History:

Lilburn is located in the western part of Gwinnett County, in the state of Georgia. The railroad runs through the old town area and Lawrenceville Highway (Highway 29) is the main corridor of traffic.

Present day Lilburn was inhabited by a tribe of Native American Indians prior to 1817. They were known as the Lower Creeks and lived in the southern part of what is now known as Gwinnett County. They used the area primarily for hunting and located the villages south of the area.

The first cession of Indian land in the present day Lilburn area was in 1818. The government wanted to encourage the settlement of the former Indian lands, the land was surveyed into land districts and surveyed further into numbered land lots. Starting in 1819 Georgia held six land lotteries to promote the settlement of these lands. Qualified participants registered for the lottery to win a numbered land lot. The numbers of the land lots and districts, in which they were located in were taken to the state capitol and placed in a container.

The names of the qualified participants were also brought to the capitol and placed in another container. The land was allocated by drawing a numbered land lot and drawing a name of a qualified participant. When the land lot and a participant were drawn from the containers, that participant held legal title to that land and had all the rights and privileges of ownership. Land lots were two hundred and fifty acres in size. The cost was one dollar to be a participant in the Lottery. The state of Georgia created the forty-second county of Gwinnett on December 19, 1818. Some earlier Land Lottery winners now found themselves in the newly created Gwinnett County. The third land lottery or the land lottery of 1820 pertained to property in Gwinnett County and what is now present day Lilburn.

William McDaniel was the winner of the land lot that present day Lilburn is located. William McDaniel arrived in the area and built his home near what is now the Lawrenceville Highway and Harmony Grove intersection.

In 1823 the first church was created in the area which is the Camp Creek Primitive Baptist and is still active today. Elder James Hale and fourteen members started the church. In 1840 a group left the church and created Liberty Baptist church, which is known as First Baptist Lilburn today. Also in 1840 the Carroll family gave land for slaves in the area to have their own church, Salem Baptist still exist today with a very active and growing church.

In 1839 The Center Academy was created for the education of children living in the area. The exact site is not known, but was apparently located on what is now Lawrenceville Highway within the present day city limits of Lilburn.

During the civil war 1860-1865, there were no major battles fought in the area, however there was a military engagement or skirmish fought at the Yellow River near Five Forks Trickum Road. The Union troops were in the area foraging supplies for Sherman's troops. The Union soldiers encountered resistance at this location and engaged the Confederates. This was the only Civil War activity in the present day Lilburn area.

The Georgia Carolina and Northern Railroad began purchasing property and right of ways for tracks to be laid from Baltimore, Maryland to Atlanta, GA in 1887. Around 1890 they began to purchase property for the present day Lilburn area. The area was called McDaniel, after William McDaniel the land lottery winner. The railroad laid out the streets and built a depot for the town of McDaniel. The Georgia Carolina and Northern Railroad was purchased or taken over by the Seaboard Airline Railway during the construction phase. The first train with passengers came through on April 24, 1892. The community had a depot, telegraph office and several mercantile businesses. Cotton was the base of the local economy with a cotton gin built along Railroad Avenue.

Around 1900 the name was changed to Lilburn, GA. It was named after Lilburn Trigg Myers who was the general superintendent for the Seaboard Airline Railway. Mr. Myers was born in 1857 and died in June 1934. He was not a resident of the area, living most of his life in Richmond, Va. His Obituary reflects that his life was associated with railroad activities. The State of Georgia Incorporated the City of Lilburn on July 27,1910, a mayor and city council were elected, by 1919 the town had grown to include a bank, school, auto dealer, two doctors and about nine merchants.

Among those who lived in the early history of the town were the following families; Carroll, Nash, Jordan, Brownlee, Harmon, Kennerly, McDaniel, Young, Dickens, Pickens, Matthews, Kelley and Garner.

A disastrous fire visited Lilburn in the early morning of November 15, 1920. Frank Garner who lived across the street from the Lilburn Supply Company where the fire apparently originated discovered the fire. The business section was destroyed except for two stores and only the heroic work of the volunteer bucket brigade saved the residence section.

The town was rebuilt but the cotton crop was attacked by the boll weevil and destroyed. The adult boll weevil does some damage but it lays the eggs inside the unripe cotton boll and the young larvae eat their way out ,destroying the cotton boll. Cotton was king and was considered white gold. Big and small farmers relied on the cotton crop. This tiny menacing insect spread from Mexico into the United States about 1898. There was not any defense from this culprit and the economic support for this area was destroyed.

The depression of 1929 also took a heavy toll on the area and the town gradually died. The government organized in 1910 ceased to exist. It is claimed that the people were so quiet, well behaved, orderly and law abiding that there was no need for government. Automobiles gave an alternative to the railroad and the town gradually relocated along Highway 29 creating an old and new Lilburn. Old Lilburn had a few businesses that continued to operate but most of the activity was on the Highway. The need for a water line in 1955 created a new city government and the town began to grown again. In 1976 a new city hall was built in the Old Town area and helped create the growth that we have today.