Weakley County, Tennessee

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

County Seat: Dresden
Year Organized: 1823
Square Miles: 580

Court House:

116 West Main Street

Room 106
Dresden, TN 38225-0000

Etymology - Origin of County Name

Named in honor of Robert Weakley (1764-1845), Revolutionary War soldier, state legislator, US congressman, US commissioner to treat with Chickasaws, 1834 Tennessee Constitutional Convention delegate.

Demographics:

County QuickFacts: Census Bureau Quick Facts

History of Weakley County

Created 1823 from Indian lands; named in honor of Robert Weakley (1764-1845), Revolutionary War soldier, state legislator, US congressman, US commissioner to treat with Chickasaws, 1834 Tennessee Constitutional Convention delegate.

Weakley County was formed in 1823 from Indian lands (Acts of Tennessee 1823, Chapter 112).

There was a fire at the Weakley County courthouse in 1948.

Weakley County is located on the Plateau Slope of West Tennessee. The north, middle, and south forks of the Obion River and its tributaries drain the land westward to the Mississippi River. It is bounded on the north by the state of Kentucky, on the east by Henry County, on the south by Carroll and Gibson counties, and on the west by Obion County. Weakley County covers 576 square miles, having lost some of its land to Gibson County in 1837 and to Obion County in 1870.

Weakley County was established October 23, 1823, and named for Robert Weakley II, Speaker of the Tennessee Senate. By early 1825 the organization of the county was completed, and the town of Dresden had been surveyed and platted by Mears Warner to contain a public square and ninety lots. In 1835 the general assembly divided the county into twelve voting districts to elect justices of the peace and constables. By 1843 two new districts had been added.

The first circuit court was held in a log house on the courtyard. It was replaced in 1827 by a brick courthouse. When that structure became too small, it was replaced by a two-story brick structure in 1852. This building was destroyed by fire in 1948 and replaced in 1950 with a four-story building, including basement, constructed of Alabama limestone, designed by the Nashville firm Marr and Holman.

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

Geography

According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the county has a total area of 582 square miles (1,507 km²), of which, 580 square miles (1,503 km²) of it is land and 2 square miles (4 km²) of it (0.28%) is water.

Neighboring Counties:

Graves County, Kentucky (north)
Henry County (east)
Carroll County (southeast)
Gibson County (southwest)
Obion County (west)

Cities and Towns:

- Dresden (County Seat)	town	Incorporated Area
- Gleason	town	Incorporated Area
- Greenfield	city	Incorporated Area
- Martin	city	Incorporated Area
- Sharon	town	Incorporated Area

County Resources:

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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."