>>This program is brough to you in part by the Paul B.

Hunter and Constance D. Hunter Charitable Foundation a proud partner of WUCF and the Central Florid community.

>>On this edition of Florida Road Trip, we're headed to a city whose history is more than bright lights and loops.

It's a plac where history is quite literally out in the streets.

>>People drive throughout the city and they drive on Bumby or Summerlin.

Those families are buried here.

>>Plus, discover how one hotel became a safe haven during segregation by welcoming travelers when no one else would.

>>You were traveling here to the Orlando area as a black person, then you would have t figure out where to rent a room.

>>Also, meet the community that turned one Orlando neighborhood into a vibrant cultural destination.

>>We made it into our second home.

The weather's exactly the same as Vietnam, so felt like a little piece of home.

>>From historic cemeterie to cultural crossroads, Florida Road Trip is back on the road and rolling into Orlando.

♪♪ >>Hi there and welcome to Florida Road Trip, I'm Scott Fais.

Orlando is one of Florida's most visited communities, and not just by tourists.

Throughout the different centuries, everyone from cattle ranchers to soldiers to entertaining pioneers have helped shape the history of The City Beautiful.

To understand Orlando's roots, you have to go back in time, before roads, before settlers, and even before the city had a name.

>>We have to start with the natives, the Timucua tribes, and the Seminole tribe is mainly the people who inhabited the land that is now known as Orlando.

In 1830, there was the Indian Removal Act, which tried to get natives to move to the west side of the Mississippi.

>>The army came here to fight Indians and so they had to build forts.

And they built a fort in Fort Gatlin which is just south of Orlando.

>>It was around Fort Gatlin that the community began to take shape.

>>The federal government started a program offering people land around the forts.

So they would have the protection of the army, but it would bring settlers and kind of further displace the Native Americans, the Seminoles.

>>One of the area's earliest settlers, Aaron Jernigan, arrived in 1843, settling near what is now Lake Holden.

>>Aaro Jernigan created this stockade to protect the settlers from that stockade again.

We got the first post office in the area, which they named Jernigan after him.

For the first few decades of what would become Orlando was actually known as Jernigan.

>>In 1857, the post office was renamed, although no one knows for sure how Orlando back then got its name.

>>There are so many theories.

One, that it was named for a soldier who was fighting Indians.

Another that it was named for a character in a Shakespeare play.

Another one that it was named for a local farmer cattleman named Orlando Reeves.

And that may have been the best theory, but there is no one for sure who can tell how we got our name as a city.

>>Whatever the true origin, Orland grew with its early industries of cattle and agriculture, especially citrus and cotton.

By 1875, the area officially incorporated as a city.

That growth was nearly derailed when another central Florida town tried to steal the spotlight.

But one local ma stepped up to make sure Orlando held on to its title.

>>Jacob Summerlin.

He was considered the cattle king of Florida.

He had thousands of cattle that he would walk around Florida selling cattle and including during the Civil War.

He helped to keep Orlando as the Orange County seat.

>>Henry Sanford wanted the county seat moved to Sanford.

Jacob Summerlin stepped forward and said, no, I'll provide the money for a new courthouse if you stay.

And they agreed to stay here.

Summerlin's gift secured Orlando's place as the Orange County seat, and his name still appears o street signs across town today.

The arrival of the railroads and later the military, marked the next major turning point in the city's growth story.

>>During World War II, we started to have some military bases here.

You had the McCoy airbase, which housed bombers and offered training for air bombers.

Eventually, McCoy airbase turned into Orlando International Airport, which is why we still have the airport code MCO.

We also had the Naval Training Center, which is now Baldwin Park.

>>The Naval Training Center was the result of a bizarre political deal, where the owner of the Orlando Sentinel had been a big supporter of Lyndon Johnson, and Lyndon Johnson ran for president in 1960.

And John Kennedy of course, won the nomination.

The Sentinel endorsed and supported Lyndon Johnson very much.

After he became president, he wanted to pay back Orlando and so a military base was kind of a golden thing back then.

The owner of the Orlando Sentinel, Martin Andersen, pushed for a military base and got the Navy base, which became, I'm told, the world's only landlocked naval training center.

And because it was a training center, it brought in thousands o recruits who would spend money while they were her during their initial training.

>>But it was a mouse that trul transformed the city's destiny.

>>A lot of times we really start to think about history as pre-Disney and post-Disney.

>>Walt Disney had tremendou connections to Central Florida.

People don't realize that his family lived here.

