HISTORY & HERITAGE
Historic Downtown Bonifay
Holmes County · Panhandle & Emerald Coast
The county seat of Holmes County, built by a railroad and named after a railroad man.
ABOUT THIS PLACE
The line came through in 1882. G. W. Banfill, a Wisconsin man, founded the settlement in what was then called the Four Hills area, and named Waukesha Street after his home town; the Hotel Eureka he built on it was the first building there and is long gone. The town took its name from Judge Frank Bonifay, an official of the railroad. Bonifay became the county seat in 1905, after Cerro Gordo and Westville had each held it, and the first courthouse went up in 1907 with T. J. Dauthtrey as the first mayor the same year. The Holmes County Advertiser was founded in 1907 by the W. D. Williams family and still works from its original building. The town was incorporated as a city in 1921. Downtown today has a courthouse in the modern style of the 1960s and a number of empty storefronts, with the two-story Mediterranean Revival Waits Mansion used for events
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