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Washington Counties
 Click Image to Enlarge Washington CountiesThere are 39 counties in the state of Washington. Washington was carved out of the western part of Washington Territory and admitted to the Union as the 42nd state in 1889. The first counties were created from unorganized territory in 1845. |
Whitman County, WashingtonWhitman County History, Geography, Demographics, Cities and Towns, and Education
Etymology - Origin of County NameMarcus Whitman, a Presbyterian missionary who was killed by members of the Cayuse Native American tribe. Demographics:County QuickFacts: Census Bureau Quick Facts County HistoryWhitman County was created 29 November 1871 from Stevens County Whitman County, located in southeastern Washington, has a population of 40,740 (2000 Census) and a land area of 2,159
square miles. The county was formed on November 29, 1871, and is named after Marcus Whitman, the missionary killed
(along with his wife and other followers) by Cayuse in 1847. Whitman County is in the Palouse country, and is bordered
by Spokane County to the north (and a small part of Lincoln County at its northwest corner), by Adams County to the west
(and a small part of Franklin County at its southwest corner), by the Snake River to the south, and by the Idaho state
line to the east. The county has a primarily agricultural history, with an emphasis on wheat (today it ranks first in
wheat production among Washington counties and second among counties in the nation); it was also known for its fruit
orchards along the Snake River before the 1970s, when lakes inundated them upon completion of the Little Goose and Lower
Granite dams. Although agriculture remains significant, today higher education plays a larger role: Washington State
University (WSU), located in Pullman, reported 18,690 students enrolled on the Pullman campus in 2005 and is the single
largest employer in the county. Pullman, with a population in 2000 of 24,675 (which includes WSU's student population),
is the largest town in Whitman County. The county seat, Colfax, recorded a population of 2,844 in the 2000 Census. GeographyAccording to the U.S. Census Bureau, the county has a total area of 2,178 square miles (5,640 kmē), of which,
2,159 square miles (5,593 kmē) of it is land and 18 square miles (47 kmē) of it (0.84%) is water. It is part of the
Palouse, a wide and rolling prairie-like region of the middle Columbia basin. Neighboring Counties:
Cities and Towns:
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." |
