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46-465: Fort Payne is a city in and county seat of DeKalb County , in northeastern Alabama , United States. It is near Lookout Mountain . At the 2020 census , the population was 14,877. This city developed around a fort of the same name, built in the 1830s to intern the Cherokee tribe who were being rounded up by the military before being forcibly removed to Indian Territory in 1838 on what they called

92-531: A Superior Court and Sheriff (as an officer of the court ), both located in a designated "shire town". Bennington County, Vermont has two shire towns; the court for "North Shire" is in the shire town Manchester , and the Sheriff for the county and court for "South Shire" are in the shire town Bennington. In 2024, Connecticut , which had not defined their counties for anything but statistical, historical and weather warning purposes since 1960, along with ending

138-410: A county seat may be an independent city surrounded by, but not part of, the county of which it is the administrative center; for example, Fairfax City is both the county seat of Fairfax County, Virginia and completely surrounded by Fairfax County, but the city is politically independent of the county. When the county seat is in the independent city, government offices such as the courthouse may be in

184-476: A manufacturer in Datang would have to wait half an hour for the part to arrive from a local company. American multinational retail corporations began to source hosiery products from Datang. The American companies’ strict negotiating positions required the Datang producers to accept as little as 3% profit. As American retail corporations began to source their products from China, Datang became the new "Sock Capital of

230-551: A pre-literate culture. In Alabama, his people soon started publishing the first newspaper in Cherokee and English, The Cherokee Phoenix . This settlement was commonly called Willstown after its headman, Will Weber, who had striking red hair. He was the son of Cherokee and German parents and raised as Cherokee. John Norton , a man born in Scotland about 1770 to Scottish and Cherokee parents, visited this area and other parts of

276-557: A tropical storm or tropical depression. However, in 1995 the eye of Hurricane Opal reached Fort Payne with hurricane-force winds. The 1993 Storm of the Century dumped more than 20 inches (51 cm) of snow on Fort Payne, immobilizing the city and the surrounding area for days. The Köppen Climate Classification subtype for this climate is "Cfa". (Humid Subtropical Climate). As of the 2020 United States census , there were 14,877 people, 5,066 households, and 3,219 families residing in

322-409: Is known as the seat of its county. Generally, the county legislature, county courthouse, sheriff's department headquarters, hall of records, jail and correctional facility are located in the county seat, though some functions (such as highway maintenance, which usually requires a large garage for vehicles, along with asphalt and salt storage facilities) may also be located or conducted in other parts of

368-548: Is on Lookout Mountain outside the city limits. Another natural attraction is DeSoto State Park . While smaller in area, it has a lodge, restaurant, cabins, and river access areas. Manitou Cave is also near Fort Payne. The country music group Alabama is based in Fort Payne. The city also houses the group's fan club and museum. Fort Payne is within a 30-minute drive of substantial water recreational areas, notably Guntersville Lake and Weiss Lake , an artificial lake on

414-546: Is subject to occasional tornadoes. The city's northern side was struck by F3 and F4 tornadoes February 29, 1952 and May 19, 1973, respectively, both of which caused considerable damage. Exactly ten years later, a tornado struck the city again. In the Palm Sunday tornado outbreak of 1994 , an F3 tornado passed just west of the city Occasionally, a hurricane that has made landfall in the Gulf of Mexico will reach Fort Payne as

460-485: Is the Superintendent of Education. For a time beginning in 1989, Fort Payne held the world record for "Largest Cake Ever Baked", for a cake of 128,238 pounds (58,168 kg) baked to commemorate the city's centennial. County seat In Canada , the provinces of Ontario , Quebec , New Brunswick , Prince Edward Island , and Nova Scotia have counties as an administrative division of government below

506-534: The Coosa River . Fort Payne is also near Mentone , a popular mountain resort area known for summer children's camps, rustic hotels, restaurants, and cabins. Fort Payne is served by the Fort Payne City Schools system. Schools in the district include Wills Valley Elementary (K-2), Little Ridge Intermediate (3-5) Fort Payne Middle School (6-8), and Fort Payne High School (9-12). Brian Jett

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552-503: The Trail of Tears . European-American settlers gradually developed a community around the former fort. It grew rapidly in the late 19th century based on industrial resources, and manufacturing increased in the early 20th century. At the beginning of the 21st century, it still had 7000 workers in 100 mills producing varieties of socks, nearly half the world production. The volume of production has declined because of competition from China. In

