side of the batter. After the batter (using a bat, board, or axe handle) hit the pitched ball (softball or stuffed sock), everybody on the field tried to hit him with the ball before he could touch deck and run to the one base and back home. If someone caught the ball, he got a turn at bat.

Most of the kids were pretty well under control, with the help of daddy's razor strop. Still, they had ways of getting back at their elders. Most of it was innocent enough, just inconvenient, especially if you happened to be in the privy when it was turned over at Halloween. They also took gates off hinges and put unusual things on rooftops. Once they put a railroad float on top of the two-story schoolhouse; this float had four iron wheels with a bed a little lower than the floor of railway express cars, and was used for transferring mail and baggage from one train to another.

In 1910 the school was a two-story wooden building on the west side of present Highway 301, across from Cummer Road. It burned on a cold night with frozen ground; the sixty-odd students weren't too unhappy. The grownups built another two-story schoolhouse of brick, which later burned too. Earl Tyer's garden on that spot still turns up pieces of desks and old square ink bottles; he irrigates from the old schoolhouse well. Trilby School in those days was the center for political rallies and for social life. Cliff Couey remembers one special softball game when the fat women played the skinny men, with the proceeds going to the school. Everybody went to Friday afternoon programs or plays once a month, there being no electric light for night activities. People were friendly, inviting each other for meals and helping out in sickness. Mrs. Gregg O'Berry's mother and aunt helped nurse a relative through diphtheria in spite of putting their own lives in danger. Two doctors who practiced in Trilby were Dr. DeVonn and Dr. Byrd.

Of course there was some meanness going on in town. There were some all-night shooting sprees when all the street lights at the depot were shot out. During Prohibition there was homemade moonshine and some bootlegging. The county sheriff couldn't be everywhere at once. Walter H. Edwards, Bert's daddy, was either constable or deputy sheriff from the early 1900's until his death in 1936. Bert found his handcuffs handy for attaching his girl to the steering wheel. Walter Edwards had come to Florida at the turn of the century with his brother-in-law Tom McCorkle and Bert Fish, who became Volusia County Judge until President Franklin Roosevelt appointed him Ambassador to Egypt. Once the Trilby State Bank was robbed. Mrs. Gregg O'Berry's aunt, Lena Crum, was teller. Her husband, Lester Crum, bank president, was out at the time. He had earlier showed her how to open the vault from the inside, which saved her life.

Gregg O'Berry's daddy was the only mail carrier from 1905 to 1911. Gregg became postmaster in 1931, and was followed by Eunice Trunnell, Myrtie Hancock (Mrs. John) Thomas, and now Mrs. Jeff Couey.

Meeting the trains and talking with the passengers was a favorite pastime for young folks and old. Most of the young boys made pocket money carrying passengers' baggage. This being in open-range days, one old three-legged pig met the train regularly for scraps thrown from the windows. Two taxis, one belonging to Mr. Edwards, took travelers to two hotels. One engineer named Dunbar had a special whistle to notify local people who brought food to sell at his stops. Once he got buzzard eggs at Lumberton and took them to his wife as turkey eggs to set under their turkey hen. Later when he asked about them, she told him that there were too few to set, and that she had put them in his lunch the very next day.

