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• Downloadable Map

This is the one and only recreation of "The City Beautiful" up for download.
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OVERVIEW
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Before the world-class theme parks arrived, Orlando, Florida was a mid-sized southern city of charm and character, quite different from the metropolis of endless suburbs that it is today. It truly was the Deep South. Baptist churches were packed every Sunday and the old folks sat on their porches reminiscing of simpler times. Citrus was king and it is said that the whole city smelled of orange blossoms in the spring. The city attracted residents for similar reasons to today, with residents arriving to enjoy the "mild climate", and to make a living. However, much has changed. Therefore, I have attempted, over the past few years, to reconstruct a city that truly is no more. Although many of the buildings in this map still exist, the culture that they were put up in has largely disappeared.

Why 1941, specifically? It was an important year, as the U.S. entered the war, and the depression was ending. A massive influx of northern residents into Florida in the 1940s and ’50s propelled population growth and marked the beginning of a shift from native population growth to growth primarily by immigration. Indeed, today less than one-third of residents were born in Florida. In a sense, this was the end of the “old” Florida.

Please note that the city is a continuous work in progress, and although I plan to keep working on the project, I have, at the moment, no goal to finish it as I feel that the area I am attempting to recreate is too large for one single person to build and requires a greater deal of work.