On October 6, 1882, the Carroll County Times reported that a new depot had been located on the Georgia Pacific "at the old Seventh Court Ground in Haralson County," and "that at the present time, there is no one living in three miles of the place." The new town of Bremen was plotted and laid out in a grid of commercial and residential lots bisected by the railroad. The commercial lots were located at the center, on either side of the railroad, and a small park was located on the north side of the railroad at the center. On October 31, 1882, a public sale of town lots was conducted and on September 5, 1883, the town of Bremen was incorporated. The corporate limits formed a rectangle, one-half mile east and west of the depot and one-fourth mile north and south of the railroad track.
When the Chattanooga, Rome, and Columbus Railroad was built through the county in c. 1887, the tracks crossed the Georgia Pacific about three-fourths of a mile northeast of the Bremen depot and about one-fourth mile east of the corporate limits established in 1883.
Growth and development in the area of the railroad crossing resulted in a shift in and expansion of the corporate limits of Bremen on December 15, 1892. The new rectangular corporate limits extended one-half mile east and 1,610 yards west from the crossing of the railroads and one-half mile north and south of the Georgia Pacific Railroad tracks. These corporate limits included the area around the railroad crossing as well as most of the "old town" area. On December 30, 1898, the shift of the town to the area of the rail crossing was completed when the corporate limits were again changed, this time extending 700 yards in every direction from where "Buchanan" street crossed the Southern Railroad. This small circle of four-tenths-mile radius, centered near the railroad crossing, was a significant reduction in Bremen's incorporated area and excluded most of the "old town" area. This fact is reflected in Bremen's population figures. Bremen's population in 1890 was 312. After the two changes in the town's corporate limits in the 1890s, the population in 1900 was only 291.
Buchanan
On September 20, 1881, Buchanan's town limits were expanded from one-half to five-eighths of a mile in every direction from the center of the public square. In c. 1887, the Chattanooga, Rome, and Columbus Railroad laid its tracks north-south through the eastern side of town, and about that time, rail service was completed between Chattanooga and Carrollton; in May 1891, construction was begun on a new county courthosue. Due to the influence of the railroad and an increase in its corporate limits, Buchanan's population increased from 158 in 1880 to 324 in 1890. Population increased modestly during the 1890s, reaching 359 by 1900.
Waco
Lying along the Georgia Pacific Railroad 2.5 miles southwest of Bremen, Waco was a small unincorporated community when the railroad skirted its northern fringe. Known first as Dean, Waco was incorporated on September 23, 1885. The corporate limits extended on-half mile in every direction from the Methodist Protestant Church, or the center of the town. In 1890, Waco's population of 357 was greater than that of either Bremen or Buchanan. By 1900, however, population declined to 345, and Waco's population was surpassed by Buchanan's.
Tallapoosa
Undoubtedly, the most significant events related to the development and growth of Haralson County's towns during this period occurred in Tallapoosa. In c. 1884 the Georgia Pacific Railroad laid track three-fourths of a mile south of the center of Tallapoosa, outside the corporate limits of the town. Beginning in July 1887, Tallapoosa's development was stimulated by the investment and promotion activities of the Tallapoosa Land, Mining, and Manufacturing Company and subsequently, beginning in c. 1890, by the Georgia-Alabama Investment and Development Company. These companies successively owned or controlled large blocks of land in and around Tallapoosa and proposed to build a large and proserous manufacturing and residential city and health resort. A city was plotted and the promoters planned to build varous manufacturing facilities, a public school building, a great hotel at Lithia Springs, streetcar lines, wtaer works, electric light facilities, parks and various other public enterprises and improvements.
A boom resulted in Tallapoosa from c. 1887 until c. 1893, when outside investment slowed or was withdrawn. On December 26, 1888, the town was reincorporated as the City of Tallapoosa and the corporate limits were extended on a grand scale to include 17 land lots or more than 3,440 acres.
Growth and development of the new city was equally dramatic. Tallapoosa's "old town" population stood at only 56 in 1884; but according to the 1890 census, the new City of Tallapoosa, centered along the Georgia Pacific Railroad, had reached a population of 1,699 by the end of the decade.
Tallapoosa's boom phase continued into the early 1890s. A Prospectus of the City of Tallapoosa published by the Georgia-Alabama Investment and Development Company in 1891 claimed that Tallapoosa had 13 manufacturing establishments operating or under construction, a state bank (the Merchants and Miners Bank), three hotels, Lithia Springs Park and Gardens and the great Lithia Springs Hotel under construction, two newspapers, an electric light company and 36 street lights, a waterworks, five churches (two black), two schools (one black), 30 stores, and nearly 700 houses, with two-thirds having been built in the past two years.
Some additional commercial, industrial, and residential development occurred bfore Tallapoosa's boom period stalled, including the construction of several additional brick commercial buildings, the construction of a street railway system, and the completion of the Lithia Springs Hotel. The previously noted industrial decline was partially offset by the development of fruit-related industries later in th decade, and the Lithia Springs Hotel attracted large numbers of visitors to the city.
Some reports claim Tallapoosa's population reached 2,500 to 3,000 in the early 1890s, during the height of the boom. After the boom subsided and the economy stabilized somewhat, the city had an official population of 2,128 in 1900. This figure indicates a net population gain of 25.2 percent over the decade of the 1890s. Thus, in 1900, Tallapoosa had almost six times the population of Buchanan, the county's second largest town.