How Each State Got Its Shape

> Population: 4,887,871
> Size (square miles): 50,645
> Capital: Montgomery
> Founded: Dec. 14, 1819 (22nd state to join)
> Famous landmarks: Edmund Pettus Bridge

Alabama's boundaries were created in colonial times. In March 1663, King Charles II of England created the Carolina colony out of the larger colony of Virginia and placed the southern limit of the new colony at the 31st parallel, now Alabama's southern boundary with Florida. Georgia was created out of the Carolina colony, and Alabama would emerge from Georgia. Alabama got access to the Gulf of Mexico in 1804, the year after the Louisiana Purchase. That was when the U.S. announced that the area between the Mississippi River and the Perdido River in what was part of what had been called West Florida -- and was owned by Spain -- was claimed by the United States. That area that bordered the Gulf of Mexico would become part of southern Alabama.