The railroads came to Trilby because of several phosphate mines in the area, and also the Peterson-McNeil Sawmill near present Peterson Pond. After the phosphate and the pines were used up, the railroads were the only big payroll in town. In 1925 most of the stores were along the railroad tracks. On the west side of the tracks, south of present Florida 575, were the Bankston residence, Bradham's Dry-goods Store, John B. Stephens Feed Store, and the postoffice. Then there was an alley going down an incline to Lake Malaria, now called Railroad Pond, where horses were hitched under the trees. South of the alley was Mr. Edwards's Redfront General Merchandise (which had the only gas pump in town, and stocked coffins before the days of embalming); Dick Pitts's Meat Market; Edgar Wade's Drugstore (nonprescription); a cafe; and Vernon Hilliard's Barbershop. Mr. Hilliard also worked for the railroad; his daughter, Mrs. Bob Greene, still lives in Trilby. There was also the Drug-Sundries Store (with soda fountain) owned by Bert Edwards's uncle, Tom Blitch. Then came a cleaning establishment, Bankston's Grocery, and Matt Lake's colored rooming house. Except for Blitch's, the backs of these stores were built up on pilings where the lake came up in heavy rains. On the east side of the tracks, facing present Florida 575 and going east, was the brick jail (regularly set on fire by a father to release his boys) and the present Methodist Church. South of the jail were the two-story Trilby State Bank, a printing shop, the old two-story Masonic Building, Joe Roller's Hotel (owned by Harvey Worthington's foster family), Hux's Rooming House, and Blue Goose Rooming House. Then came two rooming houses owned by a Mrs. Touchton; later she built the two-story Trilby Hotel now being renovated into apartments by Bill English. Between the tracks was an area where the railway express floats operated, and a 24-hour restaurant housed in a tall building with wide eaves over the tracks to protect passengers from the weather. Besides this downtown hub, there were scattered dwellings housing a population of 400 to 500. There were 300 children in the school.

That was the bustling little town of Trilby until one fateful afternoon in May of 1925. Cliff Couey, a boy then, remembers eating blueberry pie when he heard the train whistle long and loud for an alarm. He said, "I'm going to finish my pie even if the town burns!" However, when he heard pistols start shooting, he jumped up and ran out, leaving that pie. Young Bert Edwards was walking back from a fishing trip with Earl D. Tyer's daddy when they spotted the smoke. It was about 1:00 PM when the fire started upstairs in the drygoods store, and it burned until about 5:00 PM. Bucket brigades were formed, using the water hauled from the water tank south of town by train, to protect the train shed. The Dade City Fire Department came out in a Model T firetruck with water hose cart trailing behind; but the stores west of the track burned like tinder. One store, Blitch's Drug-Sundries, being farthest south and not on pilings, was wrapped with a cable and hauled away to safety by a locomotive. Very little merchandise could be saved. The coffins from the Redfront were rescued, and Mrs. Edwards carried out a 100-pound keg of nails that she couldn't budge later. It was a terrible fire, and looters added to the heartache. Some businesses tried to carry on, but Trilby was never the same. The postoffice reopened in the bank building, and the young folks still gathered there after meeting the trains.

The railroad depot was torn down and the present one built about 1927. The small restaurant there has been run in succession by Mrs. D. G. Tyer, Mr. Boykan, the Cliff Coueys, the Dewey Greens, and Mrs. Bob Greene, The railroad still did a lot of business, reaching its peak in World War II with fifty-five trains in twenty-four hours. Local women, including Mrs. Glen Whittington. passed out sandwiches to soldiers on the troop trains. Activity has gradually been cut back until there is now a possibility that Trilby depot will be discontinued.

It’s sad, somehow, to see things change so in seventy-odd years. Things that seemed so important vanished, along with the people that lived with them. But people are still here, old-timers and new folks too. We still work and play, laugh and cry, as always. We're all just part of a long stream of humanity that passes over this earth for a little while and moves on. We try to cherish what we can learn of the past, even the Indian arrowheads that turn up in the necessary diggings of this life. We muse over the old tombstones in Trilby Cemetery, and wonder about all the people who have walked the same ground we walk. Then we wonder what those who walk this ground in the future will remember about us. That's when we feel our frail mortality, and ask the good Lord to help us walk worthy of our heritage and preserve the God-fearing independence and grit that made America great.

Letter to the Editor (1896)

The following is taken from The Critic, Oct. 31, 1896.

Trilby a Future Metropolis (1897)

Founded by Henry B. Plant, the millionaire railroader, who is President of the Plant system of railways, steamship lines, and hotels, and holding its site at the crossing point of two of the railroads of this system, the little Florida village is fast growing into the proportions of a pretentious town; and, strangely enough, its prosperity dates back no further than when it was given the name of Trilby. The railroad station near this point was formerly known as Macon, Fla. There was nothing of a town so long as it went by the name of Macon.

