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James Ellwood Bartlett, Snr.

James Ellwood Bartlett, Snr.

Male 1871 - 1952  (80 years)

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  • Name James Ellwood Bartlett 
    Suffix Snr. 
    Born 4 Jun 1871  Royal Oak, Oakland, Michigan, USA Find all individuals with events at this location 
    Gender Male 
    FindaGrave ID 24195459 
    Died 5 Feb 1952  Venice, Sarasota, Florida, USA Find all individuals with events at this location 
    Buried Winter Park, Orange, Florida, USA Find all individuals with events at this location 
    Person ID I3606  Lasbury Family
    Last Modified 10 Jan 2024 

    Father Wright Bartlett
              b. 10 Sep 1847, Waterboro, Chautauqua, New York, USA Find all individuals with events at this location
              d. 18 Feb 1937, Arcadia, DeSoto, Florida, USA Find all individuals with events at this location  (Age 89 years) 
    Mother Rachel Pamelia Ellwood
              b. 26 Apr 1848, Royal Oak, Oakland, Michigan, USA Find all individuals with events at this location
              d. 28 Jul 1935  (Age 87 years) 
    Married 6 Sep 1870  Royal Oak, Oakland, Michigan, USA Find all individuals with events at this location 
    Family ID F2147  Group Sheet  |  Family Chart

    Wife Nellie Bethune Allen
              b. 27 Apr 1875, Lodi, Kalkaska, Michigan, USA Find all individuals with events at this location
              d. 11 Oct 1977, Sarasota, Sarasota, Florida, USA Find all individuals with events at this location  (Age 102 years) 
    Married 16 Aug 1898  Jackson, Jackson, Michigan, USA Find all individuals with events at this location 
    Children 
     1. Lois Rachel Bartlett
              b. 9 Dec 1901, Jackson, Jackson, Michigan, USA Find all individuals with events at this location
              d. 8 Apr 2008, Clyde, Haywood, North Carolina, USA Find all individuals with events at this location  (Age 106 years)
     2. Reverend Allen Ellwood Bartlett, Snr.
              b. 20 Feb 1904, Jackson, Jackson, Michigan, USA Find all individuals with events at this location
              d. 27 Aug 1989, Sarasota, Sarasota, Florida, USA Find all individuals with events at this location  (Age 85 years)
     3. James Ellwood Bartlett, Jnr.
              b. 20 Feb 1904, Jackson, Jackson, Michigan, USA Find all individuals with events at this location
              d. 11 Nov 1994, Clearwater, Pinellas, Florida, USA Find all individuals with events at this location  (Age 90 years)
     4. Ruth Jane Bartlett
              b. 22 Aug 1908, Jackson, Jackson, Michigan, USA Find all individuals with events at this location
              d. 20 Mar 2002, Englewood, Sarasota, Florida, USA Find all individuals with events at this location  (Age 93 years)
     5. Leah Jeanne Bartlett
              b. 11 Apr 1915, Boca Grande, Lee, Florida, USA Find all individuals with events at this location
              d. 7 Jun 2009, Englewood, Sarasota, Florida, USA Find all individuals with events at this location  (Age 94 years)
    Last Modified 10 Jan 2024 
    Family ID F1247  Group Sheet  |  Family Chart

  • Event Map
    Link to Google MapsBorn - 4 Jun 1871 - Royal Oak, Oakland, Michigan, USA Link to Google Earth
    Link to Google MapsMarried - 16 Aug 1898 - Jackson, Jackson, Michigan, USA Link to Google Earth
    Link to Google MapsDied - 5 Feb 1952 - Venice, Sarasota, Florida, USA Link to Google Earth
    Link to Google MapsBuried - - Winter Park, Orange, Florida, USA Link to Google Earth
     = Link to Google Earth 

  • Photos
    James Ellwood Bartlett
    4 Generations of the Bartlett Family
    Bartlett Family

    Article about James Elwood Bartlett
    Article about James Elwood Bartlett

  • Notes 
    • James Ellwood Bartlett

      It was still the horse and buggy era. Fuel for the horses, of course, was needed on a daily basis. The feed and grain trade was a lucrative profession, if you were a shrewd merchant. James Elwood Bartlett was certainly such a businessman. He owned feed and grain mills, retail stores where he sold his finished products and grain elevators.

      He was the largest individual feed and grain operator in the state of Michigan. Being the astute merchant that he was, maybe he foresaw the horseless future that was rapidly approaching. Or maybe he was just bitten by the warm weather sunshine bug.

      Whatever the reason, in 1915, at the age of 43, he sold his large and tremendously successful business and said to his wife Nellie, "Let's take the whole winter off and go down to this place we're hearing about, Boca Grande." The Bartletts arrived in Boca Grande with their four children and another on the way.

      Leah Lasbury, longtime Englewood resident, is the youngest daughter of Nellie Allen and J.E. Bartlett. She recalls her father was immediately taken with Florida. He travelled all over the state, exploring different areas before he started investing.

