[kuelli]

http://www.city-data.com/city/Oakland-Alabama.html

Unlike most people in this section of the forum, I don't live in Alabama and I'm not looking to move there right now either. Actually, I am way on the other side of the country -- in CA. I am going into my senior year at Harvard University in the fall, but for the time being I am spending summer at home with my family in Berkeley. As a summer job, I have been interning at a very small nonprofit consulting firm in Oakland, and right now am working on a project that requires me to find out fun or interesting information about all the other US towns/cities/boroughs/counties named Oakland. The company I work for would like to display these factoids on invitations to our annual winter holiday party. It has not been easy to find this kind of information on the many Oaklands with populations of 1000 or less, but I'm slogging through, very slowly at least.

My question for you in the Alabama set though is this: does an Oakland, Alabama actually exist? City-data seems to think it does (see link above), but I can't really find any other record of it. Most notably, it is not listed on the US Census Bureau website. Are there any locals out there who might be able to clear this up for me?

Thanks so much for your time,
Kuelli

[BobRoberts]

Using MS Streets and Trips I find two Oaklands in AL.
They being at poinds #1 and #2.

[Keeper]

According to the search I did for you.. there are people on myspace live in Oakland AL. it is in Chambers County.. so you might try calling them as their website leaves a lot to be desired

[kuelli]

well, I know there are neighborhoods in Alabama named Oakland, but I'm wondering if there is a more official town. when I start getting into the neighborhoods it becomes hard to draw the line (there are 8,722,374 (not literally, but you get the idea) things/ people/places in the US named Oakland), so I'm trying to keep it clean with officially-designated towns. the myspace lead is a possibility. I'm not quite sure what to say to these people, but I'll give it a shot. maybe they can answer for me!

thanks for the help both.

[Southlander]

There's no Oakland at #1 point.
Online maps are not always right.

[BobRoberts]

It's the one that the OP posted a link to on city-data, it's hard to tell exactly where it is from such a wide view map. I'm not using an online map.

[Keeper]

OK.. I lied.. it is in Lauderdale county.. I checked the AL website and found this..http://lauderdalecountyonline.com/Mu...es/biglaud.jpg
now it is not a city apparently as it is not listed as a city but is on the map from the city..

[harry chickpea]

There is a huge amount of confusion in Alabama on place names. The locals know an area by the historical names, the post office by other names, and mapmakers by some combination. There are a number of locations in Alabama with the duplicate names, and situations where the postal address is misleading. I live in an area that is considered one town by the county, my mailing adress is to a different town in an adjoining county, and the locals know the area by yet another name. Sometimes I wonder where I live.

Oakland in Lauderdale County (not Limestone as city-data had it) is likely a historical name of the area that was passed over by the post office and county officials. For fun, if you are into searching the database, there are adjoining towns in another county called Guin and Gu-Win. Makes me ponder what kind of feud started that?

[Threestep]

Census State Data Centers
Alabama Historical Association
Good sources to rummage around, call, email ...


http://209.85.165.104/search?q=cache:JmTosHaQ7FcJ:www.aircraftone.com/aircraft/accidents/20001212X20194.asp+oakland+al&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=16& gl=us&lr=lang_en|lang_de

FAA records tend to be pretty accurate. This 1999 single airplane fender bender gives Oakland AL with a non-public airstrip (someones backyard) and a Florence AL zipcode. Call Florence AL tax assessor's office and chit-chat. Fire department is an other option in rural communities. Make sure you point out this is not an emergency. I would not tell them about teh Christmas cards but play along the line of "small towns with same name ...".

[kuelli]

Harry Chickpea: that just might be the explanation. most of the other Oaklands are pretty cut and dry (besides sometimes taking 2 hours to find a town's website), but I've had a hard time coming up with a simple answer when it comes to Alabama. Perhaps that alone will be my interesting fact -- that the locals continue to call their hometown Oakland, even though the Census Bureau has moved on! I'll look into it. And haha, the creation of Guin and Gu-Win surely has an interesting story to it...

Threestep: Thanks a lot for the advice. With some of these places, I think it really will come down to calling the local librarian and asking if they know of anything or anyone. Small place like that, mustn't be hard to remember.