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Story Stone Stories

Holmes County Historical Society

412 West Kansas Avenue, Bonifay, Florida

GPS Coordinates              30.796171            -85.684396

Ownership                          Nonprofit

Status                                   Open to the public by appointment

 

Located in a historic early 1900s cabin, the Holmes County Historical Society was established in September 1986 to preserve, protect and interpret the history of Holmes County. The cabin is the primary feature of the museum site and features a variety of exhibits and artifacts. Originally located in the New Hope Community, it was relocated to its present site in Bonifay in 1999. An outstanding example of an early 20th century farm home, the cabin is well-preserved and its displays are designed to be hands on as part of the society’s mission to put “history within reach” of citizens and visitors of the county.

Holmes County Advertiser Building

138 East Virginia Avenue, Bonifay, Florida

GPS Coordinates              30.792877            -85.679169

Ownership                          Private/Commercial

Status                                   Business

 

One of Florida’s longest running newspapers, the Holmes County Advertiser (now the Holmes County Times-Advertiser) was founded in 1892 by W.D. Williams. The newspaper was originally located in Cerrogordo on the Choctawhatchee River, but moved with the county seat when Westville gained that status three years later. The paper operated from Westville for ten years until the county seat was moved again, this time to Bonifay. The Advertiser once again relocated, this time to its present home on Virginia Avenue in Bonifay. It has been published from this historic frame structure for more than 100 years. The newspaper was owned by the family of its founder for 99 years. Long the “newspaper of record” for Holmes County, its pages have chronicled the history of the county for nearly 125 years.

Waits Mansion

209 W. Kansas Avenue, Bonifay, FL

GPS Coordinates              30.796182            -85.680821

Ownership                          Private

Status                                   Private (being developed for public use.

 

This historic mansion was built in 1919-1920 as the home of George Orkney Waits, a successful lumber company owner. The house is built in a two-story Mediterranean Revival style and features recessed porches with fluted Doric columns on the ground floor, with wrought iron fencing on the porches as well as along the property lines facing Kansas Avenue and Tracy Street. The original contractor for the house was Bill Whaley, who supervised and did much of the construction himself and with the help of his brother-in-law, Ed Tison. The original owner, George Orkney Waits, was a partner in the Henderson Wait Lumber Company. He had the Waits Mansion built for his wife, Harriet Wait, so that she would not have to live in the mosquito-infested river swamps where the lumber company operated. The couple lived in the Waits Mansion only a short time before relocating to Baghdad, Florida to assume operation of a mill there. They sold the mansion to their son, James C. Waits, who became an important community and business leader in Bonifay. The home was later converted into apartments, but has since been restored for use as a single family home and finally as a bed and breakfast. Now undergoing restoration, the house is a noted landmark of Holmes County and was featured in the 1989 volume, A Guide to Florida’s Historic Architecture, from the University of Florida Press.

Westville

Westville Town Hall, 2522 Cedar St., Westville, Florida

GPS Coordinates              30.774373            -85.85213

Ownership                          Public/Private

Status                                   Parks, streets, sidewalks are open to the public.

 

Westville developed as a boomtown after the Pensacola & Atlantic (later the L&N and today the CSX) railroad was built across Holmes County in 1881-1882. The county seat of Cerrogordo, a few miles to the north, was bypassed by the railroad and a community quickly began to develop here to take advantage of the commercial opportunities offered by the P&A. The exact origin of the town’s name is unknown, although it may have been named for an early settler, H.V. West.

 

The Westville post office (pictured here) was established on April 20, 1883 with John Neel as the original postmaster. Within two years the town’s population had surged to more than 100 people. An 1885 profile further indicates that Westville then was home to express and telegraph offices, three stores, a steam-powered sawmill and a hotel, as well as a school, two churches and daily stage coach service to the upriver town of Geneva, Alabama.

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Westville continued to grow over the next decade and in 1894 the voters of Holmes County selected it as their new county seat. A jail was built and the courthouse was literally taken apart and moved from nearby Cerrogordo to be reassembled at Westville. The town, uniquely, did not incorporate until 1902, eight years after it became the county seat. Only three years later it lost its distinction as county seat when voters approved the relocation of their government offices to the new town of Bonifay. Westville was devastated by the massive Flood of 1929, but rebuilt and remains an active community to this day.

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Holmes County, Florida’s 27th county, was created on January 8, 1848. Situated on Florida’s northern border with Alabama, Holmes County has one of the smallest populations in the state with less than 20,000 residents.

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The origin of the name is a matter of debate amongst historians. One theory is that the name was borrowed from Holmes Creek, which forms part of the county’s eastern boundary, while some connect the name to a few of the county’s earliest residents.

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Holmes Creek - the county's eastern boundary - bore that name before the county was created, but it was originally named Weekaywehatchee (a Creek Indian name meaning "spring creek").

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One claim is that the county was named for Thomas J. Holmes, who came from North Carolina to settle in the area about 1830. Another is that it is named after Holmes, an American Indian chief who settled in the area with his band of Red Stick Creek Indians after 1814. He was subsequently killed in 1818 by a raiding party sent by Andrew Jackson during the First Seminole War.

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Holmes County has had four county seats in its history. The first was Hewett's Bluff (later renamed Bear Pen, then Cerro Gordo), then Pittman's Ferry, then Westville, and finally Bonifay. Bonifay has been the county seat since 1905.

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Early settlers were involved primarily in the lumber industry, cattle ranching and other agricultural endeavors, which still endure today.

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November Story Stones include;

  • 1856 Map of Holmes County

  • Holmes County Courthouse (Bonifay; 1912)

  • Bonifay High School (Built 1916/17; pictured here app. 1930)

  • Downtown Bonifay; 1940 (Northbound Waukesha Street)

  • Louisville and Nashville Railroad Depot; Bonifay (1960)

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