Emergency Biohazard Cleanup Services in Bridgewater, VA

Bridgewater is an incorporated town in Rockingham County, Virginia, in the Shenandoah Valley, and the largest incorporated town in Rockingham County; it is part of the Harrisonburg metropolitan area.

The town's population was 6,596 at the 2020 census, living in 2,137 households — up from 5,644 people at the 2010 census.

Bridgewater's town motto is the Latin phrase Inter Se Succurrimus, rendered in English as 'Enriching One Another.'

The first settler at the site was William Magill, who settled along the North River in 1746, when the crossing was known as Magill's Ford.

Around 1810 John Dinkle built a carding mill on the North River, joined by a sawmill, stave mill and gristmill, and the settlement became known as Dinkletown; the Dinkle Tavern of 1815 still stands on South Main Street, and the town's main east–west street still carries the name Dinkel Avenue.

The first bridge across the North River was built in 1820 and the community was briefly called Bridgeport before the Virginia General Assembly chartered the Town of Bridgewater on February 7, 1835 — a date the town still celebrates every year on Charter Day.

Bridgewater College, a private liberal arts college historically associated with the Church of the Brethren, was founded in 1880 by 26-year-old Daniel C. Flory as the Spring Creek Normal School and Collegiate Institute, moved into Bridgewater in 1882, and was chartered as Bridgewater College in 1889.

Bridgewater College has admitted women since its founding and was the first private liberal arts college in Virginia to do so; its oldest campus building, Memorial Hall, opened in 1890.

Sitting in a bend of the North River near its confluence with Dry River, Bridgewater has endured six major floods since 1835, including a devastating 1949 flood that claimed two lives, after which the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers built a long earthen levee to protect the town.

Bridgewater maintains 13 town parks totaling almost 100 acres, including Generations Park (opened in 2015, with free winter ice skating for residents), Oakdale Park, and Sandy Bottom Park with its nine-hole par-3 golf course and 18-hole miniature golf course.