This text was obtained via automated optical character recognition.
It has not been edited and may therefore contain several errors.

---

section of Harrison County was built by J. F. P. Bond and Columbus Ireland. The mill opened early March of 1896. This mill cut the material with which the railroad was built. Following the construction of the railroad, J. F. P.
Bond, Columbus Ireland, E. J. Bond, and Preston bond constructed a larger sawmill on the same site. They later sold the mill to Blackshear and Swanson of Brewton, AL. During the same year, John McMullin built a mill across the railroad and operated it for about a year. Both mills were later sold to John H. Gary, who in the year 1902, sold them to Finkbine Lumber Company, a company made up of a group of Iowa businessmen.
This mill was operated while the new mill was being constructed, about one mile east of the railroad, in the area of present day Stapp Street.
Wiggins was incorporated in March Of 1904, by a petition signed by two-
thirds of the qualified electors residing within the proposed territory. As in
accordance with the law of the state, a proclamation was signed on March
26, 1904 incorporating the municipality of Wiggins in Harrison County.
?t
The first town meeting was held on April 25, 1904 at 7:30 p.m. at the office of E. R. Davis, Justice of the Peace. The meeting was held for the purpose of organizing. It was attended by W. R. Barber, Mayor; J. A. Simpson,
Marshall; C. B. O'Neal, Treasurer; W. H. Rowan, E. I. Bailey, J. M. Price, J. Klumb and W. F. Bond, Aldermen. At this meeting the Governor's proclamation and Town Charter were adopted and spread upon the minutes.
The building for the town jail was proposed at the first regular meeting of the Town Council, May 3, 1904, and a short time afterwards it was built. The jail was 12'x20', it was 10' high and had two rooms. It was to be "well spiked, and substantially constructed." Several years later, as a Halloween prank, enterprising young boys overturned the "substantially constructed" jail. Later it was decided to construct a new town jail.
The first Town Hall, used'as Mayor's and Marshall's office, was the rear room of the second floor of the City Drug Store Building, which was rented from E.
R. Davis, June 28, 1904. The meeting place was changed May 2, 1905 to a room in the rear of the Citizen's Bank Building, on the first floor, formerly occupied by T. J. Walton, Dentist. A lot for Town Hall was purchased later for the sum of $100.
On January 21, 1910, a fire destroyed all the business part and a few residences on the east side of the railroad. The meeting place for the Town