The Development Authority welcomes you!

Few regions of Florida are as blessed by Nature at the Suwannee River Valley.  An unspoiled cluster of virgin woods and water, the valley ranges over 8 lightly populated counties.  But one is growing faster than all others - Gilchrist County.  The last county created by state lawmakers (1925), Gilchrist, some Floridians say, is an uncut emerald awaiting discovery.

Old-timers call Gilchrist the natural Florida, as it was, once upon a time.  It's hard to disagree.  Gilchrist County is still a shelter from all the rush and stress of today's uncontrolled growth.  Credit goes in part to two of Florida's most serene yet major rivers.  Most famous is the Suwannee.  It frames the entire western boundary of Gilchrist.  On the northern perimeter is the Santa Fe.

Neither is a working river.  Instead, they have been preserved for play and sport.  Particularly entertaining is the Santa Fe.  It darts underground and hides for nearly three miles.  And one of its spring-fed tributaries, the Ichetucknee, is the nation's finest tubing run.  By the hundreds every day, folks line up to tube down the crystalline stream.

Such untapped rivers often are accompanied by forests and wildlife.  In Gilchrist, the rivers' partner is a 56,000-acre primeval wonderland referred to by the natives as the Waccasassa Flats.  To geologists, this refuge in central Gilchrist is a pristine ecosystem of wetlands.  It harbors, undisturbed, nests and dens of a half dozen endangered species.

Natural wealth of such variety usually occurs only in vast territories. Yet Gilchrist is a small county, only 348 square miles.  And its population is a modest 13,000  people.  That's a density of fewer than  38 folks per square mile.  Privacy?  Tranquility? All you ever dreamed of.

Visitors say they envy our life-style here in Gilchrist.  Some of us have small farms, growing watermelon and corn, or keeping a couple dozen beef cows.  Supporting our pastoral pursuits is a cadre of banks and feed mills and veterinarians, most of them a few minutes drive away, in Trenton, Bell and Fanning Springs, our three communities.

But of all our businesses, we in Gilchrist are proud of our "cottage industries."  New residents find the county an ideal site to build their hobbies into profitable ventures, to start their own small businesses.  A leisurely drive down our country roads is full of surprises.  You will find a glassblower who sells to laboratories around the  nation, a circus tentmaker stitching together another Big Top, a wood-carver  handcrafting signs for Florida's state parks.  Working from their homes are a cartographer creating Florida maps in his computer room overlooking the Suwannee, a publisher writing books about the Sunshine State, or a retired couple tending a grape arbor and their fledgling winery.  Still other new comers pick up and move their existing business to Gilchrist, finding they can service their market as successfully from a tree-shaded warehouse in a quiet country setting as they can from a crowded big-city industrial park.  

Of course, life isn't rosy all the time anywhere.  People need doctors and hospitals.  In Gilchrist, we're proud of our county EMS and our medical facilities.  And we're unusually fortunate to have next door, in Gainesville, two of the nation's most prestigious medical complexes - the University of Florida's Shands Hospital and the acclaimed North Florida Regional Medical Center.

But an environment of good health is one of Gilchrist County's assets.  One reason is life's priorities are different here than in urban America.  Our values are the old-fashioned ones.  We're interested in what you make, not how much.  Our churches are full on Sundays.  Business often is done on a handshake.  "Little niceties" you say?  No!  Just the way life was meant to be lived.

Many agree.  Young families and retirees are leaving the urban masses of Miami, Orlando and the crowded East, for Gilchrist and its life-style.  Violent crime and drug use seldom occur in Gilchrist.  And small enrollment schools (2,200 pupils in all) help teachers to know parents as well as students.

Graduates from Gilchrist's two high schools can further their education at two community colleges and the University of Florida, all less than an hours drive.  Traffic won't spoil the commute, either.  Gilchrist has no noisy interstate slicing through the county.  In fact, oak and pine-shaded lanes are the norm in Gilchrist.  Many lead to the rivers where there are picnic sites and boat ramps.  Others end at crystal-clear springs.  Florida has 320 springs, more than half along the Suwannee River.  Two of the most popular for swimmers and snorklers are Hart and Ginnie springs, both in Gilchrist.

By now, you may learn on your own something else about Gilchrist County.  That is, we love to share.  Visit us.  Or fulfill that dream and come live with us ... down upon the Suwannee.