Tarpon Springs

Tarpon Springs, city, Pinellas county, west-central Florida, U.S., on the Anclote River bayous between Lake Tarpon and the Gulf of Mexico, about 25 miles (40 km) northwest of Tampa. The area was settled in 1876, and the city was founded in 1882 by Anson P.K. Safford, a former governor of the Arizona Territory. It was named by one of the first settlers for what she thought were tarpon, a large, silvery game fish, leaping in the ocean. In 1890 John K. Cheney, an early settler, founded the natural sponge industry in Tarpon Springs, which became one of the world’s largest; beginning in 1905, Greek divers came to the city to work in the sponge industry. A blight in the sponge beds in the 1940s considerably reduced the fleet, which in its heyday comprised more than 200 vessels. In the 1980s healthy sponge beds were found, and sponges again became important. The Spongeorama Exhibit Center focuses on the history of this industry. Tourism is the primary factor in the city’s economy. Tarpon Springs is located in a popular retirement area. The city’s Universalist Church contains paintings by the American landscape painter George Inness, Jr. Inc. 1887. Pop. (2000) 21,003; (2010) 23,484.