Linden, TX

Linden is the Cass County seat in northeast Texas, established in 1852 after an earlier county-seat arrangement put Jefferson in the newly formed Marion County. Major Wood laid out the townsite and named it for his former home in Tennessee; the post office opened that same year. The first business was a hand-sawed lumber plant building a two-story frame courthouse, and sawmills, tanyards, and syrup mills followed. U.S. 59 runs along the east side, connecting Linden with Atlanta to the northeast and Jefferson to the south. That gives Linden a very East Texas shape: courthouse work at the center, timber in the backstory, and a highway carrying the long view.