Biohazard Cleanup Near Jay Historic District Jay, FL

Jay is a small incorporated town in northern Santa Rosa County in the Florida Panhandle, only about three miles south of the Alabama state line, and it is the northernmost town in its county.

The community was settled in the early 1800s under the names Cobb Old Field and later Pine Level, when pioneers such as the Jernigan family worked in timber, logging and open-range cattle.

Jay got its unusual name in 1902, when the U.S. Postal Service — after rejecting the names submitted by James Thomas Nowling — named the new post office after Nowling's own nickname, 'Jay,' and made him its first postmaster.

The Town of Jay was officially incorporated in 1951.

Jay had 524 residents at the 2020 census, living in 217 households.

Jay is a farming community where cotton, soybeans, peanuts and hay are the major crops, and Santa Rosa County is historically Florida's number-one cotton producer and number-two peanut producer.

The Town of Jay holds the only two cotton gins in the entire state of Florida.

A livestock market started by a small group of Jay farmers in 1940 reached $1 million in sales within ten years.

Oil was discovered in Jay in 1970, and the Jay oil field has produced more than 330 million barrels of oil from about 67 wells — eleven of them inside the town limits.

Oil royalties exceeding $400 million have funded Jay's new city hall, fire department and recreation complex.