Alamance County was created when Orange County was partitioned in 1849. Early settlers included several groups of Quakers, many of which remain active in the Snow Camp area, German farmers, and Scots-Irish immigrants. Alamance County, where Burlington is located, is the site of several skirmishes that were part of the American Revolution. These include the War of Regulation which took place prior to the actual Revolution, when citizens rebelled against the corrupt British Colonial Government, the Battle of Lindley's Mill, the Battle of Clapp's Mill, and Pyle's Defeat.

The Holt family was a large part in building several different textile mills in Burlington and the surrounding areas. These textile mills provided much of the economic base on which the county would grow.

The need of the North Carolina Railroad in the 1850s to locate land where they could build, repair and do maintenance on its track was the genesis of Burlington, North Carolina. The Company selected a piece of land slightly west of present day Graham, North Carolina.

When the shops were finally completed in 1857, the village had grown to twenty-seven buildings. Thirty-nine white men, twenty Negro slaves and two free Negroes were employed in or around the shops. The employees and their families needed to live within walking distance; hence, a town began to develop. The town was called “Company Shops”.

Sale of town lots soon started, but not surprisingly, the sale of lots was slow until after the Civil War. By 1864, Company Shops numbered about 300 persons.

In 1886, the North Carolina Railroad Company transferred its operations to Manchester, Virginia. The railroad offices and shops at Company Shops were closed. With the railroad shops no longer operated there, the citizens of Company Shops decided a new name was needed. In February 1887 a committee of the town’s leading citizens selected “Burlington”.

The city of Burlington was incorporated on February 14, 1893.

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