Texas Piney Woods Realty - Area Information

Avinger Texas

Cass County, East Texas
Highways 49 and 155
16 miles NW of Jefferson
32 miles NW of Marshall
36 miles NE of Longview
29 miles SE of Atlanta
54 miles SW of Texarkana
36 miles SE of Mount Pleasant

A settlement called Hickory Hill was nearby in the early 1840s. A post office opened there in 1848 and the East Line and Red River Railroad arrived in 1876. A station was built where Avinger would later appear.

The businesses from Hickory Hill stared relocating to be near the rails and by 1877 even the post office moved. Dr. H. J. Avinger, who also operated a store, had the town renamed in his honor. The population was 100 by 1892 and by 1914 it was estimated to be 500.

Eagle Landing Lake

Prior to the Great Depression, the town was up to 700 which declined to 450 through the 1930s. The Lone Star Steel Plant was built just west of town during World War II. In 1949 the town renewed itself by rebuilding its infrastructure and paving its streets. A new high school was built as well as a water and sewer system.

The population peaked at 750 people in 1960. The 1990 Census reported 478 people which has remained at about that level in 2000.

Wildflowers in Avinger, TX.

Northeast Texas

Northeast Texas is a region in the northeast corner of the U.S. state of Texas. It is geographically centered around two metropolitan areas strung along Interstate 20: Tyler in the west and Longview/Marshall to the east. Clarksville, Mount Pleasant, Greenville, Paris and Texarkana in the north and the Nacogdoches/Lufkin area, Jacksonville and Palestine to the south are also major cities within the region. Most of Northeast Texas is included in the inter-state region of the Arklatex.

Its climate is warmer and wetter than most of Texas and its geography is more hilly and forested. Its culture is similar to that of Southeast Texas, but does not have as much of a Cajun influence. Many of the largest cities in Northeast Texas still follow a rural Southern way of life, especially in dialect, mannerisms, religion, and cuisine.

The geography is composed mainly of the Piney Woods, a mixed forest of deciduous and conifer flora. The Piney woods cover 23,500 square miles (60,900 km²) of gently rolling or hilly forested land. These woods are part of a much larger region of pine-hardwood forest that extends into Louisiana, Arkansas, and Oklahoma. Northeast Texas lies within the Gulf Coastal Plain and receives more rainfall, 35 to 50 inches (890 to 1270 mm), than the rest of Texas.The Sabine River is the major river in Northeast Texas, and flows through Longview and several other cities. The Red River also flows through the region and forms the northern border with Oklahoma and a portion of Arkansas. In Northeast Texas and the rest of the South, small rivers and creeks collect into swamps called "bayous" and merge with the surrounding forest. Bald cypress and Spanish moss are the dominant plants in bayous. The most famous of these bayous in Northeast Texas is the Cypress Bayou surrounding the Big, Little, and Black Cypress rivers around Jefferson. They flow east into Caddo Lake and the adjoining wetlands cover the rim and islands of the lake.

Culturally Northeast Texas is more closely akin to Arkansas, Louisiana, and even Mississippi than it is with West Texas. Northeast Texas is in the Bible Belt creating a strong Fundamentalist Christian sentiment. Though 35 percent of Texas's population is now Hispanic, African-Americans are still the most populous minority in Northeast Texas. During the Civil Rights Movement several communities clashed over integration. In presidential elections since 1950 both Smith County (County-seat Tyler), and Gregg County (County-seat Longview) have been reliably Republican.

Much of modern Northeast Texas culture has its roots in traditions that go back for generations.First Monday Trade Days is a monthly flea market held in Canton, Texas. The market is actually held on the Thursday through Sunday preceding the first Monday of each month. It purports to be the largest and oldest continually operated flea market in the United States, and is a highly popular event in the area.

The East Texas Oil Museum, located on the campus of Kilgore College in Kilgore, Texas. This fascinating museum houses the authentic re-creation of oil discovery and production in the early 1930s from the largest oil field inside U.S. boundaries.

Tyler, Texas has a rich culture and has been nicknamed the "Rose Capital of America" because of its large role in the rose-growing industry; about 20% of commercial rose bushes produced in the U.S. are grown in Tyler and Smith County and more than half of the rose bushes are packaged and shipped from the area. It boasts the nation's largest municipal rose garden and hosts the Texas Rose Festival each October, which draws more than 100,000 spectators annually.