Whistler, Alabama, was an unincorporated community in Mobile County, until the 1950s when it was annexed into neighboring Prichard. The founding of Whistler, in the 1850s, coincided with construction of the Mobile and Ohio Railroad. The M & O, an early land grant railroad, eventually extended from Mobile to the Ohio River, and beyond to Saint Louis, Missouri, and Chicago, Illinois. The town, 7 miles north-northwest of Mobile, developed around the M & O shops. Whistler was named for famous railroad construction engineer and West Point Military graduate, George Washington Whistler, who was father of James McNeill Whistler.