About Us

Hi, I’m Mia—your neighbor on Florida’s Front Porch.

Hamilton County is Florida’s 15th county, established on December 26, 1827 and named for Alexander Hamilton. We sit at the top of the state like a friendly porch light—Georgia just to our north, the Withlacoochee to the west, the Suwannee curling along our east and south, and the Alapaha threading through the middle, sometimes slipping underground to reveal a sandy riverbed. People call us “a peninsula within a peninsula,” but I think of us as a small place with a big welcome.

If you’re the kind of traveler who slows down to really see a place, you’ll love North Florida’s river country. Follow US-41 or US-129 into Jasper, White Springs, and Jennings, where three rivers shape our days—the Suwannee with its limestone bluffs, the Withlacoochee with quiet sandbars, and the Alapaha that reappears like a local secret. Spend a morning paddling a tannin-stained bend, bike oak-lined farm roads, hike Florida Trail miles at Stephen Foster and Twin Rivers State Forest, then wander our courthouse squares for murals, live music, and supper with locals. Our roots run deep in agriculture and rail, and our culture is stitched together by makers, musicians, and neighbors who still wave from the porch.

Come for a day trip, stay for a weekend, and—if our rhythm fits your life—consider making Hamilton County home. Whether you’re launching a small business, raising a family, or just looking for room to breathe, this is a place that says “pull up a chair.” I can’t wait to welcome you.

Plan your visit at VisitHamiltonFL.com—and if you need a local recommendation, holler. I’m happy to help.

Want to hear more? Sure-

Long before Hamilton County had a name, families gathered where the Alapaha runs clear and then slips from sight. Along those banks stood an Indigenous village remembered as Halato Micco (Micco Town)—a place of pottery shards and river stories, noted on early maps and in local histories. When the United States pushed settlement south and east after the Treaty of Moultrie Creek (1823), newcomers followed the river roads; and when Florida created Hamilton County in 1827, Micco briefly held the honor of first county seat before the center of life shifted to Jasper. 

By the late 1800s the pine woods hummed with work. Resin flowed from tapped longleaf and slash pines to feed the naval stores trade—turpentine and rosin—while sawmills made quick music of timber. State archives note that lumber and turpentining were “of considerable importance” here; the crafts and stories of that era still echo at Stephen Foster Folk Culture Center State Park in White Springs.

Rails stitched our small towns to the wider world. In the last year of the Civil War, a north–south line called the Florida Branch Railroad was pushed through to link Georgia and Florida lines and dodge Union blockades at the ports. Finished in March 1865, that line helped establish places like Live Oak and Jasper, later becoming part of the Plant System and then the Atlantic Coast Line—a steel thread that carried crops, people, and possibility.

And the farms? They’re the heartbeat that never stopped. From corn, cotton, cane, and peanuts to later tobacco and today’s diversified fields, agriculture still sets our seasons and our supper tables. Multi-generation operations like Murphy Farms, Deas Brothers Farms, and McCulley Farms—and many more—have been here for generations and are still going strong, keeping cane grinding traditions lively, and much more. 

Today, when you paddle a tannin-stained bend, walk down Central Avenue where the Florida Branch ran strong, or hear a fiddle under the oaks, you’re moving through all of those layers at once—Indigenous River country, pioneer crossroads, pine-woods industry, rail-town ambition, and the steady rhythm of the farm. That’s our story, still being told.