Tallapoosa County

Tallapoosa County. . In August 1814, following Gen. Andrew Jackson's victory at the Battle of Horseshoe Bend, the Creek Nation ceded its land in central and south Alabama to the U.S. Government. On March 24, 1832, the Creek Nation signed the Treaty of Cusseta, yielding the remainder of their lands in east Alabama to white settlers. Tallapoosa County, named for the river that bisects it, was created on December 18, 1832, from portions of this land. The area had long been on the southern route around the Appalachians, serving Indians as the Okfuskee Trail or Upper Creek Path, and prompting the English to establish trading stations at the sites of Flint Hill, Young's Ferry, Kowaliga, and Okfuskee. The final removal of the Creeks in the mid-1830s "trail of tears" brought in a new flood tide of Americans. The textile industry began at Tallassee Falls in the 1840s, and gold mining caused a boom around Goldville and New Site in the same era. The largely agricultural society began to change in the early twentieth century, with cotton mills in Alexander City and Dadeville; the completion of Martin Dam in 1926 and the formation of Lake Martin with 750 miles of recreational shoreline; and the continual reforestation program which began in the 1930s.