Business Licenses in Gautier, MS

The Pascagoula River that flows through Gautier is the largest undammed river system in the contiguous United States — a rare ecological distinction meaning the river runs entirely free of flood-control dams from source to sea, preserving one of the most biodiverse coastal waterway ecosystems on the Gulf Coast; the river is also known as the 'Singing River' for the mysterious humming sound it produces on late summer and autumn evenings, described by locals as resembling a swarm of bees in flight

Despite having a 300-year community history — French explorers Pierre d'Iberville and Jean-Baptiste Bienville briefly attempted to establish the first permanent French settlement in the Americas here in 1699 before determining the river was too shallow for large ships — Gautier only officially incorporated as a city on July 1, 1986, making it one of Mississippi's newest cities by incorporation date

The city is named after Fernando Upton Gautier (1822–1891), a man who was literally born aboard a cargo ship as his parents emigrated to New Orleans; after the Civil War he built the region's largest sawmill at the Pascagoula River's mouth in 1867, and when the railroad arrived in 1876 residents simply began calling the settlement 'Gautier' after the large sign on his railroad building — the U.S. Postal Service made it official in 1905

The 900-acre Eric Clark Coastal Preserve, established in Gautier in 2023, protects a stretch of bayou, estuary, and pine uplands directly within the city limits — a coastal nature preserve accessible within a city of fewer than 20,000 residents; Gautier's 32 square miles encompass over 70 miles of waterfront between bayous, the Pascagoula River estuary, and the Mississippi Sound