Oakdale Map
Oakdale is a town located along the Emory River in Morgan County, Tennessee, United States. The population was 244 at the 2000 census.
For much of the 19th century, Oakdale was known as "Honeycutt," after a pioneer family who settled in the area. In the 1880s, the Cincinnati Southern Railway, which connected Chattanooga and Cincinnati, was built through the area, and the town began to expand. This railroad intersected the vast system of the East Tennessee, Virginia and Georgia Railroad (later the Southern Railway) at nearby Emory Gap.
The stretch of the Cincinnati Southern from Oakdale to Somerset, Kentucky, involves steep grades that were too difficult for normal late-19th and early-20th century steam-powered locomotives, so a railyard was set up at Oakdale where trains were modified to allow them to make the trek north. By the early 1900s, Oakdale had developed into an important railroad stop, with a large hotel (the Babahatchie Inn), depot, and a population of around 2,500. The advent of diesel locomotives, which could handle the steep grades without modifications, eliminated the need for the Oakdale railyard, and the town declined in the mid-20th century.
Nearby cities include Rockwood, Oliver Springs, Sunbright, Crab Orchard, Harriman.