598-457: The Trail of Tears . Only a chimney of Fort Payne still stands in the downtown of the city that developed around it. Although European Americans had pressed for Indian removal in the Southeast because they wanted land to cultivate, by the 1860s, the city of Fort Payne and the surrounding area were only sparsely settled. Development of cotton plantations and larger settlements had taken place in

644-474: The U.S. Census Bureau , the city has a total area of 55.8 square miles (144.6 km), of which 55.5 square miles (143.7 km) is land and 0.35 square miles (0.9 km), or 0.64%, is water. The city center lies in a narrow valley on Big Wills Creek in the Cumberland Plateau region immediately west of Lookout Mountain , with Sand Mountain at a distance to the west. The city limits reach to

690-641: The Cherokee homeland in 1809-1810. He had come to North America as a British soldier and became close to Mohawk people at the Grand River Reserve in Ontario, where he served as an interpreter. During the 1830s prior to Indian removal , the US Army under command of Major John Payne built a fort near Willstown to intern Cherokee from Alabama until they were forcibly removed to Indian Territory (now Oklahoma ). Their forced exile became known as

736-947: The United States, followed by Towson , the county seat of Baltimore County, Maryland . Likewise, some county seats may not be incorporated in their own right, but are located within incorporated municipalities. For example, Cape May Court House, New Jersey , though unincorporated, is a section of Middle Township , an incorporated municipality. In some states, often those that were among the original Thirteen Colonies , county seats include or formerly included "Court House" as part of their name, such as Spotsylvania Courthouse, Virginia . Most counties have only one county seat. However, some counties in Alabama , Arkansas , Georgia , Iowa , Kentucky , Massachusetts , Mississippi , Missouri , New Hampshire , New York , and Vermont have two or more county seats, usually located on opposite sides of

782-471: The United States, resulting in large increases in sock imports. By the early 2000s a very large, highly-efficient centre for sock production had grown up around Datang, Zhuji in Zhejiang Province , China. Raw materials and hosiery machines were also manufactured at Datang. While in Fort Payne a company might have to wait two months for a replacement part for a hosiery machine to arrive from Italy,

828-511: The World." Many businesses in Fort Payne accused foreign manufacturers, particularly those from China , of engaging in dumping of socks below cost to force American companies out of the sock business. By 2005, hosiery mill employment in Fort Payne had declined to around 5,500, and several mills had closed. In late 2005, the federal government gained an agreement with the Chinese government to slow

874-421: The age of 18 living with them, 53.9% were married couples living together, 11.6% had a female householder with no husband present, and 30.5% were non-families. 26.9% of all households were made up of individuals, and 12.1% had someone living alone who was 65 years of age or older. The average household size was 2.49 and the average family size was 2.97. In the city, the population was spread out, with 23.4% under

920-461: The age of 18, 10.2% from 18 to 24, 29.3% from 25 to 44, 21.6% from 45 to 64, and 15.6% who were 65 years of age or older. The median age was 36 years. For every 100 females, there were 92.3 males. For every 100 females age 18 and over, there were 88.5 males. The median income for a household in the city was $ 33,560, and the median income for a family was $ 40,200. Males had a median income of $ 29,731 versus $ 20,135 for females. The per capita income for

966-454: The city was $ 19,690. About 8.3% of families and 12.3% of the population were below the poverty line , including 15.0% of those under age 18 and 17.6% of those age 65 or over. The ruins of the old Fort Payne are visible in the historic downtown of the city. The National Park Service has headquarters here for the nearby Little River Canyon National Preserve , a 14,000-acre (57 km) protected area established by Congress in 1992. The canyon

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1012-596: The city's economy. Several new commercial and industrial projects were developed. The largest was the 2006 construction of a distribution center for The Children's Place stores, a facility that employed 600 people in its first phase of operation. Other large corporations represented in Fort Payne include Heil Environmental Industries (a division of Dover Industries, manufacturing sanitation trucks); Vulcraft (a division of Nucor Corporation, manufacturing steel roofing systems); and Game Time (a division of Playcore, manufacturing commercial playground equipment). According to

