Samuel Smith Homesite

Duane's take

Here's the story as the official marker tells it, my own way of passing it along to you. Now settle in, because this one starts clear across the ocean and ends right here in the piney woods of Cherokee County. Samuel Smith was born in Switzerland in 1800.

Switzerland. And somehow, the road of his life wound all the way to the red dirt of East Texas. He came to Knox County, Tennessee, at the age of nineteen, and he put down roots there for a good long while.

In 1823, he married Oney Karnes. Four years after that, he received his United States citizenship. A Swiss-born man, now an American, building a life in Tennessee with his wife and, in time, seven children.

You might think that was the whole story. It wasn't even close. In 1849, Samuel and Oney Smith packed up six of those seven children and joined a group of immigrants from North Carolina and Tennessee who were heading somewhere new.

They journeyed to Texas, and together that group founded the town of Knoxville in northeast Cherokee County. Now, once they arrived, the Smiths didn't just settle in town. They purchased land three miles southwest of Knoxville, out in a place called the Blackjack community.

And in 1859, Samuel built a farmhouse right at this site. That homestead stayed in the family until 1874. But what the Smiths built out here was bigger than one farmhouse on a few acres.

Members of the family deeded land for a church and a cemetery. They operated the first blacksmith shop in the settlement. And when the International and Great Northern Railroad came through the area in 1872, the Smith family was right there, connected to that too.

Samuel Smith died in 1873, just one year after that railroad arrived. He'd come from Switzerland, crossed an ocean and half a continent, and left his mark on a corner of Cherokee County that still carries the shape of what he helped build. The marker is right here.

The land is right here. And now you know who put down roots in it first.

What the marker says

Samuel Smith (1800-1873), a native of Switzerland, came to Knox County, Tennessee, at the age of 19. In 1823, he married Oney Karnes and received his United States citizenship four years later. In 1849, the Smiths joined a group of immigrants from North Carolina and Tennessee who journeyed to Texas and founded the town of Knoxville in northeast Cherokee County. Samuel and Oney Smith brought six of their seven children with them to Texas. They purchased land three miles southwest of Knoxville in the Blackjack community. Smith built a farmhouse at this site in 1859, and the homestead remained in the family until 1874. As the patriarch of a family that made significant contributions to the rural Blackjack community, Samuel Smith is an important figure in the context of northeastern Cherokee County history. Members of the Smith family deeded land for the church and cemetery, operated the first blacksmith shop in the settlement, and were associated with the International and Great Northern Railroad when it came through the area in 1872.