Daytona Beach is a coastal resort city in Volusia County, Florida, United States.

It is part of the Deltona–Daytona Beach–Ormond Beach metropolitan area, and is a principal city of the Fun Coast region of Florida.

The area where Daytona Beach is located was once inhabited by the indigenous Timucuan Indians, who lived in fortified villages.

The Timucuas were nearly exterminated by contact with Europeans through war, enslavement, and disease and became extinct as a racial entity through assimilation and attrition during the 18th century.

During the era of British rule of Florida between 1763 and 1783, the King's Road passed through present-day Daytona Beach.

The road extended from Saint Augustine, the capital of East Florida, to Andrew Turnbull's experimental colony in New Smyrna.

In 1804, Samuel Williams received a land grant of 3,000 acres (12 km2) from the Spanish Crown, which had regained Florida from the British after the American Revolutionary War.

The plantation was situated on the west bank of the tidal channel known as the Halifax River, 12 miles north of Mosquito Inlet.

Williams was a British loyalist from North Carolina who fled to the Bahamas with his family until the Spanish reopened Florida to non-Spanish immigration.

In 1872, due to financial troubles, Day lost title to his land; nonetheless, residents decided to name the city Daytona in his honor, and incorporated the town in 1876.

Daytona's wide beach of smooth, compacted sand attracted automobile and motorcycle races beginning in 1902, as pioneers in the industry tested their inventions.

[10] Land speed racers from Barney Oldfield to Henry Segrave to Malcolm Campbell would visit Daytona repeatedly and make the 23 mi (37 km) beach course famous.

[11] Record attempts, including numerous fatal endeavors such as Frank Lockhart (Stutz Black Hawk, 1928) and Lee Bible (Triplex Special, 1929), would continue until Campbell's March 7, 1935 effort, which set the record at 276.816 mph (445.492 km/h) and marked the end of Daytona's land speed racing days.

[12] On March 8, 1936, the first stock car race was held on the Daytona Beach Road Course, located in the present-day Town of Ponce Inlet.

The city of Daytona Beach is split in two by the Halifax River lagoon, part of the Intracoastal Waterway, and sits on the Atlantic Ocean.

[citation needed] In 1992, a 28-mile (45 km) long rogue wave with a 9-foot (2.7 m) high crest hit Daytona Beach, causing property damage and 75 reported injuries.

The Bermuda High pumps hot and unstable tropical air from the Bahamas and Gulf of Mexico, resulting in daily, but brief thundershowers.

Occasional cold fronts can bring freezes, which from 1991 to 2020 were seen on an average of 3.0 nights annually; however, minima below 25 °F (−4 °C) are very rare, and were last seen on December 28, 2010.

Like much of Florida, Daytona Beach often can be very dry in late winter and early spring, and brush fires and water restrictions can be an issue.

Companies and organizations that have their corporate headquarters or a major presence in the area include: According to the City's 2019 Comprehensive Annual Financial Report,[27] the top employers in the city are: The Museum of Arts and Sciences is the primary cultural facility for Daytona Beach and Volusia County.

Since 1952, the nonprofit Daytona Beach Symphony Society has sponsored performances by U.S. and international orchestras, opera, and dance companies each season at the Peabody Auditorium.

The Daytona Tortugas, a minor league baseball team of the Low-A Southeast, play at Jackie Robinson Ballpark.

Under Daytona Beach's commission-manager form of government, voters elect a city commission, which consists of seven members who serve four-year, staggered terms.

The United States Postal Service operates a post office at 500 Bill France Boulevard in Daytona Beach.

The Daytona Beach Armed Forces Reserve Center is home of the Florida Army National Guard 1st Battalion, 265th Air Defense Artillery Regiment, Headquarters and Headquarters Battery, Battery D. Daytona Beach is part of Florida's 6th congressional district.

[34] The T-shirts contain a caricature of retired Chief Chitwood standing next to a toilet bowl with the legs of multiple individuals sticking out.

The T-shirt has been cited in at least one lawsuit against the DBPD alleging police brutality; the lawyer in the case in which the client sustained broken ribs and a fractured eye socket during an arrest for an open container of beer, claims the T-shirt shows the DBPD condones violence.

[35] The Volusia County Sheriff's Office, headed by Mike Chitwood, is a county-wide law enforcement agency with 446 sworn positions, 438 civilian employees, 300 volunteers, and an annual operating budget of $73 million that has jurisdiction in unincorporated areas of Volusia County and provides additional law enforcement support to Daytona Beach during such events as the Daytona 500 and aids in joint investigations of certain crimes.

[40] DAB is also heavily used for general aviation, largely due to Embry–Riddle Aeronautical University, whose campus is located at the airport.

The Volusia County Parking Garage is located at 701 Earl Street at North Atlantic Avenue (SR A1A).