Jack County Texas map
33.23° N · 98.17° W · County seat: Jacksboro · 920 sq mi
Jack County holds 8,472 people in 920 square miles of Cross Timbers ranch country west of the Metroplex. Its defining site is Fort Richardson, the northernmost of the federal forts on the post-Civil War frontier line, whose stone buildings still stand on the south edge of Jacksboro.
Centered on Jack County. The pin marks Jacksboro, where US-281 and US-380 cross; Lake Bridgeport lies off the southeastern corner.
Where Jack County is
The county lies in north-central Texas, roughly 60 miles northwest of Fort Worth and 51 miles southeast of Wichita Falls — far enough from both that it belongs to neither metro. Seven counties surround it: Clay north, Montague northeast, Wise east, Parker southeast, Palo Pinto south, Young west and Archer northwest.
The legislature created Jack County out of Cooke County in 1856 and it was organised the following year. The name honours two brothers, Patrick and William Jack, who took part in the Anahuac Disturbance of 1832 and served in the Texas Revolution. This is the Western Cross Timbers — post oak, mesquite and prairie over sandstone, drained by the West Fork of the Trinity and by Lost Creek. Barely 9 of the county's 920 square miles are water. Central Time; 25th congressional district.
Jacksboro and Bryson
| Place | Type | 2020 population |
|---|---|---|
| Jacksboro (county seat) | City | 4,178 |
| Bryson | City | 428 |
Those are the county's only two incorporated places, and together they hold just over half its people. The rest live on ranches and in unincorporated settlements — Antelope, Joplin, Perrin, Postoak — spread along the farm roads. Jacksboro was hit by a tornado in March 2022 that damaged the high school and part of the town.
Roads
- U.S. 281 – the main north–south route, from Mineral Wells up through Jacksboro to Windthorst and Wichita Falls.
- U.S. 380 – the east–west route, from Graham in Young County through Jacksboro east to Bridgeport and Denton. It shares pavement with US-281 through town.
- SH-199 – runs southeast out of Jacksboro through Springtown to Fort Worth; it is the shortest way to the Metroplex.
- SH-114 – heads east from Jacksboro toward Bridgeport and, eventually, DFW Airport.
- SH-59 – north from Jacksboro to Archer City.
- SH-148 – northeast from Jacksboro to Bowie in Montague County.
- Loop 187 – the short bypass around Jacksboro.
No interstate touches Jack County. The nearest are I-20 at Weatherford, about 45 miles southeast, and I-44 at Wichita Falls.
Fort Richardson and the Jacksboro trial
The Army established Fort Richardson just south of Jacksboro in 1867, at the northern end of the line of forts meant to shield the settled counties from raids off the plains. For a decade it was one of the busiest posts in Texas; it was abandoned in 1878 once the frontier had moved west.
In May 1871 a wagon train hauling corn was attacked on Salt Creek Prairie in the western part of the county. General William T. Sherman, then inspecting the frontier forts, had passed over the same road hours earlier and was at Fort Richardson when word arrived. Three Kiowa leaders — Satanta, Satank and Big Tree — were arrested at Fort Sill and sent to Jacksboro for trial. Satank was killed on the way; Satanta and Big Tree were tried in the Jack County courthouse in July 1871, among the first Native American leaders prosecuted in a civilian court in the United States.
Several of the fort's original buildings survive — the hospital, the powder magazine, officers' quarters and the bakery — and the site is now Fort Richardson State Park and Historic Site. A trailway runs south from it to Lost Creek Reservoir, the city's water supply.
Lakes and gas
Lake Bridgeport, impounded on the West Fork of the Trinity in the early 1930s for the Fort Worth water supply, straddles the Jack–Wise county line; the western arms reach into Jack County southeast of Bryson. It was one of the first large reservoirs built in North Texas and remains a busy recreation lake for Metroplex boaters.
Ranching aside, the county's other long-running business is natural gas. Jack County sits over the northwestern end of the Barnett Shale and the older Boonsville field, and drilling booms have periodically reshaped the local tax rolls without changing the population much.