Bell, FL

Bell is a Gilchrist County town in North Florida, where the 2020 census counted 518 residents. It was founded in the 1890s, named for beauty-contest winner Bell Fletcher, and incorporated in 1902 before reincorporating the following year. U.S. Route 129 runs along Main Street, carrying the town north toward Branford and south toward Trenton, the county seat. Bell sits within the Gainesville metropolitan area but keeps its small-town scale.

ATTREbyabe / CC BY-SA 3.0

Railroad history still has a visible address in Bell: the Seaboard Air Line depot built around 1905 now serves as town hall. The line once moved timber, limestone, farm products, and other goods between Starke and Wannee. Gilchrist County School District serves Bell Elementary and Bell Middle/High School, keeping education in town while the county’s roads connect students and families across the surrounding farm country. Bell’s present map is a mix of U.S. 129, the former depot, school buildings, and the North Florida landscape that shaped its early growth. The depot’s second life keeps the railroad story attached to the town’s daily business.