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The Urban Coroner
Photography By Sugarbomb
STRAWN CITRUS PACKING HOUSE DISTRICT
A relic of the thriving twentieth century citrus industry in the Sunshine State.
The unique sawtooth roof packing house at the Strawn Citrus Packing House District, the Strawn name and Bob White Oranges still visible painted on the front | Photo © 2018 Sugarbomb
Located immediately north of DeLeon Springs, the Strawn Citrus Packing House District is a historic property in Central Florida. The two-acre property in rural Volusia County is one of the few remaining relics of the 20th century Florida citrus industry. Citrus farming and processing have been an integral part of the economy of Florida for well over a century, and to this day you can’t drive down a highway in the Sunshine State without seeing billboards and shops selling locally grown oranges. The district is made up of 12 buildings and 3 other structures, all built between 1921 and 1942 as part of the Strawn family’s operation.
The central feature of the district is the packing house with a distinctive sawtooth roof. The large window-lined packing house was used for the grading, sorting, and packing of citrus fruit. All other buildings on the property were built to support this operation. Behind the packing house stands a barn, blacksmith shop, machinery house, a steam and dynamo building, along with several other small structures, including a wooden water tower that still stands (albeit precariously) behind the barn.
Inside the packing house | Photo © 2018 Sugarbomb
Early Spanish explorers planted the first orange trees near St. Augustine, Florida in the 1500s, and Native Americans in the area would obtain seeds for orange trees from Spanish Missionaries. The first commercial citrus grove, named “El Vergel,” was established in 1763 by Jesse Fish in St Augustine, over 80 years before Florida officially became a state.
The citrus industry in the state of Florida began to really take root (pun intended) in the early 1800s. Early pioneers recognized the potential of the state's climate for growing citrus fruits, including oranges, grapefruits, lemons, and limes. However, many growers would gradually move southward, driven to warmer areas like modern day Hillsborough, Manatee, and Polk counties by freezes that would decimate their crops.
The office building, water tower, and barn on the Strawn Citrus Packing House District property | Photo © 2018 Sugarbomb
While everyone is still going on about the January 2025 Florida Snowpocalypse that nearly tripled snowfall records in some parts of the Florida Panhandle and left inches of snow on the ground for days, Florida isn't as much of a stranger to winter weather as one might imagine with a moniker like "The Sunshine State." While measurable snowfall is rare, freezes are not, and there have been quite a few arctic blasts that dropped the temperature down into the teens.
Due to Florida's low latitude and subtropical climate, temperatures low enough to support significant snowfall are infrequent and fleeting. In general, frost is more common than snow, requiring temperatures of 32°F or less at 7ft/2m above sea level, a cloudless sky, and a relative humidity of 65% or more.
The worst freeze on record to hit Volusia County happened on February 8, 1835, causing the fruit trees to be "destroyed, roots and all" as far south as the 28th parallel - roughly to what is now Tampa on the west coast and Palm Bay on the east coast. Most orange varieties will start to experience damage when temperatures fall below 28°F. Even at slightly higher temperatures, prolonged exposure to cold can still cause considerable damage.
Despite the occasional freezes, by the mid nineteenth century, commercial citrus cultivation began to take off. The industry primarily focused on oranges and grapefruits and would continue to grow over the following decades. The introduction of railroads in the latter part of the nineteenth century helped to facilitate the transportation of citrus products from Florida to northern markets, leading to increased demand and expansion of the citrus industry.
Inside the packing house | Photo © 2018 Sugarbomb
Theodore Strawn was born in Illinois in 1870. He studied law at Northwestern University and was admitted to the Illinois Bar in 1896. His parents had previously settled in DeLeon Springs, Florida – then called Spring Garden – and he first came to Florida in the early 1880s to visit them. His father, Robert Strawn, had purchased several citrus groves in the area and the family would spend their winters in Florida. The family also continued to maintain a farm in Illinois and would return there each spring.
Theodore Strawn began making regular visits to Florida after 1897 and started investing in real estate in DeLeon Springs around 1905. Like his father, he also purchased a number of citrus groves in the area.
