How old is Cooter Pond? Was Cooter Pond home to a Yacht Club? Did the pond save the old Citrus County Courthouse from flooding? Did the resident fish enjoy a moonshiner’s cache? Are there boxcars from a past train derailment still hidden under the waters?
Cooter Pond was once so impure it was called the “Rodney Dangerfield of local water bodies”. Did it finally get the respect it deserves? Challenge yourself to see how many of these 11 facts about Cooter Pond you can remember.
11. Cooter Pond is named after the Florida Cooter, a type of turtle that is common in our area. You can see them basking in the sun along the edge of the pond. They usually grow to about 12 inches in size. Florida Cooters feed mainly on vegetation that is readily available in the pond. You’ll sometimes see them basking in groups on a log or along the shore.
10. Cooter Pond was originally a cove on Henderson Lake. Up until the 1950’s, the area known as today’s Cooter Pond was simply an open cove on the larger Lake Henderson. Boats could easily move between the cove and the lake. Railroad tracks ran alongside the western shore and had to negotiate a sharp curve near today’s Route 41. In the early 1950’s, the eastern bank of the cove was filled in and railroad tracks moved to eliminate the curve in the train’s path. A 25 acre (MOL) landlocked pond was created and Cooter Pond was born.
9. Cooter Pond had different names over the years. As you can see from the USGS map above, the new area was called “Cooter Lake” after the turtles that lived in the cove – but given the small size of the lagoon, most locals called it “Cooter Pond”. A developer tried to rebrand the pond as “Sunset Lake” in the 1950’s and that name was used on some maps of the area. However, during a spirited Inverness City Council meeting in 1988, “Cooter Pond” was officially adopted as the pond’s name.
8. Inverness Mayor Elfred Lassiter moored his boat in the middle of Cooter Pond to celebrate Christmas. Mayor Lassiter decorated his personal cabin cruiser to welcome visitors to Inverness during the holiday season. In spite of vandals sinking the boat in 1975, Lassiter continued the tradition for several years during the 1970’s (with additional 24/7 security, of course).
7. A hotel called the “Inverness Yacht Club” was proposed by a developer in 1982. The plan called for 96 units and a 5,000-foot restaurant lounge on the shores of Cooter Pond. Unfortunately, there would be no yachts sailing on the waters of the small landlocked pond, unless you consider Mayor Lassiter’s cabin cruiser at Christmas time. Only paddleboats and canoes would ply these waters. The plan was ultimately unsuccessful and the city’s Yacht Club was never built.
6. Downtown flooding would sometimes restrict access to the Citrus County Courthouse. Storm drains diverted waters to Cooter Pond. A huge storm drain was installed in 1971 to channel water away from the downtown area into the pond. The Highland Square Plaza was also subject to flooding, so Cooter Pond was used as a drainage solution for that problem in 1978. By 1989, officials realized that they had created an environmental challenge that resulted in stagnant water, uncontrollable plant growth and potentially harmful chemicals being dumped into the pond. Plans were developed to filter any ground water, drain the pond and clear all of the plants (and four feet of muck) from the pond. Unfortunately, the full plan did not secure the necessary government funding and a piecemeal approach was adopted to address some of the issues. Today Cooter Pond’s waters are cleaner than past years and visitors can enjoy a stroll along a boardwalk. More remains to be done to restore the pond to its original condition.
5. Storm water runoff was a minor problem compared raw sewage flowing into Cooter Pond. There were no central sewage treatment plants in Citrus County’s early days. The problem became acute when the downtown Inverness septic tanks failed and dumped raw sewage into the pond. In 1957, the problem expanded to include the Tsala Apopka lakes, and the Florida State Department of Health declared the waters in our area unsafe for swimming and bathing. There were cases of typhus directly linked to the sewage and explosion of the mosquito population, especially the culex quinquefasciatus variety which has been known to be a carrier of encephalitis. The City Council took steps to replace the outdated septic system with a modern waste control system and the quality of the pond’s water improved.
4. The U.S.S New Jersey once plied the waters of Cooter Pond. A five-foot model of the famous battleship was among the fleet of model boats that enthusiasts would sail on the pond every weekend in the early 1980’s. Their ships enjoyed the still waters but still fouled their propellers if they ventured too far into the weeds.
3. A moonshiner’s stash was dumped into the pond. A Florida State Trooper stopped a truck in 1958 and discovered a sizable cache of illegal alcohol hidden in the back. Over 250 gallons of the high-proof beverage were dumped into the storm drain which led to – you guessed it – Cooter Pond. The aroma of the “hootch” wafted through the downtown Inverness area. The fish were said to enjoy their unexpected gift from the FHP.
2. Home of the expanded Citrus County Jail? When it became apparent that the old county jail in Inverness was obsolete, the Board of County Commissioners embarked on a long project to identify a suitable location. Sheriff Charlie Dean argued that the best location would be on the shores of Cooter Pond due to its proximity to the Court House. The BoCC agreed and approved the plan. The Inverness City Council did not feel that the presence of 400 prisoners near the heart of downtown would not foster their plans to rejuvenate that area. The wrangling between the BoCC and Inverness Council lasted over a year. The BoCC tried to convince the Inverness Council several times, but the Council stood resolute against this proposal. In the end, the new facility was built in a rural section of Lecanto and the pond was left to custody of the turtles.
1. Does Cooter Pond contain the remains of a train that derailed in the past? Stories arose in the 1980’s about a past railroad derailment that resulted in several railroad cars being left on the bottom of Cooter Pond. Local citizens recounted how they saw families venturing into the water to remove sides of beef from one of the overturned cars. Others remembered seeing a boxcar full of new cars being left at the bottom of the pond. Some old-time Citrus residents recalled wading near the site of the boxcars and pulling up random items with their feet. Finally, a local man developed a large waterborne metal detector and he claimed to have found a large magnetic anomaly off the eastern bank of the pond in 1983.