His grandparents on both sides were married in Lake County, and there are still Disneys in Lake County.

He had come here as a child, played with his cousins, knew the area well.

Eventually he comes to Florida and he looks at four sites in Florida, Bradenton and near Daytona.

And he rejects those two because he did not want to compete with what he called a free attraction: The beach.

Drove up to Ocala, looked over sites there.

The next day, he was supposed to drive to Orlando, bu had to get back to California.

And so he flew over Orlando.

He looked out the window, his plane saw were I-4, and the turnpike intersected and said, that's it.

And so Orlando's fate was changed forever.

>>Although technicall located outside the city limits, Walt Disney World made Orlando a household name and a global destination.

>>People would come to Florida for the beaches, lakes, springs, beautiful flora and fauna.

But after theme parks came is when it really exploded.

We did have technically a them park before Disney in Gatorland that opened in 1949.

There was also Cypress Gardens outside Orlando, but really it's Disney that exploded the theme park industry.

>>And while theme parks brought waves of tourists, Orlando has staye true to its identity: diverse, dynamic and constantly evolving.

♪♪ Just beyond Orlando's World-Class attractions await a city full of diverse culture.

Imagine Orlando to be like a patchwork of neighborhoods, each with its own unique story, including the Vietnamese communi >>In 1975, that's the year that Saigon fell to the North Vietnamese, which kind of triggere the end of the Vietnam War and a exodus of millions of Vietnamese who lived in the South.

They fled by air, by sea, to find refuge in a different land.

The whole boat people situation began from there.

My mom was one as well.

So from 1975 to the early 80s, a large influx of Vietnamese immigrants came to Central Florida.

>>We made it into our second home and I used to ask my dad, why?

Why did he pick Florida?

He says the weather's exactly the same as Vietnam, so it felt like a little piece of home.

>>Those who relocated to Florida sought to build themselves a new life.

>>In the early years, they came here with nothing.

They were poor, but they were very persistent.

They work hard.

>>The refugees helped transform the Mills 50 area into what it is today.

>>Back then, at Mill 50 area didn't call Mill 50.

That was Colonial Plaza off of Bumby Avenue area and Colonial all the way almost to Edgewater.

That whole area there, I was considered kind of rundown at that time.

>>It started off with a few restaurants and the grocery stores, and everyone else might think downtown was Orange and Church Street.

But for us, Mills and Colonial was always our downtown.

It was a little piece of home away from home.

>>Something that gets overlooked.

It's kind of like a quirky thing about Orland is we've become a foodie city, and I think a huge part of that is our diversity in our culture and our people here.

So if you look at the Mills 50 area, we have what we call a little Vietnam or little Saigon, and we just hav so many Vietnamese businesses, including restaurants in that area.

We also have a ton of like, Cuban food and Puerto Rican food.

So we just have a huge mix of culture here that's really translated into our food.

>>Orlando's Vietnamese influence extends far beyon its businesses and restaurants.

It's woven right into the city's history.

>>This monument in Baldwin Park honors the soldiers who fought in the Vietnam War.

It shows both a U.S. and South Vietnamese soldier standing together, symbolizing their unity in battle.

The tribute highlights the deep connections between the Vietnamese community and central Florida.

>>The Vietnamese here want freedom.

They want to raise their children.

They want their children to have a better education.

That's why they came here.

♪♪ >>Tucked quietly in the heart of Orlando awaits Greenwood Cemetery.

Yet this isn't a final resting place.

Rather a living museum full of the stories of those who helped shape the City Beautiful and the legacies they left behind.

>>In 1882, some pioneers decided that Orlando needed a permanent designated resting place.

Previously, the burials of loved ones occurred on homesteads or in small burial yards.

And so they came together to designate 40 acres for a proper burial.

>>Of course, not every story here is marked in stone.

In Greenwood's earliest days many of the graves were marked with wooden headstones, simple, handmade tributes that couldn't withstand the test of time.

>>Predominantly, wood headstones were very popular.

And of course, with the fire a lot of those didn't survive.

>>That fire in 1891, which brok out before the city officially took over Greenwood scorche a large portion of the grounds and destroyed countless early markers.

The devastation proved to be a turning point.

>>And so eventually they decided that the city should own the cemetery for proper upkee and maintenance and management.

>>That original 40 acres has since grown, and so has the number of people resting here.

Greenwood Cemetery is now home to nearly 90,000 burials and includes some of Orlando's most influential figures.

