Linden

Linden, the county seat of Cass County, is at the junction of U.S. Highway 59, State highways 8 and 155, and Farm roads 125, 1399 and 1841, twelve miles southwest of Atlanta in the south central portion of the county. It was established in 1852 after a redivision of territory had given the old county seat, Jefferson, to Marion County. The townsite was laid out by a Major Wood, who named it for his former home in Tennessee. A post office opened in 1852. The first business, a saw plant for hand-sawed lumber, was established by T. J. Foster on contract to build a two-story frame courthouse. Tanyards and syrup mills were the other early industries. A school was in operation by 1856. The weekly Cass County Sun began publication in 1875, using a George Washington press of 1853 that had been used in Shreveport, Louisiana, and that had been sunk in the Red River to prevent its falling into the hands of federal soldiers in 1864. By 1885 Linden had 300 residents, two churches, a district school, several sawmills, and a number of general stores. The pine and hardwood trees of the area were in great demand for building new towns in the Red River valley. The lumber boom reached its peak around 1890. Linden continued to grow, and by the early 1930s it was incorporated, with 1,000 residents and forty-five rated businesses. The onset of the Great Depression forced many businesses to close, and in 1936 Linden had only thirty-five rated businesses. After World War II the community rebounded and grew slowly but steadily. By the mid-1960s it had 1,950 residents. In 1991, 2,439 residents were reported there. The number of businesses decreased from sixty-five in 1966 to thirty-eight in 1991. In the early 1990s the economy centered on farming, lumber, and oil. By 2000 the population was 2,256 with 152 businesses.