Formed June 5, 1916 (81st county)
Stone County (18,336), Wiggins (4,270)
The 1917 red brick Classical Revival courthouse is on Cavers Avenue at Court Street. Mississippi State Highway 26 is four blocks south of the site. The building was remodeled in 1970 and 2003. The structure features faux columns on the front. Stone County was founded on June 5, 1916 from Harrison County as the 81st county with Wiggins as the only county seat. Xavier A. Kramer is the designer of the courthouse. The county is named for Governor John M. Stone. The county seat is named for Wiggins Hatten, father of a settler.
Stone County government consists of a sheriff, an administrator, an attorney, a collector, a coroner, an assessor and a clerk (executive). It has 5 Supervisors (legislative.) Four Chancery Court Judges and Three District Court Judges serve Stone, Hancock, and Harrison counties and a court clerk serves Stone County (judicial.) The county is in southern Mississippi. Jackson, Mississippi is northwest and New Orleans, Louisiana is southwest of the county. The county center is 4.5 miles South of Wiggins nearer Perkinston. The county is surrounded clockwise by Perry, George, Jackson, Harrison, Hancock, Pearl River, and Forrest counties.
The area of the county is 445 square miles. It is 62 out of 82 in the state. It ranks 51 out of 82 in population in the state. It has a density of 41.2 persons per square mile making it 43 out of 82 in the state. Stone County has 23.3% of its population in its incorporated areas. United States Highway 49 passes north to south in the county from Perry County to Harrison County. The county looks like the number 7 lying on its face. Wiggins is near the northern border of the county. Wiggins is the county seat and the largest city as it is the only incorporated city. It is 23.3% of the county population. This county is in the Gulfport-Biloxi Metropolitan Statistical Area.
Wiggins