1058-473: The city. Fort Payne had at the 2010 census a population of 14,012. There were 5,296 households. The racial makeup of the population was 72.0% non-Hispanic white, 4.2% black or African American, 0.9% Native American, 0.8% Asian, 0.2% Pacific Islander, 0.1% non-Hispanic from some other race, 2.5% reporting two or more races and 20.9% Hispanic or Latino of any race. As of the census of 2000, there were 12,938 people, 5,046 households, and 3,506 families residing in

1104-519: The city. The population density was 231.5 inhabitants per square mile (89.4/km). There were 5,585 housing units at an average density of 100.0 per square mile (38.6/km) The racial makeup of the city was 83.22% White , 4.53% Black or African American , 0.80% Native American , 0.55% Asian , 0.16% Pacific Islander , 8.41% from other races , and 2.33% from two or more races. 12.17% of the population were Hispanic or Latino of any race. There were 5,046 households, out of which 31.2% had children under

1150-526: The counties after his unification, there were about 1,000. Under the Eastern Han dynasty , the number of counties increased to above 1,000. About 1400 existed when the Sui dynasty abolished the commandery level (郡 jùn), which was the level just above counties, and demoted some commanderies to counties. In Imperial China, the county was a significant administrative unit because it marked the lowest level of

1196-418: The county, especially if it is geographically large. A county seat is usually an incorporated municipality . The exceptions include the county seats of counties that have no incorporated municipalities within their borders, such as Arlington County, Virginia , where the county seat is the entire county. Ellicott City , the county seat of Howard County, Maryland , is the largest unincorporated county seat in

1242-420: The county. Examples include Harrison County, Mississippi , which has both Biloxi and Gulfport as county seats, and Hinds County, Mississippi , which has both Raymond and the state capital of Jackson . The practice of multiple county seat towns dates from the days when travel was difficult. There have been few efforts to eliminate the two-seat arrangement, since a county seat is a source of civic pride for

1288-409: The depot serves as a museum of local history. The iron and coal deposits were much smaller than expected. Many of the promoters left the region for Birmingham, Alabama , which became the state's major industrial city. Fort Payne suffered a period of economic decline. In 1907, the W.B. Davis Hosiery Mill began operations, processing area cotton to produce socks and hosiery. Hosiery manufacture has led

1334-425: The east and south so that more than half of the city's area is now located on Lookout Mountain. Drainage is through Big Wills Creek to the Coosa River . A magnitude 4.9 earthquake occurred here in 2003. Fort Payne is notable for a subtropical climate. Winters usually feature measurable, though infrequent, snow. Cloudmont Ski Resort on Lookout Mountain generates man-made snow as winter temperatures permit. The area

1380-620: The economy in Fort Payne. At the beginning of the 21st century, the hosiery industry in Fort Payne employed over 7,000 people in more than 100 mills. It produced more than half of the socks made in the United States and claimed to be the "Sock Capital of the World." Beginning in the 1990s, the North American Free Trade Agreement and the Central American Free Trade Agreement lowered tariffs on textile products imported into

1426-424: The imperial bureaucratic structure; in other words, it was the lowest level that the government reached. Government below the county level was often undertaken through informal non-bureaucratic means, varying between dynasties. The head of a county was the magistrate , who oversaw both the day-to-day operations of the county as well as civil and criminal cases. The current number of counties mostly resembled that of

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1472-585: The increase of Han Chinese population in Taiwan, the number of counties also grew by time. By the end of Qing era, there were 11 counties in Taiwan. Protestant missionaries in China first romanized the term as hien . When Taiwan became a Japanese colony in 1895, the hierarchy of divisions also incorporated into the Japanese system in the period when Taiwan was under Japanese rule. By September 1945, Taiwan

1518-625: The independent city under an agreement, such as in Albemarle , or may in be enclaves of the county surrounded by the independent city, such as in Fairfax . Others, such as Prince William , have the courthouse in an enclave surrounded by the independent city and have the county government, the Board of Supervisors, in a different part of the county, far from the county seat. The following counties have their county seat in an independent city: Bedford

1564-473: The late 1880s, Fort Payne's growth was stimulated after the discovery of coal and iron deposits, needed to support industrialization. Investors and especially workers from New England and the North flooded into the region for new jobs. This period is called the "Boom Days", or simply the "Boom". Many of the notable historic buildings in Fort Payne date from this period of economic growth and prosperity, including

