Beginning in 2016-2017, student workers at the McKay Archives Center, led by Archivist Gerrianne Schaad, have analyzed a manuscript acquired by the Archives in order to put together an inclusive history of the people and the property mentioned in the Business Proposal. The manuscript, an investment proposal for a tract of land in Orange County, FL, was likely created around 1926; it outlines a business enterprise belonging to some of the most influential people in early Orlando’s history. Avalon Groves, as it was named, and the Orlando Orange Groves Company, its parent company, were surrounded by money, influence, and (as we discovered in the course of our study) scandal. The students employed by the Archives have put together historical data ranging from newspapers and history books to commission and business records to put together a picture of the events and influences surrounding the company, the Orlando of the late Twenties, and of Central Florida when it was still dominated by swamps and citrus.
