By Peek Hames – Originally published in the 2006 Founder’s Review
Just a mile east of Belleview, off 110th Street, live Juddy and Lillian Perry. When you turn into their drive, you see, beside their home, some grand old flowering azaleas. Also there are some old longleaf pines and scattered oaks. On the other side of the drive, behind five strands of barbed wire, are a dozen or so premium bulls. Some are standing in the shade, while one white Charolais bull is pawing the dirt and throwing it up over his back.
Past the backyard, near the barn, are some cowboys, cowdogs, tractors, pickup trucks, and cattle trailers. Looking over the corral, past the barn—which once was all farming land—the approaching rooflines of new homes are replacing the barbed wire fences and feed lots.
It was over 6,000 acres of blackjack, palmettos, sand pines, and bushy scrubland when George Perry, his sons G.C. and Juddy, bought the land in 1948. The property bordered a sandy Candler Road, almost to Smith Lake on the east, and from the ballpark up both sides of C-25 north, to where the railroad tracks cross the road. The land had more than its share of large rattlesnakes, with some deer, bear, quail, raccoons, fox squirrels, flying squirrels, gophers, and about any kind of snake or varmint you wanted to find in Central Florida.
Juddy and his wife, Lillian, built their house off what was known for many years as Candler Road in 1951. The lumber was cut from longleaf pines in Oxford, where the Perry family had been in the cattle business since early in the century. There was no electricity on Candler Road in 1951, and the house was built by hand. Juddy’s aunt worked for Florida Power in St. Petersburg. When she found out Juddy and Lillian were building out there with no power, she talked to some of the upper-ups at the power company, and soon the power lines were run and electricity was turned on.
When the man from Florida Power came to connect the electric, he told Juddy, “Mister, you must have done something bad to move way out here, where nobody can find you.”
When they bought the land from the Camps of Ocala, the land wasn’t good for cattle. They would clear a couple hundred acres each year for watermelon land. They leased some of it and planted the rest. After the harvest, they would level the land and plant it back in Pensacola and Alice clover. They cleared the land with a 300-foot, nine-ton ship’s chain. The chain was hooked between two D6 caterpillars and pulled across the trees. Then they would turn around and come back the opposite direction, and the trees and brush would come up by the roots. The trees and brush were then piled into windrows. The first farming was done west of Baseline Road, up toward Santos, where they could load their watermelons at the Santos railroad siding.
Before the land was put into permanent pasture, the Perrys would drive their cattle on horseback to Belleview to winter on the wiregrass there. In May, the cattle were driven back to Oxford. On the drives, they would water the cattle at Smith Lake. The cowboys used long braided rawhide whips to round up and drive the cattle. The sound of the whips cracking was a loud and familiar sound among Florida cowboys. That is where the nickname “Florida Crackers” came from.
In the 1940s, they would drive the cattle from Oxford to north of Silver Springs. At that time, Juddy remembers that Spencer Tracy was in Ocala to star in The Yearling, but backed out, and Gregory Peck starred. A local taxi driver was taking Mr. Tracy to a location one day, and the Perrys were watering their cattle in the ditch along Hwy. 40. When the taxi and Mr. Tracy came along, the cattle had the highway blocked. Whether Spencer Tracy enjoyed the wait or not wasn’t told—maybe that’s one of the reasons he backed out of making the movie.
The Perrys’ cowpens were a familiar landmark alongside Baseline Road for nearly half a century. When the pens were built, the road was so sandy that semi-trucks couldn’t get to them to load and unload. Juddy went to the county commission to seek some help and was told, “Mr. Perry, you’re the only one that uses that road, and if you want it fixed, you’ll have to pay for it yourself.” Juddy purchased many dump truck loads of clay and maintained the road himself.
When he loaded watermelons, a semi-truck would stop in the middle of Baseline Road and stay until it was loaded. Juddy kept his big Molene tractor there to give the trucks a push after they were loaded.
When Juddy and Lillian moved into their new house in 1951, Harry Truman was president and Fuller Warren was the governor. There were only two homes between theirs and C-25 (what was then Hwy. 27), and only one other home towards Smith Lake East. The depot was still at the railroad tracks, and the post office was where Dr. Shelley’s office is now. Belleview didn’t have a bank, and Smith’s Food Store was the only grocery. Their children, Al and Gay, started school at what is now the Belleview City Hall.
Juddy and Lillian joined the Belleview First Baptist Church in 1952 and made many of their longtime friends. And it’s evident they have many, considering the number of people that show up at their barn when they have a barbecue. Juddy served as a deacon for over 30 years and has been on many committees involving agriculture. He also served for over 30 years on the Board of Directors for old M&C Bank, which later became Barnett Bank.
In 1972, Juddy sold part of his share of the land to Certified Grocers. He gave the railroad an easement and maintained part of the property for an industrial park. Now, some 30-plus years later, he is pursuing that idea. Many acres were sold to Silver Springs Shores, including what many referred to as Juddy’s Scrub. If you ride past Emerald Shores Elementary School towards 464, you can see much of what the country was like, as many sand pines and scrub oaks are still visible. In days past, several large bucks were taken from that area. Some of the former Perry land is now Leeward Air Ranch and numerous subdivisions.
Today the Perrys still farm 1,500 acres and have 55 acres of watermelons planted. They run close to 1,000 head of cattle. In 1999, they were recognized as a Pioneer Florida Farm Family.
After being in the cattle business all this time, are the Perrys considering retirement? “No way,” say Juddy and Lillian. “This is our life, and we love what we do.”
