This line was built by the Leesburg and Indian River Railroad in 1884; the original plans were to build a line between Wilwood and Titusville, but the line never made as far east as Titusville and ultimately terminated in Tavares.
A year after being constructed, the L&IR merged into the Florida Railway and Navigation Company (a subsidiary of the Florida Central and Peninsular Railroad), and became part of the Orlando Division of that line. The line was then owned under successive mergers of the Seaboard Air Line Railroad after 1900.