What is the history of Opelika, Alabama?
by AB-Wikibot on April 19th, 2007 The first white settlers in the area now known as Opelika arrived in the late 1830s and established a community called Lebenon. After the removal of the native peoples by force in 1836-183737, the area became known as “Opelika”, taken from a word in the Creek languageMuskogee language meaning “large swamp”. Settlement was sporadic until the late 1840s, when Opelika quickly became a commercial center with the coming of the railroad. In 1848, the Montgomery & West Point Railroad Company extended a rail line from Montgomery, Alabama to Opelika, and in 1851 completed a connection to West Point, Georgia, thus connecting Opelika with Atlanta, Georgia. This line was the only direct rail route between New Orleans, LouisianaNew Orleans and the Eastern Seaboard, and rapidly became one of the primary trade lines for shipments of raw cotton from Southern United StatesSouthern plantations to the North. The Montgomery & West Point was soon joined by a rail connectio
