An Unofficial History of Orlando

Some would say Orlando was a town without much history but they are wrong. Orlando's history dates back to the first voyage of Europeans to the New World. While the history books will insist that Christopher Columbus never set foot on the continent of North America the real facts have been lost in the fog of history. Little known documents of this period report that after visiting Hispaniola, his men, who looked upon Chris as a father figure, kept whining, "Daddy, we haven't done anything FUN on this trip."

So, after sailing north and just before turning eastward toward Spain, which was going to be a long, LONG time until they reached the next rest area, Chris spied, just on the horizon, a beautiful stretch of white sand beaches lined with lovely coconut palms. This seemed a likely place to let the crew stretch their legs so he dropped anchor just off modern day Cocoa Beach little knowing what was awaiting him.

Shortly after landing locals told Chris of a pleasure palace operated by Chief Walter of the Disney tribe located just 25 leagues to the west. Chris tried to keep this information quiet because he had heard that the attraction was not what you might call wampum-friendly and he had hoped to return to Spain with at least some treasure but shortly the whole crew was clamoring to go. Knowing that "the kids" as he called them (Chris, coming from a dysfunctional family of origin with resultant unresolved co-dependency issues, was overly invested in this father-figure thing.) would not give him a minutes rest all the way back to Madrid if he didn't stop, Chris relented and the rest was history.

You doubt this? Well, we offer as proof the following: Upon their return to Spain Chris's crew soon spread their tales of the region around. "Hey!" they exclaimed. "It was like we were kids again!" It was these reports which prompted Ponce de Leon, a vile usurper erroneously credited with the first exploration of Florida, to come in search of this "Fountain of Youth." Further, history clearly notes that Queen Isabella was very unhappy that Chris and crew returned home from their Florida vacation with pockets which had been nearly emptied by the natives - a tradition which persists even until this very day. We rest our case.

Time passed. Hurricanes, wars, orange crates, in fact most things, all came and went except, of course Yankees. While most of their invasions of the south ceased after the victor, Gen. Robert E. Lee, dictated the terms of surrender at Appomattox in 1865 thus ending the War of Northern Aggression, large contingents have continued to mount annual sorties into Florida. This has prompted some locals to insist we would have been better off had General Lee's adjutant, Lt. General Robert. E. Leave-Us-Alone, been allowed to write the document sealing our victory.

None-the-less Orlando survived and prospered . . . . well at least most of the time. During the 1930's many of the natives suffered from a malaise which later generations came to call "The Depression" and, as Prozac was not available in those times, they had nowhere to turn. A physician, Doctor Phillips, who had moved to Orlando to make a buck in the cattle industry (Medicare reimbursement rates were terrible even back then!), found an answer. He decided to buy up land, plant orange groves on the well-drained acreage and build houses on the . . . er . . . ahem . . well . . shall we say slightly moister acres . . so people could pick where they lived. Never one to struggle with self-esteem issues he named one of these communities Doctor Phillips. All of this increased activity soon brought an end to the Depression and to Doctor Phillips' personal depression, too, as his pockets were being amply lined by this activity. It was Doctor Phillips, in fact, who coined what has become our state slogan: KEEP FLORIDA GREEN! BRING MONEY!.

Look at your luggage tags as you arrive by air in Orlando. There, on the tag, you will find the three mysterious letters MCO. Where did these come from? What could be the meaning of this cryptic notation? Well, in 1942 a large patch of empty ground near the village of Doctor Phillips was recaptured by the Federal government (the losing side during what we still, politely, call "The Period of Unpleasantness With Our Neighbors To the North") who promptly began wrecking airplanes there. When, from time to time, someone was able to learn to fly his instructors would exclaim, "That one's the real McCoy!" From this came the name of the air base - McCoy Field. While later recaptured by forces of the City of Orlando and renamed Orlando International Airport the Federal government has steadfastly refused to acknowledge the error of their ways and change the identifier from MCO to OIA which they could do if they weren't so pig-headed which is what caused all of those problems 140 years ago anyway as we all know..

Thirty years ago many native American groups - now called corporations - migrated into the Central Florida area where they set up their tourist traps . . . er make that tourist venues. There were, in fact, so many of them, that the locals began to despair of having enough room for them all. "Where in the WORLD are we going to put them?" they asked. And from that came the current over-riding theme of the area today - Disney World, Sea World, Orchid World, Citrus World, Beanie World, Nurse World, Nurse Service World, Cycle World, Factory Outlet World, Clock World, Denim World, Eyeglass World, Flag World, Game World, Golf World, Horse World, Illustration World, Insurance World, Kids World, LV World, Magic World, Opti-World, Speed World, Paint Ball World, Panel World, Patio World, Party World, Rec Vee World, Spice World, Scuba World, Sci-Fi World, Sing-Along World, Transmission World, Used Tire World, Vitamin World and Window World just to name a few.

And so we find ourselves in more modern times. We will not bore you with a recitation of recent events but we do want you to know we most definitely CAN count! We can count, recount, recount again and recount yet again! In fact, Florida can honestly boast of world-class counters, our most famous being Chad, a guy with dimples who hangs in West Palm Beach. But, proud as we are of Chad, here in Orlando we did not have "those" problems nor did we contribute to them; we all voted the right way the first time: Half of us voted the right way one way and half the other right way. Now isn't that right?

Now "orange juice" glad you took the time to read this history!