The Name

"Timacuan" comes from the Timacua  or Timacuan Indians who once populated central and Northern Florida. They are considered by many historians to be the first Floridians. The tribe most commonly associated with Florida, the Seminoles, actually came from Georgia and did not move into the state until the 1700's. 

The Timacuan Indians (pronounced tim-Mak-wan) were here when Europeans first arrived in Florida, over 200 years before the Seminoles arrived. They are thought to have existed as early as 500 BC.   A loosely knit confederation of several tribes, they were the last of the Indian nations known as the St. Johns river people. They established an increasingly complex culture with large villages, each containing hundreds of residents, along the river and the coast. There were still at least 13,000 Timacuan Indians in 1600. Disease and cultural clashes left only a handful by the 1700s, when the remnants of the tribes allied themselves with the Spanish in a losing fight against British invaders. In 1763, the survivors of the Timacuan tribes were exiled along with the Spanish to Cuba.

The Community

Timacuan's community  includes over 500 homes located  in nine distinct neighborhoods, each with its own special but compatible personality. The planned, mixed-use development was built on orange groves and farmland owned by the Stenstrom's, an old line Florida family. The community had its beginnings in the late 1980's, with Stratton Hill being the first neighborhood approved for development by the city of Lake Mary. Construction progressed through the nineties,  with the community considered complete at the end of the decade when construction was finished in the neighborhoods of Fairway Hills, Summerlin and Hopewell Creek.

The community was transferred from the last developer to the the homeowners in March of 2001, and the first homeowner controlled board of directors was elected at the annual meeting that took place at that time.

Today, as a built-out community, The largest neighborhood is Fairway Hills, with around 200 homes. The other eight neighborhoods vary in size from 21 to around 70 residences each and are, in alphabetical order:  Clubhouse Cove, Eagle Run, Hopewell Creek, Hunters Ridge, Lake Dawson, Signature Cove, Stratton Hill and Summerlin. Timacuan has 90 plus acres of common area and the community meanders around the indenpendently owned 150 acre Timacuan Golf and Country Club, ranked 14th in the state. Together, the community and the country club encompass about 400 acres of beautiful homes, landscaped grounds and an abundance of Egrets, Sand Hill Cranes, ducks, turtles, and other members of the wildlife family that also call Timacuan home.

The History of Lake Mary     

Although Lake Mary's beginning dates back to the 19th century, the City did not incorporate until August 7, 1973. The lake that gave the city its name was named after Mary Sundell, the wife of Rev. J.F. Sundell, who settled on the northern shores of the lake and organized the Presbyterian congregation in 1894. Lake Mary started as a village of two tiny settlements called Bent's Station and Belle Fontaine. They were located along the railroad that ran between Sanford and Orlando. The City began as a citrus-based agricultural community.

In its early years, Lake Mary housed, in addition to the normal establishments, a dance hall and casino,  a bath house, a hotel, and a factory which produced starches, farina and tapioca from the cassava plant, a tropical looking plant with edible roots. Following the killing citrus freezes of 1894 and 1895, the factory saved what was then the citrus community of Bents, near Crystal Lake, thus establishing the foundation of the community which today is a thriving, upscale city and a much sought after residential address. Click here to visit Lake Mary's website.