Diboll, TX

Diboll grew up around a sawmill, a railroad, and the pine woods of southern Angelina County. Thomas L.L. Temple opened the Southern Pine Lumber Company here in 1894 on the Houston, East and West Texas Railway, and the town took the name of timber salesman J.C. Diboll. The 2020 census counted 4,457 residents. For decades the lumber company shaped the town's daily map, with mill houses, a commissary, a post office, a station, and jobs clustered around the woods and tracks. That timber story is still the town's main thread, even as Diboll has moved beyond one company.

The old tram rail system once carried logs through the forest, while US 59 now runs north to Lufkin and south toward Houston. Diboll Independent School District keeps the local map centered, and the nearby Angelina County Airport adds another regional connection. Diboll is an East Texas mill town with a company-town past, a working forest landscape, and a highway that keeps the Piney Woods close.