>>There' lots of mayors here and pioneers and really influential people in Florida's history, including Francis Wayles Eppes, who was a grandson of Thomas Jefferson, and Joseph Bumby.

He ran the Bumby Express.

He also became the first railroad station master in Orlando.

Mayor Carl Langford, who was buried at Greenwood, was more than a city leader.

He was a larger than life figure who helped shape Orlando's personality.

>>He is really well known for his sense of humor and his publicity stunts, including wearing a super suit.

>>Mayor Langford was huge proponent of civil rights, and he was the first mayo in all of Florida to make sure that African-American firemen could serve in the city fire departments.

>>And it's not just politicians or entrepreneurs who left their mark.

>>Joe Tinker.

He was an early baseball legend.

Built Tinker Field, which became a Major League Baseball training ground.

Jesse Johnson Branch was an early pioneer in Orlando who gave u our motto, "The City Beautiful."

>>There's Sam Robinson, the city's original surveyor, who laid out the cemetery's design.

His headstone, brought from his birthplace in Michigan, is a unique puddingston that stands out among the rows of marble and granite.

>>People drive throughout the city, and they drive on Bumby or Summerlin, Daetwyler, those families are buried here in the city.

And so just making that connection that as you go about life in this city of Orlando, there is a historical significance that is also housed here at Greenwood.

>>Yet Greenwood's mission isn' just about preserving the past.

It's about telling Orlando's full story and elevating the voices that are many times left out of history.

The cemetery recently installed markers for two historically significant but lesser known chapters.

The site of Jonestown, Orlando's first African-American community, and the relocated burials from Sunland Hospital, a former institution for those who battled mental illness and who were challenged by disabilities.

>>We wanted to highlight how far the mental illness community and disability community have come.

And we really wanted to highlight that with a historical marker, just to acknowledge the contribution an the existence of that community.

>>Greenwood' role is to find ways to engage with the community so that they are awar of the historical significance of Greenwood to the city's history.

>>Greenwood Cemetery is more than just a final chapter.

It's a place where Orlando's story continues.

Written in stone, whispered through the trees and waiting to be discovered by those willing to walk its quiet paths.

Greenwood Cemetery reminds us that every name has a story, and every story matters.

♪♪ Downtown Orlando i home to many landmarks that tell the city's story, ye few are as powerful as this one.

It began as a hotel during the segregation era, welcoming in black travelers.

Docto William Monroe Wells understood that he could stand up a practice servicing African American citizens right here in Orlando.

So he and his wife moved here in 1917, and he was servicing African American citizens.

And he was seeing the segregatio that was happening at that time.

If a black traveler was coming to Orlando and needed a place to stay, there were no hotel options.

You would have to figure out where to rent a room if you had family, if you had friends.

Sometimes people slept in cars.

Sometimes people slept in buildings like a YMCA or what have you.

And so he saw that need for the community, and he decided that he would be best equipped to fill that need.

>>Doctor Wells built a hotel and an opportunity.

>>All of the hotel room are upstairs in this building, and he was very intentional to reserve the downstairs portion of the building to provide spac for other black business owners.

And so other individuals who wanted to stand up their own entrepreneurship, their own businesses, their own storefronts and couldn't get access to funding or leases or what have you.

He wanted to be able to provide that space within the black community, in order for those businesses to stand up and thrive.

Additionally, on the land that is next door to the Wells Built hotel he constructed founded, owned and operated the South Street Casino, and that was an entertainment venue and event space and a gathering place for the community.

And so he did that as well.

>>South Street Casino became the stage for legends.

Icons like Ray Charles played here because it was one of the few places welcoming black audiences.

>>Ray Charles, who could perform at other venues, bu African-Americans could not go.

And so if you wanted to perform for an audience of African-Americans, you had to do so in this community.

And so that's really where the South Street Casino came into play.

And I mentioned Ray Charles because he is one who would perform at the South Street Casino.

And when he did, he would sta here at the Wells Built hotel.

>>As Orlando grew and changed, the Wells Built building was eventually abandoned.

The South Street Casino lost to a fire in the 1980s.

Yet, as an act of preservation, local leaders stepped in to save what remained.

Leading the charge, former State Representative Alz Reddick and Geraldine Thompson, who served as the museum's founder and would go on to represent the area in the state legislature for more than a decade.

>>We are still in the original building.

It can't be emphasized enough because our building is almost 100 years old.

The building was listed as a hotel on the Negro Motorist Green Book.

There are only a handful of physical sites listed in the Green Book that still exist today.

And we're extraordinarily proud to be one of those.

