Valrico is a census-designated place (CDP) in Hillsborough County, Florida, United States. The population was 35,545 at the 2010 census, up from 6,582 at the 2000 census.

Before the Civil War, the Place was known as Long Pond and consisted of several cotton plantations. It was renamed Valrico, meaning “rich valley” in Spanish, in the 1880s as soon as William G. Tousey, a philosophy professor from Tufts College, purchased property in the area. In 1890, an influx of immigrants arrived, following the construction of the Florida Central and Peninsular Railroad through the area.

When the railroad was completed, Tousey began building occurring the community taking into account retail stores, streets, and a bank. In 1893, Mr. Bryan built a steam mill at Valrico station. In 1895, a major freeze halted these developments, and the population began to dwindle. Nonetheless, the town continued, and a schoolhouse was completed in 1896. The population continued to fall, from 100 people in 1893 to unaccompanied 50 in 1911.

This setback did not deter local landowners from pushing dispatch with the town’s development. From 1910 to 1914 Judge Hamner, Governor Van Sant, D. Humbird, W.H., S.C. Phipps and W.F. Miller started an onslaught project along Hopewell Road, later designated SR 60. W.F. Miller, serving as president of the Valrico Improvement Association, raised $3,500 to erect the Valrico Civic Center, now known as the James McCabe Theater. The area’s first general gathering was opened by Lovett Brandon in 1912.