History:

In December 1864 as William Sherman moved in on Savannah, he found that even though a scant ten miles away, he still has "miles and miles to go before he sleeps, for he had promises to keep". You see, General Sherman promised to "give Savannah to President Lincoln for a Christmas present", and Christmas was fast approaching. Thus it was that group of harassed Yankees that pitched a camp astride the Central of Georgia Railway at Pooler Station that cold December 9, 1864. Sherman stepped out of his headquarters tent, 300 yards west of the station and peered down the long, straight stretch of rails into the very heart of this seaside city of Savannah, which he was besieging. There were perhaps less than 200 war-wearied souls in this lonely, impoverished community of Pooler and neither they nor the General could envision the Pooler that is in existence today.

Pooler was named after Robert William Pooler in 1838. Mr. Pooler was a very civic-minded resident of Savannah and worked for the Central of Georgia Railroad. Mr. William W. Gordon, President of the Central of Georgia, named the first station west of Savannah after this hard working young man of whom he was very proud. Mr. Pooler had worked long and hard to establish a "feasibility study" of the venture in the towns and counties through which a proposed railroad would extend. Mr. Gordon and Mr. Pooler were both graduate law and engineering students, both born the same year, 1796, and each took a prominent part in the civic and military affairs of Savannah. Mr. Pooler never lived in the community named after him, and died on Christmas Day, 1853, at his residence on Bull and Liberty Streets in Savannah, and was buried in Colonial Cemetery, but later his body was interred in Laurel Grove Cemetery.

For several decades, this young community, and in fact all of Georgia, was dazed and stunned by the shock of the Civil War. Gradually, the South caught its breath in a new birth. About 1883, Mr. Ben Rothwell, bought several hundred acres in the community pioneered in a new method of community development by giving free lots to builders of permanent homes. Dan Newton built the first Baptist Church in Pooler in what is now known as Gleason Park. He also built a Presbyterian Church, which survived only a few years, and gave lumber for Pooler’s First Methodist Church. A sawmill was built to supply lumber to homebuilders and the embryonic community began to take shape. The brickyard supplied other needed materials and dairies soon found a ready market. Remains of the brickyard can be found near the railroad tracks just south of what is now I-95.