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History · Arcola

Arcola’s post office opened in 1875

Most of Arcola was built recently: 8% of its homes predate 1940 and the median home dates from 1974. Below: maps from 1939 on and the census since 1910.

1875first post office
0on the National Register
8%homes built before 1940
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Photo: Chillin662 · CC BY-SA 4.0
Quick answers

How Arcola began

When was Arcola founded?

1875

The Arcola post office opened in 1875, the earliest record of the town by name.

First census: 512 in 19102020 census: 304151 years
Founding year: the first Arcola post office (Blevins & Helbock, CC0).The full story ↓

What stands out about Arcola’s past

Read from the archive, the National Register and the record. The page puts what stands out first.

A history waiting to be writtenNo old photos of Arcola are in the public archives yet. The rest are in attics and albums.
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Start Arcola’s collection

The first neighbors to add old photos shape how Arcola’s history is told.

Decades since 1900 with photos
00s10s20s30s40s50s60s70s80s90s
0 of 10 decades. The empty ones are waiting for someone’s album.
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The story

How Arcola came to be

From Wikipedia’s history of Arcola.

Read it all →

According to linguist Keith Baca, the name Arcola may be derived from the Choctaw language meaning "jar".

In the 1900s, Leroy Percy owned the Trail Lake Plantation, a Southern plantation near Arcola.

In his 2015 travel book entitled Deep South: Four Seasons on Back Roads, author Paul Theroux describes it as a "ghost town."

Text from Wikipedia, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0.

By decade

Arcola, decade by decade

Today4 recent
ArcolaMSWelcomeSign2025ArcolaMSWelcomeSignArcolaMSWaterTower2025ArcolaMSWaterTowerArcola MS Welcome Sign2021Arcola MS Welcome SignDowntown2014Downtown
On the map

Arcola on the map, 1939 to 1967

Every edition of the U.S. Geological Survey’s map of Arcola. Tap a year, or press play to watch the town change.

Arcola on the 1939 USGS mapArcola on the 1967 USGS map1939Tralake sheet · 1:62,500

U.S. Geological Survey historical topographic maps (public domain), via Esri’s collection of the scans. The red ring marks the center of Arcola.

People over time

Arcola, census by census

0100200300400500600192019401960198020002020Peak: 588

Between 304 and 588 people in every census since 1910.

12 censuses, 1910–2020.

U.S. Census Bureau decennial counts, from the census table on Arcola’s Wikipedia page.

Questions about Arcola’s history

What year was Arcola founded?

The Arcola post office opened in 1875, the earliest record of the town by name (U.S. post office records).

Memory lane

What the archives can’t tell you, neighbors can.

Town Square →
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Sources

Where this page comes from

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), 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.