Hawkins

Hawkins is at the intersection of U.S. Highway 80 and Farm Road 14, on the Missouri Pacific line twenty miles southeast of Quitman in the southeastern corner of Wood County. The town received its post office in 1873, the same year the Texas and Pacific Railway built through on its way to Dallas. The area had been fairly well settled before the railroad's arrival, as it was near the river crossing to Belzora, an early port and stagecoach crossing on the Smith County side of the Sabine River. By 1884 Hawkins was shipping lumber, shingles, livestock, and cotton, and it had a population of 400, five general stores, five steam gristmills and cotton gins, three churches, two hotels, and a district school. By 1890 its population had fallen to around 200, but in 1896 the community reported 500 residents and a newspaper, the Hawkins Banner