Oakland Park, formally the City of Oakland Park, is a city in Broward County, Florida, USA. Since the 2010 USA Census, the city’s population was 41,363, primarily due to the addition of North Andrews Gardens as well as Twin Lakes South. It becomes part of the Miami– Ft Lauderdale– West Palm Beach Metropolitan Statistical Area, which was home to 5,564,635 individuals at the 2010 demographics.
The first non-Indian inhabitants in what is today Oakland Park were Tom and also Netta Whidby, that came from Georgia in 1901 to farm land north of what is now Northeast 38th Street surrounding the Florida East Coast Railway tracks. By the 1910s, this largely rural area north of Fort Lauderdale in what is currently Wilton Manors and also Oakland Park ended up being called “Colohatchee.”.
In 1922, with the Florida land boom in full swing, the Barkdull Investment Company intended a housing development east of Dixie Highway and north of the North Fork of Middle River. It was called “Oakland Park” in honor of the attractive oaks lining the riverfront. Local citizens from north of North Fork began to make use of the name “Oakland Park” to specify their neighborhood. By December of 1925, the Oakland Parkers prepared to incorporate when they were a brand-new city, “Floranada,” a mix of Florida and Canada, had actually been included around them. Floranada, the project of group of affluent Palm Beach financiers, was meant to be a special resort community expanding from the sea to US 441 as well as from North Fork of Middle River to Cypress Creek. However, the boom had actually currently begun to fail. Slowly the wealthy backers took out of the Floranada project and the neighborhood citizens were entrusted to the care of a huge city with extremely few residents and also virtually no funds. On July 1, 1929, Floranada was liquified and a new city, Oakland Park, was included. The new community expanded from Federal Highway on the eastern to Northeast Third Avenue and also from North Fork of Middle River to Prospect Road.
In subsequent years, the little city of Oakland Park was largely the home of area farmers as well as herdsmen. The tiny Oakland Park Methodist Church (the only church in town back then) was the hub of social activities. Oakland Park Primary School (on the National Register of Historic Places) opened up in 1925 as well as is today the oldest working school in the county. Dixie Highway was the “main drag,” home to most of the local businesses.
In the 1960s-70s, Broward County began to experience a brand-new boom, with modern-day communities as well as condos appearing in every community and in between. Oakland Park ended up being a business and also commercial hub as well as bedroom community to burgeoning Ft Lauderdale.
