A Brief History of Tallahassee Florida

The name "Tallahassee" is a Muskogean Indian word often translated as "old fields" or "old town." This likely stems from the Creek (later called Seminole) Indians that migrated from Georgia and Alabama into the Tallahassee region during the late 18th and early 19th centuries. When they arrived, they found large areas of cleared land that had previously been occupied by the Apalachee tribe.

During the American Civil War, Tallahassee was the only Confederate state capital east of the Mississippi not captured by Union forces. Following the Civil War, much of Florida's industry moved to the south and east, a trend that continues to this day. The end of slavery caused the cotton and tobacco trade to suffer, and the state's major industries shifted to citrus, lumber, naval stores, cattle ranching and tourism. The post-Civil War period was also a time when many of the former plantations in the Tallahassee area were purchased by wealthy northerners for use as winter hunting preserves.