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Texas Counties

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Texas Counties

Texas is divided into 254 counties, more than any other U.S. state Texas was originally divided into municipalities, a unit of local government under Spanish and Mexican rule. When the Republic of Texas gained its independence in 1836, there were 23 municipalities, which became the original Texas counties. Many of these would later be divided into new counties. The most recent county to be created was Kenedy County in 1921. The most recent county to be organized was Loving County in 1931

Shackelford County, Texas

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

County Seat: Albany
Year Organized: 1858
Square Miles: 914

Court House:

P.O. Box 1614
County Courthouse
Albany, TX 76430-1614

Etymology - Origin of County Name

Jack Shackelford, a soldier of the Texas Revolution

Demographics:

County QuickFacts: Census Bureau Quick Facts

County History

Shackelford County is a county located in the U.S. state of Texas. Its county seat is Albany. The county is northeast of Abilene, the seat of Taylor County. Shackelford is named for Dr. John Shackelford, a Virginia physician who equipped soldiers at his own expense to fight in the Texas Revolution. Shackelford outfitted his troops in red uniforms, and they came to be called the "Shackelford Reds." Historic Fort Griffin, established in 1867, lies within Shackelford County.

Below the hill on which Fort Griffin was constructed, the civilian community of Fort Griffin, commonly called the Flat or Hidetown, developed. This community served as a marketplace and supply point for buffalo^qv hunters and as a watering place for soldiers, hunters, and trail hands driving cattle over the Western Trail,^qv which crossed the Clear Fork nearby. The combination of buffalo hunters, soldiers, and cowboys, mixed with Indians from the nearby Tonkawa camp, was volatile, and law enforcement was erratic. The long trip to the county court in Jack County to do jury duty or deal with legal matters was hazardous; so in 1874 residents of the area petitioned the county court of Jack County for permission to organize their own county. The new county was named in honor of Dr. Jack Shackelford,^qv a Texas revolutionary hero. Fort Griffin became the temporary county seat on October 12, 1874. On November 8 of that year the founders of the county called an election to determine the permanent location, and thus Albany-named by William R. Cruger^qv for his hometown, Albany, Georgia-was founded. In 1884 the county finished construction of a courthouse, built of limestone quarried a few miles southwest of Albany. The structure still functions in its original capacity, and in 1962 was recorded as a Texas Historical Landmark. The county's population peaked at 6,695 in 1930, dropped to 3,323 by 1970, then climbed back to the 1980 figure of 3,915. Of the 1980 population 3,761 were white (including 211 Hispanics), 36 black, 6 Indian (in 1884 the federal government moved the Tonkawa Indians to Indian Territory), 4 Asian, and 108 of other origins. Of these residents, 2,450 lived in Albany; the remainder were in Lueders (which is partly in Jones County), Moran, and Spring Creek, or on farms and ranches. In 1990 Shackelford County had 3,316 inhabitants

More at Handbook of Texas Online, s.v. "," http://www.tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/SS/hcs8.html (accessed November 9, 2008).

Geography

According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the county has a total area of 916 square miles (2,371 km²), of which, 914 square miles (2,367 km²) of it is land and 2 square miles (4 km²) of it (0.17%) is water.

Neighboring Counties:

Throckmorton County (north)
Stephens County (east)
Eastland County (southeast)
Callahan County (south)
Jones County (west)
Haskell County (northwest)

Cities and Towns:

- Albany (County Seat)	city	Incorporated Area
- Moran	city	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."