Editing Wakulla County, Florida (section)

=== Antebellum Wakulla ===
Wakulla County was created from Leon County in 1843.  It may (although this is disputed) be named for the [[Timucuan]] [[Native Americans in the United States|Indian]] word for "spring of water" or "mysterious water". This is in reference to Wakulla County's greatest natural attraction, [[Wakulla Springs]], which is one of the world's largest freshwater [[spring water|springs]], both in terms of depth and water flow. In 1974, the water flow was measured at {{convert|1.23|e9USgal|m3}} per day—the greatest recorded flow ever for a single spring.

In an 1856 book, adventurer Charles Lanman wrote of the springs:{{citation needed|date=October 2013}}

{{blockquote|An adequate idea of this mammoth spring could never be given by pen or pencil; but when once seen, on a bright calm day, it must ever after be a thing to dream about and love. It is the fountain-head of a river... and is of sufficient volume to float a steamboat, if such an affair had yet dared to penetrate this solemn wilderness... It wells up in the very heart of a dense cypress swamp, is nearly round in shape, measures some four hundred feet in diameter, and is in depth about one hundred and fifty feet, having at its bottom an immense horizontal chasm, with a dark portal, from one side of which looms up a limestone cliff, the summit of which is itself nearly fifty feet beneath the spectator, who gazes upon it from the sides of a tiny boat. The water is so astonishlingly clear that even a pin can be seen on the bottom in the deepest places, and of course every animate and inanimate object which it contains is fully exposed to view. The apparent color of the water from the shore is greenish, but as you look perpendicularly into it, it is colorless as air, and the sensation of floating upon it is that of being suspended in a balloon; and the water is so refractive, that when the sun shines brilliantly every object you see is enveloped in the most fascinating prismatic hues.}}

Another possible origin for the name Wakulla, not as widely accepted, is that it means "mist" or "misting", perhaps in reference to the [[Wakulla Volcano]], a 19th-century phenomenon in which a column of smoke could be seen emerging from the swamp for miles.

The town of [[Port Leon, Florida|Port Leon]] was once a thriving cotton-shipping hub, with a railroad from Tallahassee that carried over 50,000 tons of cotton a year to be put on ships, usually for shipment direct to Europe. Port Leon was the sixth-largest town in Florida, with 1,500 residents. However, a hurricane and the accompanying storm surge wiped out the entire town. New Port (today known as [[Newport, Wakulla County, Florida|Newport, Florida]]) was built two miles (3&nbsp;km) upstream but never quite achieved the prosperity of Port Leon.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.wakullacountytdc.com/wakulla-41.htm |title=Historical Places |publisher=Wakullacountytdc.com |access-date=April 29, 2013 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120303064829/http://www.wakullacountytdc.com/wakulla-41.htm |archive-date=March 3, 2012 }}</ref><ref name="Jahoda, Gloria 1967">Jahoda, Gloria (1967). ''The Other Florida'', Florida Classics. {{ISBN|978-0-912451-04-6}}.</ref>