24/7 Biohazard Cleanup Near West Bagdad Bagdad, FL

Bagdad is a census-designated place in Santa Rosa County, set at the confluence of Pond Creek and the Blackwater River in Florida's western Panhandle.

Bagdad began in 1840 around a settler's sawmill, and lumberman Joseph Forsyth named the town after Baghdad, Iraq; a post office has operated there since 1887.

Joseph Forsyth and the Simpson brothers built the Arcadia Mill complex beginning around 1830 — the first and largest water-powered industrial complex in territorial Florida.

In 1835 the Florida territorial legislature chartered the Pond Creek and Blackwater River Canal Company, Florida's third railroad, which hauled Bagdad's lumber on mule-drawn carts over iron-covered wooden rails.

Around 1900, Bagdad shipped more yellow pine lumber than any port in the world, drawing on the vast longleaf pine forests of northwest Florida.

Bagdad was also a shipbuilding center — a shipyard was established in 1833, and the Ollinger & Bruce yard won a Confederate contract in 1861 to build a 110-foot gunboat, which was burned in 1862 to keep it from Union troops.

The Bagdad Land & Lumber Company closed in 1939, ending the mill era that had created the community.

The Bagdad Village Historic District was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1987, and the old mill site has since been developed into the roughly 22-acre Bagdad Mill Site Park.

Bagdad was hit hard by Hurricane Dennis in 2005, one of several major Gulf storms to strike the Pensacola area.

Bagdad had 4,467 residents at the 2020 census, up from 3,761 in 2010, spread across roughly 1,770 households, of which about 92% are owner-occupied.