Washington County, Tennessee

Washington County History, Geography, Demographics, Cities and Towns, and Education

County Seat: Jonesborough
Year Organized: 1777
Square Miles: 326

Court House:

P.O. Box 219
County Courthouse
Jonesborough, TN 37659-0219

Etymology - Origin of County Name

Named in honor of George Washington (1732-1799), member of the Virginia House of Burgesses and the Continental Congress, Revolutionary War commander unanimously elected first US president.

Demographics:

County QuickFacts: Census Bureau Quick Facts

History of Washington County

Created 1777 by Act of North Carolina; named in honor of George Washington (1732-1799), member of the Virginia House of Burgesses and the Continental Congress, Revolutionary War commander unanimously elected first US president.

Washington County was formed in 1777 by Act of North Carolina
(Laws of North Carolina 1777, Chapter 31).

There was a fire at the Washington County courthouse in 1839.

Established by the North Carolina legislature in November 1777, Washington County came from western territory known as the Washington District. This first county included the whole territory within the boundaries of what would become Tennessee. Jonesborough, the first town in Tennessee, was selected as county seat, and in 1779, construction began on a log courthouse covered with clapboards.

Hunters came early to Washington County. Daniel Boone left tangible evidence of his hunting forays in the Boones Creek area, where settlers found a tree that bore the inscription, "D Boon cilled a bar on tree 1760." William Bean and his family became the first permanent white settlers in Tennessee in 1768-69. Jacob Brown, who migrated from South Carolina to trade with the Cherokee Indians, later bought from the Indians thousands of acres of land on the Nolichucky River in 1775.

Find more from the Tennessee Encyclopedia of History and Culture: WASHINGTON COUNTY

Geography

According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the county has a total area of 330 square miles (854 km²), of which, 326 square miles (845 km²) of it is land and 3 square miles (9 km²) of it (1.06%) is water.

Neighboring Counties:

Sullivan County (north)
Carter County (east)
Unicoi County (south)
Greene County (west)
Hawkins County (northwest)

Cities and Towns:

- Johnson City	city	Incorporated Area
- Jonesborough (County Seat)	town	Incorporated Area

County Resources:

Enter County Resources and Information Here

County Resources

The history of our nation was a prolonged struggle to define the relative roles and powers of our governments: federal, state, and local. And the names given the counties, our most locally based jurisdictions, reflects the "characteristic features of this country!"

But age, size and colorful names of our counties isn't the only reason to explore counties' role in American history, or the history of county government itself. In fact, the story of county government reflects the larger meanings of American history.

Today's counties are the most flexible, locally responsive and creative governments in the US. They are the most diverse, varying in size, population, geography, and governmental structure. In their politics and policies, they express a 1990's political slogan "Think globally, act locally."