In 1842, Cornelius Taylor, a Seminole Wars veteran who came to Lake Monroe by way of other American frontiers, arrived from Mayport near Jacksonville with his wife and children, several dozen settlers, and a number of slaves, and on a 160-acre land grant built a cotton and sugarcane plantation that largely became Enterprise. Tall, loud, and hot-tempered, he became known as "the Thunder of Enterprise," and as founder of the first settlement there on this general site, he stood at the center of a community focused on the shell mound, topped by a commodious hotel, and three nearby springs that offered travelers a kind of health spa. Enterprise soon became the seat of Mosquito County, with Taylor as its territorial representative, but his rough manner also fueled conflicts, including a deadly shooting at the shell mound. After Taylor eventually left for Texas, the settlement declined. The story of Old Enterprise also included his wife Catherine, a cultured woman of Minorcan ancestry who ran the hotel, raised three children, and showed a sweet disposition in a trying place, and Taylor's African-American slaves, who battled the land and worked constantly to make him a living. However lovely the place seemed, it exacted a heartbreaking price: nine slaves died of disease, and the Taylors' own young daughter also died.