The Alabama-Coushatta story in Polk County reaches beyond the reservation map

The Alabama and Coushatta peoples took different paths into the land now called Texas. They then built a shared home in the Big Thicket. The Tribe dates that move to before 1780. Its history also tells of both peoples helping settlers and Sam Houston's army during the Texas Revolution.

Texas bought Polk County land for the Alabama people in 1854. The Coushatta joined them there in 1859. That land grew into an 11,000-acre reservation east of Livingston. More than 1,400 tribal citizens carry the Alabama-Coushatta name today.

The federal government ended its formal tie with the Tribe in 1954. Congress restored that status in 1987. The reservation is more than a point on US 190. It is a home held through changing laws and many generations.

Lake Tombigbee Campground is one place where visitors meet that living homeland. The Tribe runs it and keeps the current stay and visitor details on its own site.