Over the next two decades, Theodore Strawn acquired a large number of citrus holdings, in part by buying off existing groves that other growers could not make profitable. Through careful cultivation and use of the latest scientific methods, he was able to make these groves flourish and turn a profit.
Barrels left behind in the packing house | Photo © 2018 Sugarbomb
He began his citrus packing operation about 1909, establishing his own "Bob White" brand, named after the Northern Bobwhite quails the family enjoyed hunting. Strawn initially worked out of a small tent, moving from grove to grove packaging oranges. In 1912, he built a two-story wood frame packing house near the DeLeon Springs Railroad Depot. By 1915, Theodore Strawn had become one of the most prominent citrus growers in Central Florida, cultivating nearly 100 acres of groves and shipping approximately 20,000 boxes of oranges annually.
As the citrus industry boomed in Florida around the turn of the century, growers began to establish packing houses. These packing houses, also known as packing plants or packing sheds, allowed growers to streamline the packing and distribution process, and provided growers with a centralized location for processing, sorting, and packing their fruit for shipment.
Initially simple wooden structures, packing houses evolved over time to incorporate modern equipment and technology, including conveyor belts, grading machines, and waxing lines. The development of improved packing and shipping technologies, such as wax coating and refrigerated railcars, allowed Florida-grown citrus to be shipped longer distances and stored for longer periods, expanding market reach.
In 1909, Strawn joined other Florida growers to organize the Florida Citrus Exchange. Organizations like the Florida Citrus Exchange and the United Growers and Shippers Association formed in the early 20th century, pooling the resources of individual growers to streamline operations, market their products more effectively, and negotiate better prices for their fruit.
However, Strawn left the Florida Citrus Exchange in 1911 because he felt that his fruit was superior in quality to what was produced by most of the other members of the organization and believed he could more effectively market his product on his own. His confidence in his fruit’s quality was not misplaced, and Strawn was able to find buyers for his fruit throughout the North and Midwest within a very short time. The consistent high quality of Strawn’s citrus put it in high demand, and it was regularly bought for a higher price than that of the majority of other Florida and California citrus producers.
The front of Strawn's sawtooth roof packing house, constructed in 1921 after the original packing house caught fire | Photo © 2018 Sugarbomb
The packing house as photographed by the in 1993 | Photo © National Register of Historic Places
In February 1921, Strawn’s original wooden packing house burned down. He purchased the tract of land on which the current packing house district is located shortly afterward. Strawn then contracted Truscon Steel Company of Youngstown, Ohio to manufacture a prefabricated fireproof building that would serve as a new packing plant. He also had the Atlantic Coast Line – now called CSX – extend a rail track to the site.
A metal frame building lined with windows and topped with a unique sawtooth roof was constructed to replace the old packing house. The concrete foundation was poured at the site, and the sectional building was shipped by rail to Strawn’s property where it was then assembled upon the foundation. This new packing house would be the largest structure on the property, measuring 142 by 78 feet at its base. Work was completed by December 1921 and the project cost approximately $75,000 – over $1.3 million in 2025.
The metal and glass packing house contained approximately 5,000 square feet of floor space and was designed to provide an abundance of natural lighting. The walls were built from stamped copper alloy steel panels and were designed to be fireproof. The packing house’s distinctive tripartite sawtooth roof was designed to maximize the distribution of natural light within the interior of the packing house. Three pairs of large metal sliding doors were located on the west side of the building at the loading platform, and a conveyor was later installed extending from the southwest corner of the building to the cull house nearby.
Theodore Strawn himself designed some of the equipment installed in the packing house, but much of the large apparatus was purchased from the Skinner Machinery Company of Dunedin, Florida.
Buildings on the Strawn Citrus Packing House District property; the back of the packing house, shed, and water tower | Photo © 2018 Sugarbomb
The Engine House, located about 20 feet east of the packing house, was also completed in 1921. It served as a power plant for the property, containing a forty-horsepower steam boiler and dynamo that operated the equipment in the packing house. A drive shaft connected the engine room with equipment in the packing house through a tunnel in the poured concrete floor.
