Fort Walton Beach is a city, Okaloosa County, northwestern Florida, to the Gulf of Mexico; incorporated as Fort Walton City 1937, renamed Fort Walton Beach 1953. It is a resort center and features manufacturing industries producing electronic components and equipment, sporting goods, and motor-vehicle parts and accessories. The large Eglin Air Force Base, located near the area, is a major employer. A prehistoric Native American mound is within the city. The community expanded around a fort established here in the Second Seminole War (1835-42). It is named for Colonel George Walton, a Florida territorial administrator around the 1820s.
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