1610-538: The late 18th and early 19th centuries, this was the site of Willstown , an important town of the Lower Cherokee. They had moved south along the Tennessee River and into what became Alabama in an effort to escape European-American pressure. For a time this was the home of Sequoyah , a silversmith who by 1821 created the Cherokee syllabary , one of the few writing systems created by an individual from

1656-703: The later years of the Qing dynasty . Changes of location and names of counties in Chinese history have been a major field of research in Chinese historical geography, especially from the 1960s to the 1980s. There are 1,355 counties in Mainland China out of a total of 2,851 county-level divisions. In Taiwan , the first counties were first established in 1661 by the Kingdom of Tungning . The later ruler Qing empire inherited this type of administrative divisions. With

1702-775: The provincial level, and thus county seats. In the provinces of Prince Edward Island, New Brunswick, and Nova Scotia the term "shire town" is used in place of county seat. County seats in China are the administrative centers of the counties in the People's Republic of China . Xian have existed since the Warring States period and were set up nationwide by the Qin dynasty . The number of counties in China proper gradually increased from dynasty to dynasty. As Qin Shi Huang reorganized

1748-403: The schedule for the removal of tariffs, delaying their full removal until 2008. The hosiery industry continues to have a foothold in the community, diversifying from athletic socks to boutique designs such as Zkano , and other specialty and medical socks. In the 1990s, facing the international threat to their manufacturing, business and civic leaders in Fort Payne began to take steps to diversify

1794-777: The state's area, has no borough government or borough seat. One borough, the Lake and Peninsula Borough , has its borough seat located in another borough, namely King Salmon in Bristol Bay Borough . In Louisiana , which is divided into parishes rather than counties, county seats are referred to as "parish seats". In New England , counties have served mainly as dividing lines for the states' judicial systems. Rhode Island has no county level of government and thus no county seats, and Massachusetts has dissolved many but not all of its county governments. In Vermont , Massachusetts , and Maine county government consists only of

1840-644: The state's oldest standing theater, the Fort Payne Opera House ; the former factory of the Hardware Manufacturing Company (today known as the W. B. Davis Mill Building , now the location of the Fort Payne Depot Museum , and formerly the passenger station for the present-day Norfolk Southern Railway . Following the decline of passenger traffic in the mid-20th century as people took to automobiles, today

1886-416: The towns involved, along with providing employment opportunities. There are 33 counties with multiple county seats in 11 states: Alaska is divided into boroughs rather than counties; the county seat in these case is referred to as the "borough seat"; this includes six consolidated city-borough governments (one of which is styled as a "municipality"). The Unorganized Borough, Alaska , which covers 49% of

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1932-592: The uplands region known as the Black Belt. With no strategic targets nearby, during the Civil War only minor skirmishes between Union and Confederate forces took place here. About the time of the Second Battle of Chattanooga , a large Union force briefly entered the county, but it did not engage substantial Confederate forces. In 1878 the city Fort Payne was designated as the county seat, and in 1889 it

1978-624: The use of county seats in particular, will fully transition with the permission of the United States Census Bureau to a system of councils of government for the purposes of boundary definition and as county equivalents. Two counties in South Dakota , Oglala Lakota and Todd , have their county seat and government services centered in a neighboring county. Their county-level services are provided by Fall River County and Tripp County , respectively. In Virginia ,

2024-536: Was an independent city from 1968 to 2013, while also being the county seat of Bedford County . Bedford reverted to an incorporated town, and remains the county seat, though is now part of the county. The state with the most counties is Texas, with 254, and the state with the fewest counties is Delaware, with 3. Fort Payne Opera House Too Many Requests If you report this error to the Wikimedia System Administrators, please include

2070-635: Was divided into 8 prefectures ( 州 and 廳 ), which remained after the Republic of China took over. There are 13 county seats in Taiwan, which function as county-administered cities , urban townships , or rural townships . In most of the United States , a county is an administrative or political subdivision of a state that consists of a geographic area with specific boundaries and usually some level of governmental authority. The city, town, or populated place that houses county government

2116-458: Was incorporated as a town. The community of Lebanon had served as the DeKalb county seat since 1850. With the completion of rail lines between Birmingham and Chattanooga that went through Fort Payne, the city's growth was stimulated by connection to this new transportation route. County sentiment had supported having the seat in a community served by the railroad, seen as key to the future. In

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