Around the same time as the packing house was completed, Strawn had the Box House built for assembling field and shipping crates.
About 60 feet south of the machinery house was the Fertilizer House, a wood frame building with a gable roof and walls made of stamped steel panels and sash windows which provided natural interior lighting. It was completed in 1922, and as the name would suggest, was used for storing fertilizer.
The Water Tower and tank were built some years earlier and moved from its original site near Deland and reassembled at the new packing house district, northeast of the packing house itself.
The Tire House and Blacksmith Shop, also located on the property, were constructed in the early 1920s. In addition to these, there were two wood frame storage buildings built in the 1940s, and two sheds, one constructed in the 1920s and the other in the 1940s.
A two-story corrugated metal barn, the second largest building in the district, was completed in 1955 and located about 60 feet east of the packing house.
Inside the office building | Photo © 2018 Sugarbomb
The Strawn family's citrus business flourished throughout the early and mid-twentieth century. The state's favorable climate, coupled with advancements in irrigation and pest control, allowed growers to produce large quantities of high-quality fruit year-round. The highest quality oranges they grew were given the “Bob White” mark. These "Bob White" oranges were typically shipped up north, while the more mediocre citrus was sold at roadside fruit stands and markets in Florida.
Theodore Strawn’s operation pressed on (pressed – get it? It’s a juice pun!) through the 1914 and 1933 outbreaks of Citrus Canker, a crop disease that was referred to as the most dreadful disease threat to US agriculture. In both instances, controlled crop burns were the only cure for the outbreaks, and fire remains the only cure for it to this day. In 1929 the first Mediterranean fruit fly infestation occurred, affecting 75% of Florida’s Citrus trees and leading to an embargo of all fruit from affected areas enforced by state officers and the national guard.
Inside the packing house - taken in 1993 by the NRHP | Photo © National Register of Historic Places
Inside the packing house | Photo © 2018 Sugarbomb
Theodore Strawn prided himself on the high quality of the citrus produced by his groves. Workers in both the field and the packing plant would wear gloves, and Strawn boasted that "the first human hand to touch the fruit was that of the customer." To ensure that the fruit sold under his brand names was of the finest quality, Strawn only processed citrus that had been produced by his own groves, which totaled nearly 500 acres.
The citrus was rolled into field boxes rather than dumped. It was then placed into a water tank at the packing house, where mechanical devices scrubbed, rinsed, dried, graded, and sized the fruit. Employees at Strawn’s packing house were trained in specific tasks, ranging from equipment repair to grading fruit.
Strawn’s "Bob White" and "Intrinsic" brands were each separated into three varieties based on the color of the peel. A fine coat of paraffin was then sprayed onto the fruit, and marking machines placed the "Bob White" and "Intrinsic" seals on each orange. Packers then wrapped each piece of fruit in tissue paper and placed it in boxes for shipment to customers.
The office building at the Strawn Citrus Packing House District | Photo © 2018 Sugarbomb
Theodore Strawn passed away in 1925 at the age of 55, at which time the operation of the packing plant and other Strawn Company interests in DeLeon Springs passed to his wife and sons. By the time of his death, less than two decades after beginning his citrus packing operation, Strawn’s markets extended throughout the United States and even included Great Britain. Strawn had begun shipping his fruit to England and Scotland in 1923, and one of the crowning achievements of his life came in 1924 when the renowned Frascati's Restaurant on Oxford Street in London featured Bob White oranges and tangerines in a Christmas Eve display.
The Strawn family continued to make additions to the packing house complex. An office building to the north of the packing house had been under construction when Theodore Strawn died and was completed in 1926, sporting two brick chimneys and a flat roof porch at the entrance.
Other buildings and structures to support the operation were added in the 1930s and early 1940s. Two 1,000-gallon water tanks were purchased around 1935, and storage and grease rack buildings were completed on the eve of World War II. In 1947, an increased demand for commercial orange juice in the post-war period prompted the construction of an addition to the packing house which included a conveyor and cull house for processing juice oranges.
