Seminole Rest - Oak Hill, FL
N 28° 52.237 W 080° 50.215
17R E 515904 N 3193662
Seminole Rest, also known as Snyder Hill, Oak Hill, and Live Oak Hill, was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1997.
Waymark Code: WMJ10A
Location: Florida, United States
Date Posted: 09/07/2013
Views: 6
"...Seminole Rest, a former plantation on the Indian River. Sitting atop a series of large middens topped with cedars and an oak hammock – it holds thousands of years of history, first as a coastal encampment for Florida’s early peoples (2000 B.C. – 1040 A.D.) and during the Spanish period, home for the Ais and Timucua Indians.
There are two historic buildings on site, including the Instone House, a plantation home built before the 1890s, and a caretaker’s cottage of a similar vintage."
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"The Instone house was constructed sometime prior to 1890 and may have been moved from its original location elsewhere on the mound. It was enlarged from nine rooms to 14 plus three baths through the addition of a third floor by Hatt on Tumor, who owned the property from 1890-1911. The structure is of a late Victorian style with steeply pitched roof and end gables. It is wood frame with board and batten siding covered with yellow shingles. It originally had porches surrounding it, but only the porches on the east, south, and west remain. The interior retains much of its original fabric and appears to have been altered only to provide electricity, indoor plumbing, and a modem kitchen.
In 1911 the property was purchased by Wesley H. Snyder and remained in the Snyder family until the late 1980s when it was sold to the Nature Conservancy and then to the National Park Service.
The caretaker's house or cottage is a wood frame structure that dates to pre-1890. It has a steeply pitched roof, board and batten siding, an original bay window, and porches on the east and south. Several doors and windows have been modified from the original, and the interior has undergone much more extensive modernization than the Instone house. This structure may have been the post office for Oak Hill for some years.
The garage is a frame structure with corrugated metal roof and siding on cement block piers. The national register form designates it as "noncontributing."
A wooden dock once extended out to the Intracoastal Waterway. It was replaced with a boat dock near the caretaker's house that was designated on the national register form as "noncontributing." Pilings are all that remain of that dock.
The significance of the historic structures and landscape as described in the national register form relates to (1) design and integrity of the buildings, (2) the nearly 100 years of occupation by only two families, (3) the local prominence of the two families, and (4) the lack of landscape change during the last 80 years. The history section of a historic structures report would probably compare and contrast the historic structures with others in this part of Florida to better understand their architectural significance.
The landscape of the site's historic period is thought to be relatively intact.
The archeological significance of the Seminole Rest mounds lies in the fact that they have survived relatively intact when 70% of the mounds in Volusia County have been destroyed. They are also significant because they are the only remaining mounds known to have data covering the Orange-St. Johns II periods. The scientific value of the mounds is high."
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