Isaiah Hart

After moving to a location near the cow ford on the narrows of the St. Johns River, he began platting the town in 1822, and later served as postmaster, court clerk, commissioner of pilotage, judge of elections, major in the local militia during the Seminole War, and as a Whig member of the Florida Territorial Senate.

[1] In 1801, William Hart moved his family to East Florida when he received a land grant of 640 acres on Moncrief Creek and the Trout River from the Spanish governor.

Hart realized that the location offered economic opportunities, and on May 18, 1821, he bought 18 acres on the north bank of the St. Johns from Lewis Zachariah Hogans, owner of the surrounding land, which was formerly part of the Taylor Grant, for $72 worth of cattle.

[2] When Duval County was incorporated in 1822, Hart saw new opportunities for development, and persuaded his neighbors John Brady and Lewis Z. Hogans to join his enterprise of platting a town.

He continued to buy more real estate, and by the mid-1830s had acquired 2,000 acres of land ten miles west of Jacksonville near present-day Marietta, where he established a plantation he called "Paradise".

In 1859, Hart extended the original plat of Jacksonville to include all of his property, and moved the town business center to higher ground on a sand ridge.