November 5, 2026
Mount Dora’s Nathaniel Bell Center Honors Late Educator and Community Leader
By Gina Horan
Mount Dora’s Nathaniel Bell Center Honors Late Educator and Community Leader
The Nathaniel Bell Community Resource & Recreation Center opened in Mount Dora in September, giving the city’s Northeast community a place to find resources and recreation under one roof.
“The community had envisioned a facility like the Nathaniel Bell Community Resource & Recreation Center for more than 20 years,” center supervisor Tela Williams says.
The path from idea to opening took about eight years. In January 2018, Councilman Nate Walker started conversations with the Northeast Community Redevelopment Agency about the need for a community resource and recreation center. The project went out to bid in fall 2024, broke ground in June 2025 and held a ribbon-cutting Aug. 31.
The center is named for Nathaniel Bell (1931–2007), a longtime Mount Dora resident, educator, U.S. Navy veteran, entrepreneur and former City Council member. He spent 38 years in education, first as a teacher at Milner-Rosenwald Academy and later as an assistant principal in the Lake County School District.
Through his business, Liberty Bell Charters, Bell provided transportation and organized trips so children could experience places and activities they might not otherwise have had the chance to see. He was elected to the City Council in 1978, where he advocated for housing, recreational spaces and improvements in Northeast Mount Dora, and he was an early supporter of a recreation complex along Lincoln Avenue. The council named the facility in his honor in March 2026.
Membership at the center, at 1010 Lincoln Ave., is free and open to everyone, regardless of residency. It offers recreation, athletics, wellness and community programming for youth, families, adults and seniors. Inside are a gymnasium, classrooms, a computer lab, a commercial teaching kitchen and a child watch area.
Partnerships are also part of the plan. The center is working with organizations such as Lake Cares Inc.’s food pantry to connect families with services beyond traditional recreation.
“As we continue developing programs, expanding services and establishing partnerships, what the community sees today is only the beginning of what we hope to offer,” Tela says.
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Gina moved to Central Florida from the San Francisco Bay Area in 2021. She holds a degree in linguistics and has worked as a fashion editor, photo stylist, lifestyle columnist and food writer since 1995. She later covered travel, events, restaurants, music festivals and sports throughout Northern California, including work as a morning show host with KSAN radio and food critic for KRON Bay TV. A veteran bartender, she has worked in hospitality on and off since high school. Gina joined Akers Media in 2022 and is currently the Food and Lifestyle Editor. Her passions include travel, road trips, history books and podcasts, tasting menus and arriving in a new city without a map.
