Area Code 850
Area code 850 is used in the Florida Panhandle of the U.S. Originally area code 904 was used for the whole northern part of Florida, which was from the 11th of July, 1965 when it was split from the 305 area code. Then 904 were also split in the middle of the 1990's. It wasn't mandatory to use 850 until March 23rd, 1998. Between then and June 23rd, 1997 it was only permissive.
Originally 850 were going to be used as a relief code in the 1995 split. Panama City, Pensacola, Jacksonville and Tallahassee were going to keep 904, and Gainesville, along with Daytona Beach was going to be changed to 850. The plan was discarded though, to favor another plan that only moved Gainesville to a new area code, which were 352. Most of this was done due to political pressure that came from the tourism industry in Daytona Beach, and it resulted in them keeping the 904 area code. In 1997 they finally adopted the plan that implemented area code 850 to Pensacola, Panama City and Tallahassee due to the pressure from the business and public communities.
If you are receiving calls from this area code, there are 21 counties and 85 cities they may be coming from. The 21 counties include Alachua, Bay, Calhoun, Escambia, Franklin, Gadsden, Gulf, Hillsborough, Holmes, Jackson, Jefferson, Leon, Liberty, Madison, Okaloosa, Orange, Santa Rosa, Taylor, Wakulla, Walton and Washington. 5 of the cities included are Chattahoochee, Destin, Freeport, Greensboro, and Tampa. It has 641 exchanges, ranging from 200-997.
It has a population of 1, 258, 677, which white's and black's making up the majority. The average house value is $73, 144 and the average income per house is $34, 220. There is an average of 2.5 people per home. The median age is 36, 37.9 for females and 35.8 for males. All information that is shown here is provided by the census conducted in 2000.
If you're ever in the area the Florida Panhandle it has some of the best and top rated beaches that are located in the Gulf. The Florida Panhandle includes almost all of the northwestern area of the state. It lies between Alabama and Georgia, with the Gulf of Mexico to the south of it. There are also a huge variety of activities that you are able to do in this area from entertainment, shopping, sightseeing and great restaurants and hotels. You won't ever have trouble finding something to do.