West Tampa, Florida

West Tampa is one of the oldest neighborhoods within the city limits of Tampa, Florida, United States. It was an independently incorporated city from 1895 until 1925, when it was annexed by Tampa.West Tampa is located west of the Hillsborough River approximately 1 mile from downtown. As of the 2000 census, the district had a population of 22,008. It has consistently been home to one of the highest concentration of Latinos in the city since its founding in 1892.HistoryEstablishment and early historyWest Tampa was founded in 1892 by Scottish immigrant and local attorney Hugh Macfarlane, who bought 200 acres of forested land with the intention of starting a new development by luring some of the cigar factories and cigar workers from Ybor City, a very successful new immigrant community on the northeast side of Tampa.Initially, West Tampa's growth was stunted by transportation problems. The first cigar factory built in the area was forced to close temporarily because workers refused to ride a ferry across the Hillsborough River to the "wilds" of West Tampa.But after Macfarlane built a bridge and then a streetcar line, his development experienced a period of tremendous growth. Many of these new residents had not come over from Ybor City; most were Cuban immigrants who settled in West Tampa soon after arriving in the United States. Accordingly, the community was almost exclusivity Cuban during the first several years of its existence. A gradual influx of Italians and Spaniards, mainly from Ybor City, gradually made the cultural mix of the two communities more similar over time.