>>Now a museum, The Wells Built invites visitors to learn the stories that help shaped Central Florida's black community.

We have an exhibit that talks about the Ocoee massacr that happened in Ocoee, Florida.

And that was a stor that was not necessarily as well known.

There is information about the Groveland Four and Thurgood Marshall, who at the time was a lawyer for the NAACP, and he was assigned to work the appeal for the Groveland Four.

And when he was, he stayed here.

What is so special about the Wells Built museum of African-American History and Culture, is that here you're going to get what you don't get anywhere else.

We want to bring forwar the stories of the contributions made by African-Americans here in Central Florida.

That's our focus.

And if you want to understand what that is and who these people are, you come visit the Wells Built Museum.

That's what we have to offer.

That's what makes us a unique visitation site.

♪♪ >>Lake Eola's story begins with a generous gift.

An Orlando resident donated the plot of land with one condition that it always remain a park.

Other philanthropists followed.

And today, this is the Lake Eola that downtown enjoys.

>>The first property that wa donated was by Jacob Summerlin.

He owned 200 acres of property right in this area.

He went to a city council meeting in 1888, and he said he wants to donate it to the city, and he wants it to be made into a park.

Now, over time, other people donated portions of their property to the city as well.

So one of them was the Musselwhite family.

And one special land donation came with the fountain.

Thanks to Orlando Mayor E. Frank Sperry in 1914.

Of course, when it comes to the fountains at Lake Eola we can't forget the showstopper.

The Linton E. Allen Memorial Fountain.

Installed in 1957, it was originally named the Centennial Fountain.

>>So people have been in Orlando a long time.

They may remember when the Lake Eola fountain got struck by lightning.

And that was in 2009.

It was a big thing you know, the fountain went out.

>>This led to a full renovation of the fountain in 2011.

Today, this glowing, ever changing beacon stands i the heart of downtown Orlando.

Whether it's illuminated in patriotic, red, white and blue for the 4th of July, or shining in the colors of the Orlando soccer teams, the kinetic landmark is more than just the fountain.

It's a symbol of the city's beauty, resilience and unity.

As Orlando grew, so did Lake Eola.

In the 1920s the first bandshell was built, designed by pioneer female architects Ida Ryan and Isabel Roberts.

They strategically placed it over the water to enhance the acoustics.

A design ahead of its time.

Today's Walt Disney Amphitheater continues that legacy, serving as a stage for concerts, plays, and community events.

It's just one notable structure inside the park that has its own story.

>>It was actually constructe in Guilin, disassembled there, shipped to the United State and reassembled here in Orlando.

>>It's one of our man structures on Lake Eola to show our diverse culture in our community.

>>Of course, no visit to Lake Eola is complete without seeing one of those famous swans.

Since the 1920s, these graceful birds have called the lake home.

But this wasn't their first home.

>>The swans came about in 1910 from Charles Lord, and they originally started at Lake Lucerne, which is where Lord lived.

Lord was from England, an after a trip back to his home, he decided that Orlando could use some swans because we have lots of lakes here.

So he brought back four swans, two white swans and two black swans.

The white swans were named Sally and Billy.

And Billy has a very notorious history in Orlando.

He was kind of a jerk.

And bullied everyone, but also bullied the Black Swans to the point where I'm not sure when exactly this happened, but the black swans had to be moved to Lake Eola, and then Billy continued to terrorize Lake Lucerne.

>>Billy, this one was such a notorious local character that when he passed away, he was preserved by a taxidermist and then put on display downtown.

Today he's part of the collection at the Orange County Regional History Center.

And while the swans of Billy's time may be gone today, the birds remain as an iconic part of Lake Eola's identity.

>>The Swan boat dock and the Swan boats.

We opened that in 1925, so we've had swan boats here for that long.

So swans have really becom sort of a symbol of this park.

>>From swans to symbols, from history to heart.

Lake Eola Park is truly a gem of the City Beautiful.

>>This park wouldn't be here if it wasn't for this sense in Orlando that we are one community that we want to give of ourselves, that we are together, that we're united.

>>From swan boats to diverse neighborhoods to the pioneers who built the City Beautiful, Orlando was created one story at a time.

Thanks for joining us for our story.

I'm Scott Fais.

We'll see you on the next edition of Florida Road Trip just down the road.

Until then, safe travels everyone.

♪♪ >>This program is brough to you in part by the Paul B.

Hunter and Constance D. Hunter Charitable Foundation, a proud partner of WUCF and th Central Florida community.