Archaeological evidence indicates that Indians were the earliest residents of the Shingle Creek area, and centuries later Seminole Indians from north of Florida established themselves there. During Florida's Territorial period, scattered populations of Indians from Georgia and South Carolina and free and escaped slaves found safety in the local swamps. During the Second Seminole War, including a skirmish nearby, the Seminoles eluded the military, and after the Third Seminole War they moved deeper into the Everglades but continued to trade with new settlers. When Florida became a state in 1845, only a handful of homesteads existed between Orlando and Bartow, but within a few years settlers staked claims along the creek, and at the close of the Civil War soldiers from both sides sought new lives in this wilderness. These pioneer families established a rural community with homes, a store, postal service, citrus groves, cattle herds, schools, and churches. During the mid to late 1800s and early 1900s, families such as the Yates, Overstreet, Bronson, and Steffee families sustained themselves with crops and cattle, while businesses included a sawmill, slaughterhouse, and packing house, with products going to market in Kissimmee by train, boat, or wagon. Jackson Yates, the first to settle in the area, carried mail on horseback between Jernigan, today's Orlando, and Bartow, married Vianna Overstreet, and his brother James opened a general store on the east side and drove to Mellonville, Sanford, for supplies. Henry Overstreet, the area's second homesteader, arrived with his family from Georgia in 1858, and his son Eleazer Lewis Daniel Overstreet became a farmer and cattleman. Shingle Creek, the headwaters of the Florida Everglades, flows for 23 miles from north near Orlando to Lake Tohopekaliga and has long been a place of solace, recreation, and connection with nature.