President Plant was just at the time deeply interested in a second reading of Du Maurier's book the popularity of which at that time amounted to a craze with the American people. The character as drawn by the author and given to the little waif about the streets of Paris had touched the railroad magnate with all its weird and grewsome phases, and when one of his officials came to him and asked what the new station should be named Mr. Plant looked up with his accustomed bright twinkle about the eye, which seems to bespeak a nature full of merriment as well as shrewdness, and said: "We will name it Trilby" — and Trilby it is to-day.

That was enough. Trilby began at once to grow. A place which had never been heard of so long as it was called Macon became known in a jiffy to all the world as Trilby. Ever-alert real estate agents took hold, Winter tourists on the west coast of Florida craned their necks out of Pullman car windows to see Trilby, and went home to talk about it among their fellow-capitalists of the North; newspaper writers wrote about it; the map of Florida held it out the most conspicuous of all names of towns and cities. Under such environment the little town of Trilby bids fair to become an important point some day. The streets have been named after the characters of the famed book; there is a Svengali Square, with the network of railroad tracks in the centre, presenting the fanciful spider web which was the emblem of the book; there is a Little Billee Street, a Taffy Street, and a Laird Lane. The avenues are named for the women of the book.

Trilby Village (1897)

It Has a Svengali Square and a Little Billee Street

Now that there is a town named Trilby down in Florida, with streets named for the characters of Du Maurier's book, it is fair to assume that for years to come the people of that neighborhood will hear nothing, see nothing, but Svengali, Svengali, Svengali.

The founding and the renaming of this town are part of a good story. It seems that H. B. Plant, the millionaire, who owns all the railroads on the western side of Florida, was called on to name the new town which he caused to have built at the crossing of two of his railroads. There had been a station there before the new town was started, and it had been called Macon. When it was decided to cut down the grade of the railroad at that point the old station house, which was about all there was to the old town of Macon, was left standing high upon the bluff. It had to be torn down, as it was of no use in its lofty altitude above the track. When the old building was demolished the death knell to Macon, Fla., was sounded, and the question was asked Mr. Plant the railroad president: “What shall we name the new town?”

Just at that time the railroad magnate was much absorbed in a second reading of Du Maurier's book, and when the question was asked, he responded: “Let us call the little town site Trilby.” And so it was. Strange to say, the little village at once began to grow. It was put down Trilby on the maps of Florida, and it became conspicuous by reason of the Trilby craze, which was in full frenzy just at that time. Real estate agents took hold and helped to build it up, while the traveling newspaper men passing over the railroad wrote columns about the town that was growing there to perpetuate the name of Du Maurier's book. The town Trilby is to-day a pretentious little place, with a dozen or more stores, shops and dwellings. The streets are named appropriately. The principal square is called Svengali square, and the three leading streets which run parallel and lose themselves in this square are called “Little Billee street,” “Taffy street” and “The Laird.” There are several avenues named after the women folks of the book. —N. Y. Sun.

In Trilby Town (1898)

A man who recently came back from a trip in Florida says: “They have a town down there named Trilby. It is the production of a real estate firm at Jacksonville, and they get the best advertisement in the world out of it. When the trainmen call out “Trilby!” nearly every one in the cars laughs and looks out to see what sort of place it is. The station is commonplace enough, but standing on the platform as you approach is a man made up like Svengali. Of course every one exclaims, ‘Why, there is Svengali!’ The next you see is a tall girl in Greek costume, with the long, straight nose and regular features of Du Maurier's heroine. Then every one says, ‘There is Trilby,’ while at the farther end of the platform are seen three men made up to resemble respectively Little Billee, Taffy and the Laird. This calls for the appropriate exclamation, which never fails to come. When the train stops, half the passengers get out to see these curiosities. The characters on the platform turn out to be ‘barkers’ for the real estate firm. I heard that the streets of the town are all named from people or places in the book such as Billie boulevard, Laird lane, Trilby terrace.”

