Mount Vernon, AL

Mount Vernon occupies the northeast corner of Mobile County, with U.S. 43 running past the town toward Mobile to the south and Jackson to the north. It joined the incorporated towns of Alabama in 1959, and its place in the Mobile metro is still shaped by that road corridor and the Mobile River country nearby. The big historical marker here is the Mount Vernon Arsenal and Searcy Hospital complex, a military and medical site whose buildings hold several chapters of Alabama history.

ATTRhttps://www.loc.gov/pictures/item/al0387.photos.005706p / Public domain

Mount Vernon Arsenal was established as a federal military post in the early 1800s, and the property later became Searcy Hospital, a state psychiatric facility opened in 1902. The complex also housed Apache prisoners in the late nineteenth century, giving the site a story that reaches well beyond the town. Local preservation groups have kept attention on the remaining buildings and the McCafferty House, while Mobile County Public Schools serves local students through North Mobile County K-8 near Axis. Mount Vernon's local map is a highway town wrapped around a historic campus and river landscape.