Valdez is an

unincorporated community An unincorporated area is a parcel of land that is not governed by a local general-purpose municipal corporation. (At p. 178.) They may be governed or serviced by an encompassing unit (such as a county) or another branch of the state (such as th ...

located in southwest

Volusia County Volusia County (, ) is a county located in the east-central part of the U.S. state of Florida between the St. Johns River and the Atlantic Ocean. As of the 2020 census, the county was home to 553,543 people, an increase of 11.9% from the 2 ...

Florida Florida ( ; ) is a U.S. state, state in the Southeastern United States, Southeastern region of the United States. It borders the Gulf of Mexico to the west, Alabama to the northwest, Georgia (U.S. state), Georgia to the north, the Atlantic ...

, within the city limits of DeBary. Valdez is located along U.S. Highway 17-92 (Charles Richard Beall Blvd.) where it intersects with Barwick Road, just north of the St. Johns River.

History

Valdez was named in honor of Antonio Valdez, the secretary of the Spanish navy in 1787, when the Spanish explored the area. He chose one of his protégés, Lt. Jose del Rio Cossa, to conduct an exploratory survey of Florida's naval store resources. In this survey, Cossa created an enormous map in which he renamed Lake George (now Lake Monroe) to Laguna Valdez. Although this name did not persist, pre-American land deeds referred to what is now Lake Monroe as Valdez. In 1928, Florida Power & Light began constructing a power plant in Valdez on the north shore of the St. Johns river.

References

{{authority control Unincorporated communities in Volusia County, Florida Unincorporated communities in Florida