Turney

Turney is on Farm Road 22 eight miles north of Rusk in central Cherokee County. The area was settled before the Civil War, but a community did not develop until the early 1900s, when the Texas and New Orleans Railroad was built through the area. A post office was established in 1903 and named for J. A. Turney, a pioneer settler. In its early years the town was a shipping center for tomatoes and other produce. By 1914 Turney had a grocery, a produce-box factory, a general store, several packing sheds, and a population of seventy-five. It continued to prosper during the 1920s, and as late as the mid-1930s it reported five businesses and 100 residents. In the years after World War II all its businesses closed, and by 1990 only a community center and a few scattered houses remained. That year the reported population was 100.