Segno

Segno is on Farm roads 943 and 2798, south and west of the Big Sandy Creek and Menard Creek corridors of the Big Thicket National Preserve and sixty-four miles northwest of Beaumont in south central Polk County. Henry S. Knight, an early settler, named the community. One source attributes the name to that of a musical sign, the segno. Another argues that Knight named the town after an Indian named Sego, and that later residents altered the original name to Segno. In any event Segno was the center of scattered plantations until the late nineteenth century, when the lumber industry in Polk County, spurred by railroad development, became increasingly important. Like many small Polk County agricultural communities, Segno eventually had its own sawmill, in this case owned by the Harrison Lumber Company. A school, called Magnolia Hill, was established in the early 1900s. The Segno post office opened in 1911. After a brief period of growth, many residents left Segno, which by 1925 had declined to an estimated population of ten. Oil was discovered at the Segno field, eight miles southeast of the community, in 1936. Though newer discoveries of oil and natural gas have not proved as profitable as the early finds, continued interest in the area has proved important to the Segno community, which by 1941 had grown to eighty persons. Through 2000 the population was still estimated at eighty.