Was the Biblical Garden of Eden in Florida? Minister long claimed park in northwestern part of the state was once home to Adam and Eve

Nestled in Florida’s northern panhandle, Torreya State Park was established as a nature preserve in the 1930s, but some say it houses a historic site of Biblical proportions.

A former lawyer and Baptist minister insisted for decades that this wilderness retreat was the literal site of the Garden of Eden from the Bible’s book of Genesis.

Flanked by the Apalachicola River and home to the now endangered Torreya tree, the park gained new neighbors in 1956, when this minister established a ‘Garden of Eden’ tourist attraction in the nearby city of Bristol – with fares as low as $1, 10 per ticket.

Although many Bible scholars and theologians have speculated for centuries that a true “Garden of Eden” once existed in Turkey, Armenia, or at the head of the Persian Gulf (where the Tigris and Euphrates rivers meet), few have suggested Florida.

Flanked by the Apalachicola River and home to the now endangered Torreya tree, the park gained new neighbors in 1956, when a Baptist minister founded a ‘Garden of Eden’ tourist attraction (above) in nearby Bristol, Florida – with rates as low as $1.10 per person. ticket

This Baptist minister claimed that the geography of the area encompassing Torreya State Park was reminiscent of the Garden of Eden

But the Rev. Elvy E. Callaway, then a retired attorney, claimed that he had uncovered several geographic features of the local landscape that matched the description of the Garden of Eden as detailed in the Old Testament.

“The Garden of Eden, east and west, is not more than 10 miles wide and runs parallel to the (Apalachicola) River from Chattahoochee to Bristol,” said Rev. Callaway said a reporter from WFSU-TV in 1972.

The core of his argument was a passage in the Book of Genesis that said, “A river that watered the garden flowed out of Eden, and from thence it was divided into four heads.”

According to Rev. Callaway’s analysis, this four-way split only occurs in two rivers on Earth, the Apalachicola or another tributary half a world away in Siberia.

Former lawyer and Baptist minister Rev. Elvy E. Callaway (above) maintained for decades that this wilderness retreat in northern Florida was the literal site of the Garden of Eden from the Bible’s Book of Genesis.

But Siberia, the former lawyer and once devout nonbeliever believed, was far too cold to be the paradise described in Genesis as the birthplace of humanity, according to a Florida reporter. Anthony Talcott.

In his 1971 book At the beginningRev. Callaway proclaimed that the four-headed Apalachicola river system “proves beyond a reasonable doubt that the Bible account is true, and that the garden was located in the Apalachicola Valley of West Florida.”

Decades earlier, Callaway had left his father’s strict Baptist church in Weogufka, Alabama and adopted a secular perspective with plans to leave home to pursue a law degree.

In the 1920s and 1930s, Callaway prosecuted cases in Lakeland, Florida on behalf of the newly formed National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), helping to combat racial injustice in the area.

But shortly after the end of World War II, Callaway had befriended a local retired physician, Dr. Brown Landone, who had devoted his golden years to producing spiritual and metaphysical books with titles such as “Transforming Your Life in 24 Hours” and ‘Spiritual Revelations of the Bible.’

The shape of the local river system was just one feature of the land that led the reverend to conclude that the region was the Eden of the Old Testament. The native Torreya trees, which are among the rarest and oldest in the world, also influenced his thinking

After World War II, Callaway had befriended a local retired physician who had devoted his golden years to the production of spiritual and metaphysical books. The friendship may have convinced him to buy the estate that became his tourist attraction ‘Garden of Eden’ (above)

Callaway soon changed course and purchased the property that would become his “Garden of Eden” tourist attraction in northwest Florida.

But the shape of the local river system wasn’t the only feature of the land that led the reverend to conclude that this verdant parcel of land in the Panhandle was once the Eden of the Old Testament.

The native Torreya trees, among the rarest and oldest in the world, also influenced his thinking, perhaps as much as the eccentric teachings of Dr. Landone.

“The Torreya taxifolia, authentically ancient, had survived the previous ice age in what is called a ‘pocket reserve’ along the Apalachicola River,” said Brook Wilensky-Lanford, author of the 2011 book Paradise Lust: In Search of the Garden of Edenput it.

“It is a remnant of a now-vanished world that existed before a massive geological event,” she wrote in an article for Religion and Politics from the University of Washington‘just as a flood survivor should be.’

The already rare tree was threatened by disease and overfishing in the 1950s, as the evergreen southern tree was used for everything from riverboat fuel to shingles and Christmas trees.

There were only a few hundred trees left, most of which were saplings not much more than two feet tall.

Visitors to Rev Callaway’s park were treated to a well-worn 4.2-mile hiking trail called Garden of Eden Road and dotted with many specimens of the endangered Torreya tree. The minister said the company was a “non-profit sanctuary.”

Rev Callaway passed away in 1981 and today his Garden of Eden path can be walked as part of the non-profit organization Nature Conservancy’s Apalachicola Bluffs and Ravines Preserve.

And the nearly four-mile trek still offers views of the Apalachicola River from Alum Bluff, the site Callaway long claimed was once home to Adam and Eve.