DUANE
Duane's take
The way the marker tells it, here's the story of Franklin County, and I'm just along for the ride. Now, some counties come into being with a lot of fuss and fanfare, and some just arrive quiet and ready to work. Franklin County did it the second way — carved right out of Titus County, created on March 8, 1875, and organized just fifty-three days later on April 30, 1875.
That's not dragging your feet. That's a county that knew what it wanted to be. But here's where the story gets interesting, because every county worth its salt has a name, and this one carries a name with some real weight behind it.
Benjamin C. Franklin. Born in 1805, died in 1873.
A hero of San Jacinto — and if you know anything about Texas, you know that those three words are not handed out lightly. That was the fight, the one that changed everything, and Benjamin C. Franklin stood in the middle of it.
But the battlefield was only part of his story. He went on to serve as a district judge of the Republic of Texas — the Republic, mind you, back when Texas was its own sovereign nation — and he sat in the Legislature too. That's a man who gave his whole self to this place, in war and then in law.
So when the time came to give this stretch of East Texas land an identity, they reached for a name that meant something. Mt. Vernon sits at the heart of it all as the county seat, steady and planted, the way a county seat ought to be.
Franklin County — formed in 1875, named for a man who'd already given Texas everything he had.
What the marker says
Formed from Titus County, created March 8, 1875; organized April 30, 1875. Named in honor of Benjamin C. Franklin, 1805-1873, hero of San Jacinto, district judge of the Republic of Texas, member of the Legislature. Mt. Vernon, county seat. (1936)