Greenville was established in 1846 as the newly created Hunt County seat. The town was located near the headwaters of the Sabine River on land described at the time as “a great prairie with tall waving grass.” McQuinney H. Wright, a surveyor, land speculator, and early settler donated a 640-acre tract for the new county seat. To the north of this site passed the Central National Road of the former Republic of Texas, which connected Dallas to the Red River. The Missouri, Kansas and Texas (MKT) Extension Railway arrived in Greenville in 1880, and three more railroads followed, making Greenville a prosperous rail town by 1887 and one of the leading cotton-producing centers in the Blackland Prairie. Agriculture still dominates the economy.
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