Ocala is a city in Marion County, Florida, United States. As of 2007, the population recorded by the U.S. Census Bureau was 53,491. It is the county seat of Marion County, Florida, and the principal city of the Ocala, Florida Metropolitan Statistical Area, which had an estimated 2007 population of 324,857.

History
=Early years=
Ocala was established in 1846 near the site of Fort King, a military outpost of the Seminole Wars. Ocala is a derivation of the Timucua word'Ocali'which is believed to mean the'Big Hammock'. Hernando de Soto (explorer) passed through a Timucua village or province named Ocali or Ocale near the present site...

Ocala is a city in Marion County, Florida, United States. As of 2007, the population recorded by the U.S. Census Bureau was 53,491. It is the county seat of Marion County, Florida, and the principal city of the Ocala, Florida Metropolitan Statistical Area, which had an estimated 2007 population of 324,857.

History
=Early years=
Ocala was established in 1846 near the site of Fort King, a military outpost of the Seminole Wars. Ocala is a derivation of the Timucua word'Ocali'which is believed to mean the'Big Hammock'. Hernando de Soto (explorer) passed through a Timucua village or province named Ocali or Ocale near the present site of Ocala during his famous expedition through what is today the southeastern United States in 1539. Greater Ocala is known as the'Kingdom of the Sun'.

=The Brick City=
Railroad reached Ocala in June 1881, encouraging economic development. Two years later, much of the Ocala downtown area was destroyed by fire on Thanksgiving Day, 1883. Buildings were rebuilt with brick, granite and steel rather than lumber. By 1888, Ocala was known state-wide as'The Brick City'.

In December 1890, the Farmers Alliance and Industrial Union, a forerunner of the Populist Party (United States) held its national convention in Ocala. At the convention, the Alliance adopted a platform that would become known as the'Ocala Demands. 'This platform included abolition of national banks, low interest government loans, free and unlimited coinage of silver, reclamation of excess railroad lands by the government, a graduated income tax, and direct election of United States senators. Most of the'Ocala Demands'were to become part of the Populist Party platform.

Ocala was an important center of citrus production until the Great Freeze of 1894-1895.