John Strawn inside the packing house at the Strawn Citrus Packing House District | Photo © Volusia County
John Strawn, the grandson of Theodore Strawn, returned from college in 1951 to take over the role of overseeing a bookkeeper and the workers employed by the packing house. By the 1960s, Volusia County was a leader in Florida's orange growing industry. The Strawn’s citrus business operated in the same Central Florida location until Christmas 1983 when freezing temperatures descended on the Sunshine State.
Two days before Christmas, a strong Arctic high pressure system dipped southward and on Christmas morning 1983 – referred to in many news articles as the “coldest Christmas ever” – temperatures in Volusia County were recorded in the teens. That year, the orange trees were killed down to the stump by the freeze, according to John Strawn. This freeze once again devastated much of the citrus industry in Florida, with nearly a quarter of crops destroyed, equating to a loss of about $4 billion in today’s money. After the 1983 freeze, the Strawn family’s packing house packed it in, and the property was left mostly abandoned.
Nearly a decade after closing up shop, the old packing house and 12 other buildings on the property were placed on the National Register of Historic Places in August 1993. The NRHP form describes the Strawn Citrus Packing District as among the most complete historic citrus packing complexes presently documented in the state of Florida, containing a variety of buildings and structures erected between 1921 and 1942 that are devoted to preparation and packing of oranges for shipment to market.
One section of the window-lined walls of the old packing house, which provided an abundance of natural light during its operation | Photo © 2018 Sugarbomb
Very little citrus was processed at the packing house since the hard freeze of 1983 devastated the citrus groves in the DeLeon Springs area. At the time of its addition to the NRHP in 1993, Theodore Strawn, Inc. continued to maintain the packing house and support buildings, though the packing house and other buildings on the property were no longer in use. However, the packing plant remained fully operational, and the equipment was still in the buildings and noted as being in a good state of repair.
Over the following decades, however, the site was heavily vandalized and looted. In 2008 a fire destroyed the machine shop. In 2010, another fire destroyed a 40-foot by 50-foot outbuilding and damaged two others.
Small room at the front of the packing house, the only separate room from the otherwise open packing house | Photo © 2018 Sugarbomb
At the time I first explored the Strawn Citrus Packing House, the rows of machinery that once filled the packing house were long gone and vines had crept up the walls and wound through the windows. The Bob White name could still be seen on the front of the old packing house, faded from time and partially shrouded by overgrowth, but still visible to anyone who may have found themselves driving down Lake Winona Road in rural Volusia County. By 2023, however, the packing house had deteriorated further, and the walls were completely gone, leaving only the metal support beams propping up the skeletal remains of the sawtooth roof on the foundation.
Hurricane Ian’s landfall in September 2022 was no doubt a contributor to further damage to the packing house. After making landfall on the southwest Florida coast, the massive storm cut a path of destruction moving northeast across the state and bringing hurricane force winds, power outages, and severe flooding to Central Florida. Hurricanes Helene and Milton in 2024 both grazed the same area of Central Florida as well.
Looking out of the back of the packing house and the two-story barn about 60 feet to the east behind the packing house | Photo © 2018 Sugarbomb
Even in its dilapidated condition, the site holds considerable historic value as a representation of the early development of the citrus industry in Florida. It was added to The Florida Trust for Historic Preservation's list of Florida's Eleven Most Endangered Historic Sites in 2007 and is listed as endangered by the Volusia County Historic Preservation Board.
To this day, citrus remains an integral part of the economy in the state of Florida. Most citrus grown today is produced in the southern two-thirds of the Florida peninsula, where the probability of freezing temperatures is lowest. When you stop at one of the official Florida Welcome Centers on the way into the state, you’re greeted with a cup of free Florida orange juice – a tradition since 1949. The orange is the official state fruit, orange juice is the state beverage, and the orange blossom is the state flower. The Strawn family’s packing plant may have fallen victim to the elements and passage of time, but the citrus industry continues to thrive in the Sunshine State.
An early 20th century postcard of the Strawn family's packing house | Source: Volusia County History Facebook page
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