Pouppeville

Two names mark the railroad's arrival on this stretch of prairie. Pouppeville was a settlement named for a local merchant, and when the Southern Pacific came through in the 1880s the town that grew beside the tracks took a new name, Rayne, in honor of an engineer on the line. Accounts identify him as Rayne Grey. The railroad brought commerce and a diverse population. The settlement's church made the trip to the tracks too, on wheels.

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Vermilionville — 16 mi
  A living-history village of about 23 acres on Bayou Vermilion in Lafayette, opened in 1990 to interpret the Native peoples, Acadians, Creoles and people of African descent of the Attakapas region.
• Prairie Acadian Cultural Center — 21 mi
  A National Park Service center in Eunice on the Cajun prairie, with exhibits on the Acadians who settled the prairies, a Courir de Mardi Gras display, free music and cooking demonstrations, and the shuttered Liberty Theatre nearby.
• Cypress Island Preserve at Lake Martin — 22 mi
  Nearly 10,000 acres of bottomland hardwood and cypress-tupelo swamp at the south end of Lake Martin, owned by The Nature Conservancy, with a boardwalk and a rookery of egrets, spoonbills and alligators.
• Louisiana Oil and Gas Park — 24 mi
  The roadside park at Jennings where Louisiana's oil industry began in 1901, with a replica derrick, a pioneers' plaque and Gator Chateau.

More markers nearby

• Louisiana Frog Company — 0.3 mi
• St. Joseph's Catholic Church & Cemetery — 0.5 mi
• Jacques Weil Company — 0.7 mi
• Rayne Depot Square — 0.8 mi