Originally known as Hardenbergh's Corners in the town of Aurelius, the settlement was renamed Auburn in 1805 when it became the county seat.The name Auburn resonated with the opening lines of Oliver Goldsmith's then-familiar poem "The Deserted Village" (1770): "Sweet Auburn, loveliest village of the plain, Where health and plenty cheered the labouring swain." It became an incorporated village in 1815, and was chartered as a city in 1848. It was only a few miles from the Erie Canal, which opened in 1825 and allowed local factories to inexpensively ship goods north or south. In 1871, the Southern Central Railroad, financed by the Lehigh Valley Railroad, completed a line primarily to carry anthracite coal from Athens, Pennsylvania through Auburn to wharves on Lake Ontario at Fair Haven.
