Etowah was the name given to the town at the center of the industrial complex created by Mark Anthony Cooper in the mid 1840’s. (AKA Cooper’s Furnace) Located on the south side of the Etowah River at the confluence of Stamp, McKaskey, and Allatoona Creeks, it boasted a huge blast furnace and foundry, machinery to produce rails and railroad spikes, a flour mill, two corn mills, a saw mill, shops, and warehouses. It was actually an entire community, with 1200 residents, a post office (1849-1857), a Baptist church, a schoolhouse, a store, bank, and boarding houses. The entire town and industrial complex centered around the mining of iron ore in the surrounding hills.

Approximately four miles west of Etowah stood the Etowah Depot on the north side of the Etowah River along the tracks of the Western & Atlantic Railroad. The depot and town were connected by rail in 1859. The Yonah, a steam engine used by Cooper’s Iron Works, happened to be at the Etowah Station on the morning of April 12, 1862 and played a critical role in what today is known as the Great Locomotive Chase. An advancing Union Army destroyed Etowah in May 1864 and it was never rebuilt. The ruins of the town of Etowah are now at the bottom of Lake Allatoona near the Allatoona Dam.

Source: Mark Anthony Cooper, The Iron Man of Georgia by Mark Cooper Pope III and J. Donald McKee.