Texas County, the largest county in Missouri, covers 998.06 square miles of Ozark Highland with rugged hills, springs, creeks, rivers, and caves. The area was part of the 1808 Osage Indian Land cession. Formally organized on February 14, 1845, and named for the Republic of Texas, it has a county seat laid out in 1846 near the county center and named Houston for the first president of the Texas Republic. Pioneers arrived in the 1820’s from Virginia, Kentucky, Tennessee, and the Carolinas, homesteading fertile valleys, building log cabins, and in some cases establishing sawmills along the Big Piney River. The timber industry has long been vital to the county’s economy, and small family farms have remained an important part of the landscape. During the Civil War, when the populace was predominantly southern, the courthouse was occupied by the Union Army, Houston served as an important stop on the route between federal headquarters in Springfield and Rolla, some skirmishes were fought there, and Confederate soldiers stormed the town and burned every building. Before the courthouse was burned, county records were taken to a cave on Arthurs Creek and were safely returned after the conflict. The first federal census of the county in 1850 counted 2,312 citizens. Early settlers raised their own provisions, hunted and trapped wild game, and sold furs to traveling buyers, while livestock remained limited. In the early 1900’s, farmers grew small crops and kept a few cattle and hogs; later the county became beef and dairy country with some feeder pig production. Social life centered on churches and schools, with gatherings such as hoedowns, candy pullings, corn huskings, barn warmings, quilting bees, and log rolling, while arts, crafts, church activities, auctions, musicals, square dancing, sports, fishing, floating the rivers, and hunting continued to shape community life. Education remained important as rural one-room schools disappeared and students were transported to ten school districts, with college courses offered in local communities. In the county’s northwest, some 48,000 acres became part of Mark Twain National Forest, and several acres in the southeast became part of Ozark National Scenic Riverways Park. Incorporated communities include Cabool, Houston, Licking, parts of Summersville and Mountain Grove, and Raymondville. The 1990 federal census counted 21,476 citizens, and the county’s rural environment, schools, churches, hunting, fishing, community spirit, businesses, industry, and natural beauty made it a desirable place to live and retire.