By Staff
We are getting to how the county towns came into being, according to Hoomes’ history of the county.
Brewton, the county seat of Escambia County, is located in the central part of the county, on the main line of the Louisville and Nashville Railroad, between Montgomery and Mobile, 105 miles southwest of Montgomery and 75 miles northeast of Mobile. Brewton was incorporated by act of the legislature on February 13, 1885, with corporate limits described as “bounded on the east by Murder Creek, on the west by Burnt Corn Creek, and shall extend one mile north from the courthouse in said town, in all directions between the said two creeks.”
On Feb. 18, 1891 the act was amended, presumably due to some error in the original legislation. W.T. Titcomb was the first mayor of the town serving in 1882. It is thought that Brewton gets its name from one of the first settlers, a Mr. Bruton, but it is not known how the change in spelling came about.
The Brewton Standard, established in 1887, a Democratic weekly newspaper, and the Brewton Trade Record, published first in 1929 by the merchants in the town, are published there.
Brewton has three strong banks, Farmers and Merchants Bank, the Bank of Brewton and Citizen’s Bank, none of which failed during the period in which there were so many bank failures throughout the country.
Atmore is in the southwestern corner of Escambia County, on the main line of the Louisville and Nashville Railroad. It was settled in 1870 and incorporated in 1907 under the general municipal code. Atmore, has two banks, The First National and the Bank of Atmore.  A democratic weekly newspaper, The Atmore Record, established in 1903, is published there. The principal industries are the ice plant, electric light plant, and the Carney Lumber plant. The Escambia County High School is located there and the churches are the Methodist, Baptist and Episcopal.
The locality was settled by William S. Williams, previous to the coming of the railroad, and was called William’s Station in honor of its first settler. In 1895 the name was changed to Atmore, for C.P. Atmore, general passenger agent of the Louisville and Nashville Railroad.
Flomaton is an incorporated town in the southern edge of Escambia County, on the Escambia Creek about four miles north of where it joins with the Conecuh River. It is on the main line of the Louisville and Nashville Railroad; 13 miles southwest of Brewton; 44 miles north of Pensacola; and 60 miles northeast of Mobile. It was incorporated in 1908.
It was first named “Whiting” in honor of the second president of the railroad company; this name was later changed with “Pensacola Junction” when it became a railroad junction. The name later changed to “Flomaton,” this being made of the first three letters of Florida, the last two of Alabama and the suffix, meaning town.
At the time Escambia County was formed, Pollard was a railroad center, having the shops of the present Louisville and Nashville Railroad and the division of offices of the railroad, and was the home of the division officers. The town was named for Charles Teed. Pollard, who was the first president of the railroad. After the railroad junction was moved to Flomaton and the shops were moved Mobile, Pensacola, and Montgomery. Mr. Mark Lyons abandoned his timber yards near Pollard. The timber booms having been moved from Pollard to Ferry Pass, there was nothing left at Pollard except the courthouse. Brewton was rapidly becoming a town of importance, and at an election the county seat was moved to Brewton from Pollard. As is often the case there were very bitter feeling and much litigation with reference to the removal of the county sear from Pollard to Brewton. The people were so incensed that they sent a carload of cats to Brewton and turned the loose, and Brewton was for many years after that infested with cats and the editor of the Trade Record says, “Perhaps it has a surplus today.”
This seems like a good place to stop for this week. Next week we will get to some of the early growth of the county.