WINTER SPRINGS

Until the mid-1950s, Winter Springs was nothing more than several square miles of scrub pine and palmettos. That's when developers Raymond Moss and William Edgemon bought the land, subdivided it and introduced the Village of North Orlando.

At the start of the 1970s, a time of rampant growth throughout Central Florida, the area contained one small grocery store and roughly 300 homes straddling S.R. 434.

Tuscawilla, eastern Seminole County's first upscale golf course community, changed all that. Also, a new city charter was adopted in 1972, changing the city's name to Winter Springs.

Today, the city's growth rivals that of adjacent Oviedo. In the past two decades, population has increased 800 percent, to more than 31,600. And more growth is on the way, through both residential and commercial development.

Officials are now eyeing more of the so-called Black Hammock, a marshy wilderness north of the city, where scattered homes are set on three- to five-acre lots. Over the years, the city has annexed several Black Hammock parcels and rezoned them to allow new subdivisions, much to the chagrin of many Black Hammock residents.

In any case, Winter Springs is moving ahead on other fronts. For example, a South Carolina-based developer has built a 240-acre Town Center at the corner of S.R. 434 and Tuskawilla Road.