Dalton, Georgia: A Senator's Name on a Railroad Town

Dalton, Georgia, honors a New England merchant and senator who died in 1817, long before the railroad town at Cross Plains was laid out by his grandson. That grandson, Edward White, sold the first lots in 1846.

Cross Plains on the state railroad

In the 1840s the Western and Atlantic Railroad was being built north from Atlanta toward Chattanooga. A spot called Cross Plains lay on the route. George White described the new town in his Statistics of the State of Georgia in 1849, just a few years after it began:

“Dalton, formerly called Cross Plains. It received its present name in honour of Mr. Tristam Dalton, an eminent merchant of New England.”

White adds that the lots “were sold in 1846, by Mr. Edward White, who was sent out by a company who had previously purchased the land.” By 1849 the town had about 1,500 people, 100 miles (161 km) north of Atlanta and 35 miles (56 km) southeast of Chattanooga. Read a little further and you’ll find him calling it the market for much of East Tennessee and western North Carolina, with wagons hauling in “immense quantities of produce.”

The Geological Survey’s place-name record gives 1847 as the year Dalton was incorporated. White’s later Historical Collections of Georgia (1854) adds that Whitfield County was laid out from Murray County in 1851, with Dalton as its county town.

The senator and his daughter

White spelled the name “Tristam,” but the man is Tristram Dalton. The Georgia Historical Society’s marker in Dalton, put up in 1953, fills in who he was: born in Newburyport, Massachusetts, a Harvard graduate of 1755 who “followed mercantile pursuits,” and a U.S. senator from 1789 to 1791. It also explains the family tie. Edward White, the man who laid out the town, was Dalton’s grandson, and the marker says the city “was named in honor of Senator Dalton and his daughter Mary, mother of Capt. White.”

The Geological Survey’s 1905 place-name bulletin, compiled by Henry Gannett, agrees on the man. Its entry for this Dalton says the town was “named for Gen. Tristram Dalton, speaker of the house of representatives of Massachusetts,” though the marker never calls him a general. The same page lists a Dalton in Coos County, New Hampshire, “named for Hon. Tristram Dalton, a grantee.” If you’ve passed through both, you’ve been to two towns named for the same man.

Quick answers

Who is Dalton, Georgia, named after?

Tristram Dalton, a Massachusetts merchant and U.S. senator. George White’s 1849 Statistics says the town was named “in honour of Mr. Tristam Dalton,” and the Georgia Historical Society’s marker adds his daughter Mary, the mother of the town’s developer.

What was Dalton called before?

Cross Plains, according to White (1849).

Who founded Dalton, Georgia?

Edward White sold the first lots in 1846 for the company that had bought the land, White’s Statistics says. The historical marker says he was Tristram Dalton’s grandson.

Key dates

1. 1846Edward White sells the town lots for the company that bought the land.
2. 1847Dalton is incorporated.
3. 1851Whitfield County is laid out from Murray County, with Dalton as its county town.

Getting there

Open Dalton in Google Maps

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Opens in a new tab. The pin is the center of Dalton in the USGS place-name record.

The closest airports, Amtrak stations and intercity bus stops, measured in a straight line from the center of Dalton.

Airports

• Lovell Field (CHA) Chattanooga 23 mi 36 km
• Hartsfield/Jackson Atlanta International (ATL) 84 mi 136 km

Amtrak trains

• Gainesville station (GNS) 73 mi 118 km
• Atlanta station (ATL) 75 mi 120 km

Intercity buses

• Greyhound Athens Exxon 51 mi 83 km
• FlixBus Marietta/Kennesaw 57 mi 92 km

Distances are as the crow flies, not by road. We don't list schedules or fares because they change; check with the airline, Amtrak or the bus company before you go. Official data (FAA commercial service airports (2025), FAA airport locations, Amtrak stations and Intercity Bus Atlas) from the FAA and the U.S. Bureau of Transportation Statistics, checked Nov 6, 2026.

Historical Sources & References

• George White, Statistics of the State of Georgia (1849), pp. 439-440. Dalton “formerly called Cross Plains,” named “in honour of Mr. Tristam Dalton, an eminent merchant of New England”; the lots sold by Edward White in 1846; the Western and Atlantic Railroad.
• George White, Historical Collections of Georgia (1854), p. 679. Whitfield County laid out from Murray in 1851, with Dalton as the county town.
• Georgia Historical Society, “Tristram Dalton” marker (1953). Tristram Dalton’s life; Edward White as his grandson; the city named for the senator and his daughter Mary.
• Henry Gannett, The Origin of Certain Place Names in the United States (1905), p. 99. Dalton, Georgia, “named for Gen. Tristram Dalton, speaker of the house of representatives of Massachusetts”; Dalton, New Hampshire, “named for Hon. Tristram Dalton, a grantee.”
• GNIS feature 355424 (U.S. Geological Survey). The Geological Survey’s listing and coordinates for Dalton, in Whitfield County, incorporated in 1847.