Editing Marion County, Florida (section)

===Settlement===
After acquisition of the Florida territory by the United States in the 1820s, Marion County was created in 1844 from portions of [[Alachua County, Florida|Alachua]], Mosquito ([[Orange County, Florida|Orange]]), and [[Hillsborough County, Florida|Hillsborough]] counties. Until 1853, Marion County included most of what are now [[Lake County, Florida|Lake]] and [[Sumter County, Florida|Sumter]] counties. In 1849, [[Putnam County, Florida|Putnam County]] was created and took the northeast portion of Marion. Levy County's creation took some of the western portion of Marion in 1877, near the end of the Reconstruction era.

Marion County is named after General [[Francis Marion]] of [[South Carolina]], a [[guerrilla]] fighter and hero of the [[American Revolutionary War]] who was known as the "Swamp Fox".<ref>{{cite book|title=Publications of the Florida Historical Society|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=WZQ-AAAAYAAJ&pg=RA2-PA33|year=1908|publisher=Florida Historical Society|page=33}}</ref> Numerous early settlers of this area were natives of South Carolina and likely picked their local hero as the county's namesake.<ref>{{cite news | url=https://news.google.com/newspapers?id=tK5PAAAAIBAJ&pg=6903%2C7420165 | title=County's history reflected in its names | work=Ocala Star-Banner | date=May 14, 1987 | access-date=May 30, 2015 | author=Pyle, Nancy | pages=8A}}</ref> The Act creating the county of Marion of the Territory of Florida was signed on March 14, 1844, by the territorial governor, [[R. K. Call]]. The county motto is "Kingdom of the Sun."