page_title: Tucker, Georgia
section_title: Railroad
hierarchical_section_title: Tucker, Georgia / History / Railroad
caption_attribution_description: English: Portion of Georgia, Atlanta Sheet, United States Department of the Interior Geological Survey showing Tucker, Georgia. Map contains survey conducted in 1887-1888 with NAD27, and printed in 1955.
context_page_description: Tucker is a city located in DeKalb County, Georgia located near Atlanta and was originally settled in the 1820s, and later developed as a railroad community in 1892. According to the 2016 United States Census Bureau annual estimate of resident population, it has a population of 35,322. In a November 2015 referendum, by a 3:1 margin, voters approved incorporating Tucker into a city. In March 2016, Tucker residents elected the city's first mayor and city council.
context_section_description: In 1886 the Georgia, Carolina and Northern Railway received a charter to build a new rail line between Monroe, North Carolina, and Atlanta. Prior to the project's completion, the company leased the road to the Seaboard Air Line Railroad system, a collection of regional railroads headquartered in North Carolina eager to extend its reach to Atlanta.
  Seaboard built depots at a number of small villages, often little more than a crossroads, and named them for railroad company officials. The depot at Jug Tavern, for example, was named for Seaboard's general manager, John H. Winder. The stop at Bryan was named in honor of the system's general superintendent, Lilburn Meyers. Although the origin of the name is unknown, it is possible that the next stop, in the Brownings District, may have been named for Rufus S. Tucker, a director and major shareholder in several Seaboard system railroads. At the DeKalb County Centennial Celebration in 1922, Charles Murphey Candler stated that Tucker a “prosperous and promising village on the Seaboard Air Line Railway . . . was named in honor of Capt. Tucker, an official of the Seaboard Air Railway.” Some residents attribute the name to a local family with the surname Tucker.
  The first train steamed into the new Tucker station on Sunday, April 24, 1892. Originating in Elberton with a final destination of the Atlanta suburb of Inman Park — a four-hour trip — the Seaboard train consisted of two cars carrying 150 passengers and a baggage car. Two months later the US Postal Service appointed Alpheus G. Chewning first Postmaster of the Tucker Post office. Rural Free Delivery began on March 2, 1903.
  On Saturday July 1,1967, the Seaboard Air Line Railroad merged with the Atlantic Coast Line to form Seaboard Coast Line Railroad. In 1983 The line became Seaboard System and merged with the Chesapeake & Ohio, Baltimore & Ohio and the Western Maryland in 1986 Chessie System to form current railroad operator, CSXT.
  Although no longer a train stop for passengers, the Tucker depot is currently a CSX field office for track repair and signal maintenance.
  Tucker, at 1,117 feet (340 m) feet above sea level, is the highest point of elevation on the railroad line between Atlanta and Richmond, Virginia.
caption: 19th century geological survey showing railroad in Tucker
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