The Tuscumbia Railway, the first railroad west of the Alleghenies, was begun here in 1832 and completed to Decatur, 45 miles east, in 1834. Cotton shipped by this line went around nearby Muscle Shoals, then by boat down the Tennessee and Mississippi River to world markets. In 1851 it was expanded into the Memphis and Charleston Railroad. A vital line in the Civil War, it changed hands several times before becoming part of Southern Railways in 1898.

Photo: Sandra Hughes

Muscle Shoals, Alabama · USA