Transportation of Citrus By Steamboats, Railroads and Trucks

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Citrus was first introduced to Florida in 1565 at St. Augustine by the Spaniards. It then was spread throughout Florida and the states of Georgia, South Carolina, Alabama, Mississippi and Louisiana by natives, settlers and wildlife. For the first 250 years, citrus was grown in small areas in settlements and in the wild. Many of these ‘wild’ plantings were later used to establish commercial groves. Commercial citrus groves began showing up after 1850.

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At first, packinghouses were located at the groves and were privately owned. They were small in size, manually operated, and usually packed fruit from their owner’s groves only. The biggest challenge facing a citrus grower was getting their packed fruit from the packinghouse to the end buyer.

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By the 1870s, steamboats were plying most of the river systems in Florida and hauling citrus to northern markets. This form of transportation was slow, often taking one or two weeks for the citrus to arrive at the buyer’s location. There was no refrigeration available to maintain fruit quality.

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With the coming of the railroads in the 1880s, citrus could now be shipped to the northern markets much more quickly (usually a week or less) and arrive in better condition than when transported by steamboat.

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Large citrus grower associations and association packinghouses began to come into existence in 1909; most all of the packinghouses were built along existing railroad tracks. Railroads courted these large associations with a proposal to build their packinghouses for them in return for locating on their line. By building the packinghouses along railroad lines, citrus could be shipped to the northern markets with greater speed.

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In the beginning, the railroads used ventilated box cars to ship citrus. These cars did not provide any means of keeping the citrus cool and in good condition. Refrigerated boxcars, or reefers as they were called, did not come into wide use until around 1920 when ice plants became readily available to produce and provide ice in large quantities for the cooling of reefers. Large blocks of ice were packed in each end of the car to keep the citrus cool and in better condition. Crushed ice was also placed on top of the boxes of citrus in the reefers for added protection to keep the citrus in good condition on it’s trip to market.

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Mechanical refrigerator cars did not come into existence until the early 1950s. These cars contained a mechanical refrigeration unit that could maintain the citrus at a constant temperature and in better condition for it’s trip to market. With these cars, ice was not needed to keep citrus cool.

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With the improvements in refrigeration on railroad cars and the railroads switching from steam locomotives to diesel locomotives, citrus could now be moved from the packinghouse to the end buyer in as little as two days. Reefers required frequent reloading of ice and steam locomotives required much more maintenance and servicing than diesel locomotives.

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By 1950, trucks were starting to eat into the transportation of citrus to market. Trucks could deliver citrus from the packinghouse to the northern markets in as little as 24 hours. By the mid-1960s, the majority of citrus was being transported to market by truck.