West Jefferson emerged after Congress appropriated funds in 1831 to extend the Cumberland Road through Ohio, Indiana, and Illinois, and after this National Road was completed through Madison County in 1836-37. In the early 19th century, Madison County had scarcely any roads, and travel followed wagon tracks along former Indian trails through forests and prairies. When the settlement of Hampton learned that the National Road would pass about a quarter mile to the north, the village relocated en masse to the present site of West Jefferson, moving barns and houses on roller logs. The resulting pike town was named for President Thomas Jefferson, with West added later by the post office department, and it was incorporated in 1833. With the National Road, West Jefferson grew to about 300 inhabitants and included five taverns, a large horse barn for stagecoaches, a grocery store, a blacksmith shop, and two water-powered sawmills; by 1844-45 it also had five hotels and a wagon-making shop. Merchants traveled the National Road by stagecoach, with three to five coaches daily in each direction, linking the town to eastern markets in Boston and New York City, where goods were bought, shipped by canal to Columbus, and then hauled west by teams of four or six horses pulling freight wagons. Located on the fertile Darby Plains, the surrounding region prospered because of the National Road, and two nearby slaughterhouses supplied much of the dressed meat for the Columbus market. The construction of the old Columbus and Xenia Railroad around 1848, later absorbed by the Pennsylvania system, slowed commerce along the National Road.