Each edition grades its towns against each other only.
Its Register listing is the Ebenezer African Methodist Episcopal Church and School. Below: 2 old photos and papers, maps from 1955 on, and the census since 1880.
Whigham first appears in the census in 1880.
Read from the archive, the National Register and the record. The page puts what stands out first.
The first neighbors to add old photos shape how Whigham’s history is told.
Peaked at 662 in 1920; 428 people lived here in 2020.
15 censuses, 1880–2020.
U.S. Census Bureau decennial counts, from the census table on Whigham’s Wikipedia page.
From Wikipedia’s history of Whigham.
The community was named after Robert Whigham, a local merchant. The Georgia General Assembly incorporated Whigham as a town in 1896. It was incorporated again as a city in 1970.
Text from Wikipedia, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0.
Woven from the archive, old maps, post office records, the National Register and the people born here.
BuiltEbenezer African Methodist Episcopal Church and School is built
In the archiveGeorgia [Effingham County (part) - Newton County (part)
On the mapFirst mapped by the U.S. Geological SurveyOne decade in the archive so far: the 1940s. Scroll each row; tap a photo for its story.
Every edition of the U.S. Geological Survey’s map of Whigham. Tap a year, or press play to watch the town change.
U.S. Geological Survey historical topographic maps (public domain), via Esri’s collection of the scans. The red ring marks the center of Whigham.
No then-and-now pairs yet. Take a photo from the same spot as an old one and they appear here side by side.
Find the spot, match the angle, and add your photo. It becomes the first then-and-now pair on Whigham’s page.
Retake this view · +15The country’s official list of buildings and places worth saving.
National Park Service, National Register of Historic Places. Photos from Wikimedia Commons, credited on each place’s page.
The Whigham post office opened in 1880, the earliest record of the town by name (U.S. post office records).
One place: the Ebenezer African Methodist Episcopal Church and School (listed 2008).
What the archives can’t tell you, neighbors can.
Founding dates: Wikidata, Wikipedia, the U.S. post office records of Blevins & Helbock (CC0) and the Census. Homes by year built: Census ACS 2020–24. National Register of Historic Places: National Park Service (list of May 22, 2026). Old photos, postcards and papers: Wikimedia Commons, the Library of Congress and other public archives, credited on each item’s page. Maps: U.S. Geological Survey historical topographic maps (via Esri) and Sanborn fire-insurance maps (Library of Congress). History text and census tables: Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0). Places that used to be: USGS Geographic Names Information System (2021). How TownRatings grades history →
From Wikimedia Commons (4), Wikidata (1), the National Register of Historic Places (1), Wikipedia, U.S. Geological Survey historical maps, U.S. Census counts (via Wikipedia), the US Post Offices dataset (Blevins & Helbock) and the USGS Geographic Names Information System. Archive images are copied here with their credits and licenses, shown on each photo’s page. Refreshed monthly.
1940
2015
2005