Trilby News (1914)

This article appeared in the Dade City Banner on Oct. 9, 1914.

D. W. Pinholster, Jr., spent Sunday with his brother at Tarpon Springs.

Rev. G. T. Butler and wife drove down from Inverness Monday.

J. R. Walker is relieving J. B. Girardeau for a few days at the bank, Mr. Girardeau being away on a short business mission.

Mr. and Mrs. L. B. Hollar and Mr. and Mrs. W. M. Watkins motored to Webster Tuesday.

J. J. Roller and T. J. McPherson will return from Green Springs Wednesday evening after a week’s vacation.

W. C. Abbott and S. A. Lewis went to Bayport Wednesday on a fishing trip.

A delegation of eighteen juryman from Dade City inspected the new roadway Wednesday.

The new arrivals for treatment at the Florida Tuberculosis Sanatorium last week were Harvey Galloway, of Miami, and W. B. Noell, of Sanford.

W. D. Trunnell purchased the mill site in the north edge of town last week from Colon Monroe.

C. Brock was elected to fill a vacancy in the city council at a special election Tuesday.

W. J. Duther, of Dunnellon, is erecting a twenty by forty foot frame building between Bud Bankston’s store and L. J. Keller’s Confectionery, and will put in a bottling works. He will no doubt do a thriving business as this is a first class distributing point.

Lumber is being placed on the ground for a new residence for Mrs. Julia Barmer this week.

The meetings held at the Methodist Church are being well attended. Rev. Mitchel is conducting the day services and Rev. G. T. Butler the evening meetings. Much good is being done.

1918-1919 Florida State Gazetteer and Business Directory

Bandits Rob Trilby Bank and Escape (1922)

This morning's Tampa Tribune has the following story about the robbery of the Trilby State Bank Thursday morning:

Three men, one a deputy from Sheriff Sturkie's office, are hot on the trail of two men who yesterday held up the Bank of Trilby and got away with about $250, all of the cash in sight. At last reports the posse was said to be close on the trail of the fleeing men, who were said to be headed toward Orlando.

The robbers, both masked, entered the bank of Trilby, seven miles from Dade City, during the temporary absence of the cashier. Ordering Mrs. L. D. Crum, assistant cashier, to throw up her hands, the robbers were surprised when instead of obeying orders, she reached for a gun. One of the masked men beat her to it and seized the weapon. The two men then took all the cash off the counter and out of the tills, and ordered Mrs. Crum to give them the combination of the vault, which she refused to do.

With their small haul the two men ran out of the bank and climbed into a closed Ford touring car, speeding out of Trilby. The alarm was given at once and a posse was soon on the track of the robbers.

Sheriff Sturkie stated this evening that he had no knowledge of the cutting of telephone or telegraph wires in the vicinity of Webster, as was first reported. The sheriff also stated that the robbers did not lock Mrs. Crum in the bank vault, and said they got only between $240 and $250, instead of $1,000, as first stated.

Mrs. Crum was able to give only a meager description of the two robbers. One, she said, was short and heavy set, smooth shaven and wearing a light colored cap, gray suit and amber goggles. The other man, Mrs. Crum stated, was tall and slender, wore a dark blue suit and appeared to have dark brown or black eyes.

Business Section of Trilby Burned (1925)

Seventeen Buildings, Including Stores and Post-Office, Destroyed Friday

Practically the entire business section of Trilby, comprising a row of frame buildings occupied by stores, postoffice and express office, were destroyed by fire Friday afternoon, causing a loss of approximately $40,000, with insurance of not more than $5,000. The fire was caused from a spark from a chimney, or a defective flue, in a two-story building owned by Mrs. Henry Bradham and occupied by Lonnie Wiggins as a store and residence.

The fire was discovered shortly after noon and an alarm immediately turned in. A brisk wind was blowing and as the town had neither waterworks or fire-fighting apparatus, the flames soon spread until the entire row of buildings was ablaze. Calls for help were sent to Dade City, Plant City and Lakeland and the fire truck from Dade City responded, but was unable to do anything, as it is not equipped with a pump and so could not pump water from the lake close by. Plant City and Lakeland sent word that they could not send their apparatus so far away.

