Lake Miriam Neighborhood Association

ABOUT LAKE MIRIAM NEIGHBORHOOD

The Lake Miriam neighborhood is a centrally located, quiet area with a variety of lot sizes, home styles and mature trees. Many of the residents have lived in the neighborhood for decades. It is bordered on the north by Hallam Drive, on the south by Lake Miriam Drive, on the east by Lakeland Highlands Road, and on the west by Cleveland Heights Boulevard. Lake Miriam is the southern Lakeland city border in this area. The neighborhood offers easy access to Florida Avenue, 98 and the Polk Parkway. There are 906 single family homes in this neighborhood, many of which were built in the 1960s through the 1980s.

In 1968, in the Dakeman Road area, there were about four wood frame homes and one concrete block house. Dakeman Road was paved to where Heidi Lane would end, and the rest of the road was dirt and bordered by orange groves. Some were owned by Miriam Hallam Gladman, and others had previously been auctioned. One early resident's house on Dakeman Road was build in 1968 behind Evernham's Ceramics. Much of the land was horse pasture. All of Valley View was built at the same time and many houses ended up with orange trees.

By 1969, the bus to Lakeland High School was standing room only and the area was growing rapidly. That winter, smudge pots were lit throughout the remaining groves and that was the last of them in the area. Commerce soon followed the expanding base of residents. Many sections that were still in the county became part of the city on March 1, 2001.

The Hallam name comes from Willard Fordyce Hallam, a wealthy Washington D.C. publisher who bought 13,000 acres six miles southeast of downtown Lakeland for $5.25 an acre in 1910. He then added success as a developer to his business empire by subdividing the properties into 10-acre lots, with nine acres of citrus and one acre for a homestead. The properties were sold for $96 per acre, payable in three years.

Hallam's daughter, Helen Miriam Hallam Gladman spent part of her childhood at the family home in the Lakeland Highlands area near Banana Lake, along what is now Clubhouse Road. In 1930, after attending Cornell University, she became a teacher at Medulla Elementary. She later taught first grade at Dixieland Elementary, before retiring in 1966 at the age of 68. She died in 2004 at the age of 105.

Lake Miriam is a 22-acre private lake located south of E. Alamo Drive and behind what is now the Publix at Lake Miriam Square. The lake was a result of phosphate pits dug between 1941 and 1964, which later filled with water.

The Lake Miriam Neighborhood Association recently formed and is excited to make a difference for residents and their community.