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- Peter Boyer Perry served in Company F, 9th Regiment, State of Florida during the Civil War. He was paroled at Appomattox Court House, VA on April 9, 1865.
"Peter B. Perry taught school in a log meeting house near the Crum cemetery, southwest of Summerfield, beginning in 1854, for a number of years." Excerpt from, "Gone with the Hickory Stick: School Days in Marion County 1845-1960," by Broward Lovell
The following article appeared in the Ocala Star Banner on 21 October 1998
"Founding Families still live in Pedro," BY CHRISTOPHER LLOYD, STAFF WRITER
Chances are if your family has lived near the comer of County Roads 42 and 475 for a long stretch of years, you had some Proctors or Perrys among your ancestors.
Those two families settled Pedro, a loosely defined community west of Summerfield, more than a century ago. They raised cattle, hogs and watermelon, and it wasn't at all uncommon for a Proctor gal to marry a Perry feller, or vice-versa.
"There's an old saying that if you see some guy on the street, you can say, 'Hello, Mr. Perry,' and if he doesn't answer you can come back and say, 'Hello, Mr. Proctor' and get an answer," said Ralph Hackett, 67.
Hackett, who lives across the street from his [grand]father's farmhouse where he was born, is a direct descendant of Peter Boyer Perry, who gave Pedro its name. His great-great-grandfather passed through the area in 1847 on his way to fight in the Mexican-American War.
Perry helped win the war, planting a flag inside Mexico City. He stayed there for two more years, friends with many of the Mexicans who used to be his enemies.
"He was called Pedro, which is Spanish for Peter," Hackett said.
As he prepared to return to the States, Perry's mind recalled the quiet open lands in Florida he had passed through, and thought it would be a great place to raise cattle. He became one of the first white men to settle the area, and gave it his Spanish name.
In 1849, when most people were going out West for the Gold Rush, he came to Florida," Hackett said. Don't make the mistake of pronouncing the name as "pay-dro," though it's "pee-dro!'
It would remain a spread-out farming community. In the early days the Perrys let their cattle roam free, rounding them up when auction time came. Occasionally the men would fight off roving raiding bands of Seminole indians.
Nearby Dank
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House of Hackett
1823 - 1899 (75 years)
