Towns Histories

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Histories Of Our Towns

Jonesville - Jonesville was once a cotton community, and is humorously known as one of those "wide spots", but the wonderful T.C. Lindsey General Store will take you back to the turn of the century and manages to keep Jonesville a tourist spot. The Post Office was established under the name of Border on January 18, 1848. The name of the Post Office was changed to Joneville on November 13, 1849, named for a man named William Jones who established the first store in 1849. A Napoleon Jones was Postmaster in 1857. The original Trading Post operator William Jones moved it in 1874 to take advantage of the railroad. (The Trading Post or store was in existence before 1849 at Old Border.) In 1868 Jonesville moved 1 1/2 miles south, then in 1874 it moved to present location.

Marshall - The city was founded in 1841. By 1850, it was the seventh largest city in Texas; and in the 1860 census, Marshalll had risen to fourth largest - in the most prosperous county in the state. After the Civil War, the town became known as the "GATEWAY TO TEXAS" when the Texas and Pacific Railroad provided transcontinetal railway service to the west. Marshall's renaissance was due largely to the vast expansion of the T & P Railroad operations, which brought an enormous influx of new settlers and railroad employees, including many skilled craftsmen and artisans for the railroad's sprawling shops. As builders of fine public and private rail cars, they had beautiful raw materials readily available to build homes. Those opportunities and influences are apparent throughout a tour of Marshall, Texas.

Scottsville - Scottsville, on Farm roads 1998 and 2199, four miles east of Marshall in east central Harrison County, was named after its founder, William Thomas Scott, who moved to Texas from Louisiana in 1840. In 1840 Scott's slaves built his lavish plantation home, reputedly identical to Jefferson Davis's Mississippi mansion. Scottsville's white schoolchildren attended classes in the small schoolhouse that Scott had built; it was staffed with the Scott family governess. The Scotts also established the first church in the community, a Methodist congregation. During the Civil War the Scott plantation provided provisions for Confederate troops. On August 4, 1869, Scottsville was granted a post office. Its population was reported as 300 in 1929, as 50 during the Great Depression, and as around 260 by 1950, a total that remained fairly steady into the 1980s. In the early 1990s Scottsville, which still had its post office, was an incorporated community and reported 287 residents and eleven businesses.

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