When the fire was first discovered J. S. Matthews, formerly chief of the Tampa fire department, happened to be in Lacoochee. He saw the smoke and hurried to the scene, where he voluntarily took charge of such fighting as was possible and had locomotives pump water and steam on the Coast Line station, which was close by, and which caught fire in several places. By this means this building was saved without any damage of any consequence. Complete information as to the amount of the loss has been impossible to obtain, as the buildings destroyed were old and their value apparently not known. Only three of the owners of the buildings and businesses they housed carried any insurance, the total of which was not more than $5,000. The losses, as far as it has been able to estimate them, were as follows: Mrs. Bradham, building, $1,000, no insurance; Louis Whidden, who occupied it with a store and residence, lost approximately $1,200 in stock, fixtures and household goods, with no insurance; J. W. Stephens, building and general merchandise stock, $10,000, insurance $2,000; F. Bankston, building occupied by the postoffice, $1,500, no insurance; W. H. Edwards, building and general merchandise stock, $10,000, with no insurance; R. H. Wade, meat market, $250, no insurance; J. E. Wade, Trilby Drug Store, building and stock, $6,000, insurance $1,000; Abbott building, vacant, $800, no insurance; a man named Ward, who had a restaurant in the building, lost his equipment valued at $500, with no insurance; Burt building, $1,000, no insurance; the American Railway Express Company office, located in this building, lost their records and books, but little of value; Hilliard building, $750, no insurance; and Mr. Mullins, who operated a barber shop here, lost his fixtures valued at $200; Bauknight building, $1,000, no insurance; A. H. Bankston, building and grocery stock, $5,000, no insurance; T. J. Blitch, building and confectionery store, $2,500, no insurance; two buildings occupied by negroes as a pressing club and boarding house were burned with a loss of $1,500, and the residence of Mrs. Amy Reynolds was destroyed, adding $2,000 to the total, with no insurance.

Trilby Postmasters

This article by Scott Black appeared in “Sandspurs,” a newsletter of the Trilby Cemetery Association, May 2009. It is reproduced here and updated, with the permission of the author.

Only a few of Trilby’s former postmasters are buried in the Trilby Cemetery. The post office here actually had several names in the early years before finally becoming permanently known as Trilby.

The first post office for this area was given the name of Pinan, but it only existed from June 10, 1880, until being discontinued on March 30, 1881, with the sole postmaster being William C. McLeod. Originally from Georgia, he died here in 1886 (his gravestone shows 1885) and was a veteran of both the Florida Indian Wars and the War Between the States. His second wife, Tomsey Ann, was buried next to him a few years later.

Since January 6, 1885, the post office has been in continuous operation. It was known then as McLeod, but was officially changed to Macon on January 29, 1885, before finally being designated as Trilby on January 17, 1901.

The first postmaster for the new post office was Harrison K. Bankston, serving from January 6, 1885, until April 18, 1896. A Confederate veteran from Mississippi, he died at Trilby in 1922 (although his gravestone gives the year as 1923) and his wife, Alice, was later buried next to him.

Richard H. Pitts was the fifth postmaster and was appointed for the period between September 21, 1912, and September 11, 1914. He, too, was born in Mississippi and died at Trilby in 1950. His wife, Mary, survived him by several years and they are both buried in our cemetery.

The tenth to serve, Hattie E. Tyer, was acting postmaster from February 5, 1930, until June 4, 1931. She was buried here next to her husband, Darley, when she died in 1970 at her son’s home in Sebring.

Originally from North Carolina, Myrtie E. Hancock-Thomas was the longest serving postmaster, appointed on October 1, 1942, and retired on May 28, 1971 (succeeded then by our own Lillie Mae Couey). Trilby’s fifteenth postmaster, Mrs. Hancock-Thomas died in Jacksonville in 2004 and was buried here between her first husband, David Hancock, and her second husband, John Thomas.

