1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/De Land

DE LAND, a town and the county-seat of Volusia county, Florida, U.S.A., 111 m. by rail S. of Jacksonville, 20 m. from the Atlantic coast and 4 m. from the St John’s river. Pop. (1900) 1449; (1910) 2812. De Land is served by the Atlantic Coast Line and by steamboats on the St John’s river. It has a fine winter climate, with an average temperature of 60° F., has sulphur springs, and is a health and winter resort. There is a starch factory here; and the surrounding country is devoted to fruit-growing. De Land is the seat of the John B. Stetson University (coeducational), an undenominational institution under Baptist control, founded in 1884, as an academy, by Henry A. De Land, a manufacturer of Fairport, New York, and in 1887 incorporated under the name of De Land University, which was changed in 1889 to the present name, in honour of John Batterson Stetson (1830–1906), a Philadelphia manufacturer of hats, who during his life gave nearly $500,000 to the institution. The university includes a college of liberal arts, a department of law, a school of technology, an academy, a normal school, a model school, a business college and a school of music. De Land was founded in 1876 by H. A. De Land, above mentioned, who built a public school here in 1877 and a high school in 1883.