      He bought extensive orange groves in Fort Ogden, property in Venice and Winter Park. He opened offices in Tampa, Sarasota and Winter Park, but he was most partial to the Lemon Bay area. He thought the bay spectacular and the fishing fabulous. So in the early 1920s, as the Florida boom was going strong, he started buying land here in Englewood. At one point in time, he was one of the largest land owners in our area. He owned about 40,000 acres altogether, some of which is now Manasota Key and Casperson Beach.

      One part of his holdings included 16,000 acres that started on the north side of Dearborn Street and meandered unevenly northward beyond Forked Creek. On the east side of State Road 776, there still is an area that is on the record as Bartlett Subdivision. He owned the 5,000 acres that today is platted as the Overbrook Gardens Development. It was probably 1922 when Bartlett bought that piece of land for a total of $700,000 or about $43 an acre. "His land also encompassed what is now Englewood Isles and Alameda Isles" says Leah Lasbury.

      "But then the debacle hit Florida in 1927. Everybody in Florida lost everything. The Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers, the BLE, went broke also. They had built the town of Venice, and the town really became a true ghost town.

      "Now this is really interesting," continues Leah, "There was one master mortgage on the town. All of those little houses and all the various component parts were included in one mortgage. So, when things began to pick up a little bit, nothing could be purchased because of this one mortgage. My father found out Kingsbury Curtis, he owned Curtis Publishing Company that put out the Saturday Evening Post, held the mortgage. He lived somewhere in the east and my Dad went up there and explained to him that the whole town was being held back. Not one piece of property could be released. Well, my dad got him to agree to break the condition and release individual parcels.

      "I think that was my father's greatest contribution to the area. He was the one who broke the log jam and opened things up in the whole Venice area."

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      The Bartlett Family

      James Elwood Bartlett was the largest individual feed and grain operator in the state of Michigan. Being the astute merchant he was, maybe he foresaw the horseless future that was rapidly approaching. Or maybe he was just bitten by the warm weather sunshine bug. What ever the reason by 1915 he had sold his very successful business and relocated with his wife Nellie and their four children to Boca Grande.

      Soon another child was born who would later become a prominent Englewood citizen, Leah Bartlett Lasbury. She said her father bought extensive orange groves in several parts of Florida, hotels and in the early 1920s started buying land here in Englewood. At one point in time, he was one of the largest land owners in our area. He owned about 40,000 acres altogether, some of which is now Manasota Key and Casperson Beach.

      One part of his holdings included 16,000 acres that started on the north side of Dearborn Street and meandered unevenly north beyond Forked Creek. It encompassed what are now the residential areas of Alameda Isles, Englewood Isles and Overbrook Gardens. Mr. Bartlett once took Sgt. Alvin C. York, the famous W.W.I hero, on a fishing trip out of Englewood.

      Dearborn Street and Olde Englewood Village
      http://www.oldeenglewood.com/site/history/pioneers/258-the-bartlett-family.html
    • A Legacy Continues

      James Elwood Bartlett was the patriarch of the Lasbury-Tracy family, one of the early pioneers of Englewood.

      J.E. and his wife Nellie took the daring step of moving to Englewood from Michigan in 1915 after selling his successful tackle and feed stores. J.E's adventure south lead him through several Florida communities of interest where he purchased land but it was Englewood and Venice that finally settled him down. No one is really sure what the final attraction to Englewood was. The people? Lemon Bay? Or was it simply the price and availability of land that hooked J.E.

      Family stories totaled J.E.'s land purchases as well over forty thousand acres that included large tracts of Venice and Englewood. Manasota Key was purchased but quickly resold because of the limited access and the rugged environment. Venice airport military bunkers were purchased and moved into Englewood for housing. Subdivisions were platted, lots were sold while family members grew up and moved away to pursue higher education, marriage and raise families. J.E. had five children, two boys, James and Alan and three girls, Leah Lois and Ruth. Leah B. Lasbury, Ruth Kuykendall and Lois B. Tracy returned to Englewood years later.

      Leah Lasbury founded Englewood's first Real Estate office in 1951 called Lee Lasbury Realty later purchased by Red Branning then Nathan B. Tracy III and renamed to Lasbury Tracy Realty Inc. Leah was a very active supporter of the Englewood community: she served as the president of the Chamber of Commerce, was one of the founders of the Elsie Quirk Community Library, the Englewood Water District and was actively involved in many organizations, including the Business and Professional Women's Organization and many other community and art organizations. Ruth Kuykendall, the youngest of the family settle into Venice working with her father J.E. as his personal secretary and married Kirk. Lois B. Tracy became a renowned abstract painter. Her artwork and her musings made her one of Englewood's most celebrated citizens. Some of Lois' works inducted into the Smithsonian and Metropolitan Museum of Art. Read more about Lois Bartlett Tracy.

      Blood lines may thin but in print, photos and canvas, the Bartlett's, Lasbury's and Tracy's will always be part of Englewood past, present and future.