Other postmasters included Stephen Weeks (also a school board member, buried in Tampa), Alexander M. Galaher and William S. Kuster (both buried in St. Petersburg), Enoch W. Gideons (buried at Linden), D. Guy Allen (buried in Sanford), Walter E. and Eunice E. Trunnell (husband and wife, both served two separate times each, buried in Dade City), Allyne H.Withers (buried in Madison County), and James Gregg O’Berry (buried in Dade City).

Incorporation of Trilby (1913)

THE REGISTERED VOTERS OF TRILBY FLA. RESIDING IN THE FOLLOWING DESCRIBED LIMITS.

Notice is here by given to all the registered voters residing in the following described limits to wit:

Commencing at the Northeast corner of NW 1/4 of Southeast 1/4 sec. 22 Township 23 S of Range 21 East, thence west 3/4 of one mile to NW corner of the NW 1/4 of the SW 1/4 sec. 22 Township 23 South of Range 21 East, thence south one and 1/4 miles to the SW corner of the NW 1/4 of the Southwest 1/4 sec 27 Township 23 South of Range 21 east thence east 3/4 mile to the SE-corner of the NW 1/4 of the Southeast 1/4 sec. 27 township 23 south Range 21 east. thence north one and 1/4 miles to point of beginning Embraceing the Town of Trilby Florida. Are required to assemble at the office of T. S. McCorkle in the town of Trilby Fla. on Thursday the first day of May A. D. 1913, at 8 o'clock A. M. To organize a municipal Government, To select a corporate seal and to select by vote a mayor, Clerk, Marshall and five aldermen which shall be known as the City Council.

Names: H. O. Byrd M. D., T. S. McCorkle, J. E. Beach, R. H. Pitts, G. R. Pitts, D. Foster, W. A. J. Prescott, J. W. Brown, S. A. Lewis, W. G. Devane, M. D., L. M. McLeod, W. M. Watkins, W. H. Edwards, Dal Hilliard, H. Cunningham, Forrest Bankston, A. P. Hix, Geo T. Butler, Pierce Kerrell, L. Allen Jr., B. T. Butts, J. A. Bradshaw, J. J. Roller, B. F. Knott, C. F. Croft, R. B. Tyer, W. C. Mock, J. L. Keller, C. H. Tedder, E. G. Worthington, J. D. Turner, W. A. Croft.

Trilby, Florida.
May 1st 1913.

At a call meeting of the voters of the City of Trilby in the County of Pasco in the state of Florida, having assembled themselves together in the office of T. S. McCorkle in the aforesaid town for the purpose of electing City Officers for the town of Trilby, F. Bankston presiding as chairman, Lott Allen, Jr acting Secretary, and citizens proceeded to vote as follows:

Moved and seconded that the incorporate name shall be the Town of Trilby, motion carried,

Moved and seconded that we adopt the Seal of "The Town of Trilby," same was carried -

Citizens proceeded to vote as follows:

For Mayor, Dr. W. G. DeVane, receiving a majority of the votes cast, was declared elected.

For Alderman, F. Bankston, J. J. Roller, R. H. Pitts, W. H. Edwards and Dr. H. O. Byrd, receiving the largest number of votes were declared elected.

For City Clerk, L. Allen, Jr. receiving the largest number of votes for that office was declared elected.

For City Marshal, W. M. Watkins, receiving the largest number of votes was declared elected to that office.

All of said officers taking the following oath, administered by W. P. Edwards, viz:

"That I and each of us, do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support, protect and defend the Constitution and Government of the United States and of the State of Florida against all enemies, domestic and foreign, and that I will bear true faith, loyalty and allegiance to the same, and that I am entitled to hold office under the Constitution; that I will faithfully perform all the duties of the office which I am elected to on which I am about to enter. So help me God."

Under Article #100 General Statutes, count was made of number of qualified voters present, same being thirteen (13) Meeting adjourned.

W. P. Edwards, N. P. My commission expires 10/8/1913.

Filed for record May 6th 1913.

(official seal)

A. J. Burnside Clerk

(illegible) D. C.